370
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BRITONS V. GERMANS IN CHINA them, and they had, moreover, a smaller domain in which to interest themselves. Little things, however, show our failings in this respect. The number of letters re- ceived by merchants in Hongkong bearing 23d postage stamps point to the fact that many junior clerks in offices at home do not know that Hongkong is a British Pos- session, and that the id rate of postage ap- plies. Also, had our Empire been better known there would have been no occasion for the appalling misapprehension by which many merchants at home were left in doubt as to whether they could trade with Hong- kong, because the names of Hongkong firms were not on the official White List published with reference trading with China. It would assuredly profit everybody concerned to further a more intelligent appreciation of our Colonial Empire, otherwise we can hardly expect
to
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BRITONS V. GERMANS IN CHINA
other nations to admit that we deserve our inheritance. Everything must be done to foster our national desire to travel and explore foreign lands. We shall require men, and the best men at that, to maintain our prestige abroad after the
war.
We may not have been prepared for war, but let there be no mistake about our organisation for peace, and trade after the war. We have not done so badly up to the present, and it has been the purpose of this book to show that hitherto our "muddling" has been pretty successful and to the point. As a local paper recently pointed out, similar "muddling" by our enemies would be promptly acclaimed as a new brand of "Culture," and on the whole our own peculiar modesty is preferable to this. The author feels strongly that in spite of unfair conpetition in the past and prospective
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