Directory_and_Chronicle_1885 — Page 463

HANKOW.

Hankow is situated on the river Han at the point where it enters the Yangtsze, and is in lat, 30 deg. 32 miu. 51 sec. N., and long. 114 deg. 19 min. 55 sec. E. The natives look upon Hankow as only a suburb of Hanyang, which it immediately adjoins, and which is a district city of the province of Hupeh. Those two towns lie immediately facing the city of Wuchang-fu, the capital of the province, which is built upon the south bank of the Yangtsze. Hankow is distant froin Shanghai about 600 miles.

Lord Elgin visited Hankow in 1858, and must have been one of the first foreigners who ever entered this important inland city. Attention was first drawn to it as a place of trade by Huc, a French missionary. Captain Blakiston, in his work "The Yangtaze," gives the following description of the place and its surround- ings:- -"Hankow is situated just where an irregular range of semi-detached low hills crosses a particularly level country on both sides of the main river in an east and west direction. Stationed on Pagoda Hill, a spectator looks down on almost as much water as had oven when the rivers are low. At his feet sweeps the magnificen! Yangteze, nuriy a mile in width; from the wost and skirting the northern edge of the range of hills already mentioned, comes the river Han, narrow and canal like, to add ita quota, and serving as one of the highways of the country; and to the north- west and north is an extensive treeless flat, so little elevated above the river that the scattered hamlets which dot its surface are without exception raised on mounds, probably artificial works of a now distant age. A stream of two traverse its farther part and flow into the main river. Carrying his eye to the right bank of the Yangtaze one sees enormous lakes and lagoons both to the north-west and south-east sides of the hills beyond the provincial city."

When the port was opened, in 1861, to foreign trade, the natives, as at several other new ports, raised many difficulties in the way of nxing a site for the British Settlement. They demanded excessive prices for the lots marked o. for occupation, and it was not till the port had been open for some time, and me y residents had temporarily taken up an abode on the Hanyang shore, that an arrangement was arrived at. The site chosen is very bad, both from a sanitary and commercial point of view, but is well laid out, and has a good bund. A Fronch Settlement was also fixed upon,

but it has never been occupied. The population of Hankow is estimated

at 700,000.

Great expectations as regards trade were entertained respecting the opening of Hankow. Foreign commerce would, it was thought, be brought into immediate contact with the large internal populations of China, and a port be established in the locality of the great tea producing districts. These expectations, however, have been but partially realised. Tea is, of course, the staple export, and it is at Hankow that the first steaners for home take in their cargoes. The total export of Tea from Hank w (including re-exports of Kiukiang tea) amounted in 1883 to 771,344 picule, as compared with 797,416 picule shipped in 1882. In 1883 Opium was imported to the extent of 8,485 piculs as against 3,222 picula in 1882. The trade under the transit pass system is larger at Hankow than at any other port; its value in 1883 was Tls. 5,605,31. The total value of the trade of the port in 1883 amounted to Tls. 35,354,885, and in 1882 to Tls. 34,342,894.