46 BRITONS V. GERMANS IN CHINA Banking interests in China; also the best Insurance offices are British. We are, after the Chinese themselves, the largest property owners in China. Even Americans would admit we have "some elegant trade propositions" out in Far Cathay. Yet we are told year by year that we do not know how to do our own business. The Chinese have a proverb that says
Native Ginger is not sharp," meaning, of course,
that one is more inclined to regard foreign goods with favour than the home product. It would seem we have made a fetish of praising up foreigners, foreign methods, and foreign products, much to our own detriment.
C
Our Consuls in their reports forget to mention our undoubted success in establish- ing manufacturing enterprises in Hongkong and other parts of China. In Hongkong we have large Engineering establishments,
BRITONS V. GERMANS IN CHINA 47
large Sugar Refineries, Cement and Rope Works, all under direct British control. The only business of a similar kind which was run by Germans consisted of a small soap- making establishment. And in other places in China the Germans have little interest in industrial enterprises apart from their control and management of certain breweries.
Let us examine certain trades in which the Germans were supposed to, and in some cases did, actually excel. The lion's share of the business in arms and ammunition naturally fell to the Germans by reason of the fact that they have specialised more than any other nation in the manufacture of war material, and therefore had the best sources of supply. However, as far as Hongkong is concerned, the liquidations have shown that there was no legitimate profit to speak of made by the Germans out of the sale of arms and ammunition. No doubt Messrs.
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་་་ས་:*th,
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