Block in particular was a mere shell. He had particularly made a point of visiting the refugee students who were being &ccommodated in Fros Caina, particularly those at the changha Medical College just outside Chungking. The Dean of this
College was a close friend of Dr. Li and as asked for his assistance in obtaining laboratory equipment.
In reply to a question, Dr. Li said that he agreed that the action of the British authorities in providing funds to assist these Hong Kong students to continue their studies in China had been a right and proper courɛe. He spoke with some emphasis on the desirability of encouraging Chinese students to come to this country, to pursue their higher studies here, and referred to the better facilities for information and assistance provided by the American as compared with British authorities. He also said that U. S. universities were more accommodating in that they showed greater readiness to let students take Chinese in their entrance examinations as a foreign language. He was assured that the British Government were fully alive to the importance of encouraging Chinese students to come to this country, and were pushing ahead with the matter as fast as the difficulties inevitable in wartime could be overcome.
5.
Political warfare.
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Dr. Li said that soon after the occupation the Japanese had ordered that all short-wave receiving sets in the Colony should be taken to an authorised dealer and the short-wave reception apa ratus sealed under official "chop". This was done with his own set, but he found to his surprise that he was able to pick up the B.B.C. (though he did not know from what station) on long-wave reception, and had listened in the evenings with a blanket covering the set and his own head. He thought that this was done fairly widely in the Colony, but the risks attached were so great that people were cnary in admitting that they did listen to Allied broadcasts. He suggested that it would be useful if the B.B.C. were to employ a wavelength in the neighbourhood of that of the local Hong Kong station, since tuning in to their present wave- length involved the risk that the listener might be detected by instruments in the hands of the Japanese or their agents. Dr. Li said that Free China stations were not received in the Colony, and he doubted whether much use could be made of broadcasts from such stations since their power problems rendered their transmission erratic and unreliable.
He was not aware of any underground paper circulating in the Colony, but mentioned that soon after the ban on short-wave transmission, he had heard of a man who circulated a typewritten report of short-wave broadcasts to subscribers in return for a fee of (he thought) 7 dollars a week. This man, however, was detected and executed.
The main means of spreading news among the Chinese population was in cafes and teashops but it was dangerous work particularly as the town was full of Formosan or Nanking agents of the Japanese. (Incidentally, he mentioned that the Formosans had done had done a lot to create bad blood between the local population and the Japanese, since they used their privileged position even more outrageously than the Japanese themselves).
6.
Canton-Kowloon Railway.
Dr. Li said that when he left Hong Kong this railway was working from the Hong Kong end as far as Shamchun on the New Territory frontier, and at the other end as far as Sheklung. The stretch of line in between was disputed between the Japanese and the local guerillas.
7.
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