CO129-446 - Others & Individuals - 1917 — Page 204

202

L 21, 1917.

The

able citizen. We trust that steps

| Morth-China Baily Dews | will be taken to bring this pro-

IMPARTIAL, NOT NEUTRAL.

SHANGHAI, APRIL 21, 1917.

THE GOVERNOR OF

HONGKONG.

Yesterday's telegrams contain- ed a brief report of an attempt by the unofficial members of the Legislative Council of Hongkong to secure the exclusion of Ger- | mans from the Colony, after the ' War. The sentiments expressed by Mr. P. H. Holyoak, support- ed by Mr. Anton and Mr. Pol- lock, are those of the overwhelm- ing majority of the British peoples that the mercantile community does not desire. and will not be, if it can be avoided, associated in Hongkong, either socially or commercially, with man and women who have failed to realize what honour, justice and mercy mean, and who ae- knowledge neither international obligations nor treaties unless they stand to gain by so doing." In the end the motion Was thrown out, the official metubers, as usual, voting en masse to swamp the unofficial, and the Gov- ernor, concluding the debate, thought that every official was thoroughly convinced that the re- solution was not in the best in- terests of the Colony."

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nouncement to the notice of the Home Government.

Telegraphic summaries and sentences taken out of their con- text may, of course, be mislead- ing. But it will need a very ex- plicit context.

immense amount of palliation in the rest of what the Governor may have said, to explain the words we have italicized. It is an amaz- ing and shameful statement. The slow course of liquidation of Ger- man firms in Hongkong has proved up to the hilt that, for years past, German merchants had been using every meanness in their power to undersell and min the British in the Colony where they, the Germans, were received with equal freedom and friend- ship. This is the experience, not of one small colony, but of the whole world. It is the main- spring of the Russian revolution and of the present fury of the South American Republies. There may be, there probably are, de- cent Germans, taken individual- But where the ambition nề

Germany is concerned, no Ger- ma.Can Be trusted. Treachers. is his practice and deceit, so long as successful, his pride. And these are the people whose exclusion from Hongkong Sir Henry May thinks would not be the best interests of the Colony. Put it the other way about. Does Sir Henry May then think that the presence of Germans is to the best interests of Hongkong? That their places should be kept wadm for them until after the war? And that directly the sword ís sheathed they should be re- admitted in full freedom to smile and lie and insinuate themselves into prosperity, to the detriment of: Great Britain and her subjects? Whom can Sir Henry May blane if this construction," "with all that' it.may imply, is put upon his words?

Mr. Holyoak is reported 10: have entered a strong objection against "what he characterized as a studied insult to the Committee of the Chamber of Commerce." Nine months ago we noted with regret the refusal of the Colonial f Secretary at Home to grant the petition of British residents in 1 Hongkong for greater representa- tion on the Executive and Legis lative Councils. Shanghai, we would venture to say, is not so bad an example of what nier- chants in the Far East can do in the sphere of government. when left to themselves, that Hongkong should be thus treated. How far The Governor of Hongkong ly have ipfumed the decision, at headquarters against the British residents we do not know. But it would be idle to pretend that un- der his régime the sympathy has been shown by the government of Hongkong towards the busines community which ought to have been shown; or that the Gover- nor's demeanour, whatever his intentions, has suggested any- thing but a steady determination t to keep the merchants in their places. But here we have a wider issue. For reasons best known to himself. Sir Henry May has declared himself in op- position to the common opinion of the world and while the Lon- don Chamber of Commerce, not, perhaps, so inferior in intel. ligence to the Governor of Hong- kong, is urging that, for five years after the declaration of peace, enemy steamers shall not The allowed to you the stations of the British Empire. the Governor of a small but not ' unimportant part of that Empire would appear to consider that the German is not such a bad fellow after all, and that bo is, for the interests of the Colony, a desir