Directory_and_Chronicle_1900 — Page 751

CANTON

277

site of the Viceroy's Yamên, on which the Catholic Cathedral has been erected. Shameen is pleasingly laid out, and the roads are shaded with well grown trees. A neat church, called Christ Church, stands at the western end. There is good hotel accommodation. During an anti-foreign riot on the 10th September, 1883, sixteen houses and the Concordia Theatre on the settlement were burned by the mob.

In consequence of the decline in the importance of Canton as a place of trade, caused principally by the opening of some of the northern ports, many of the merchants by whom lots were purchased there in 1861, at enormous prices, withdrew from Canton altogether. The trade now transacted there by foreigners is limited. Tea and Silk are the staple exports. The total export of Tea for the year ending 31st December, 1898, was 10,025 piculs, in 1897, 13,501 piculs and in 1896 10,900 piculs. The extent to which the trade has fallen off will be seen on a comparison of the above figures with those for 1888, when the export was 131,141 piculs. The quantity of Raw Silk (exclusive of Refuse and Wild Silk) exported in 1898 was 33,853 piculs, in 1897 30,716 piculs and 23,287 piculs in 1896. These figures, however, which are taken from the Foreign Customs returns, do not give the total export, but only those in foreign vessels. Both Tea and Silk are carried in large quantities to Hongkong by junk, for tran- shipment. The net value of the trade of the port coming under the cognisance of the Foreign Customs was for 1898 Tls. 49,554,973, for 1897 Tls. 49,934,391, and for 1896 Tls. 46,160,343.

+

Ample means of communication exist between Canton and Hongkong, a distance of about ninety-five miles, by foreign steamers plying daily, and a large number of native craft. There is daily steam communication with Macao. Steamers also run regularly between Shanghai, Hongkong, and Canton. There is a safe and commodious anchorage within 150 yards of the river wall at Shameen. Canton was connected by telegraph (an overland line) with Kowloon in 1883, and another overland line was completed from Canton to Lungchau-fu, on the Kwangsi and Tonkin frontier, in June, 1884. The electric light has been introduced into a portion of the city. A projected railway between Canton and Kowloon has received the Imperial sanction and a preliminary survey has been made, but it still remains a project. The survey by an American syndicate of a railway route to connect Canton with Hankow was also made in 1899.

DIRECTORY

ABDOOLALLY, EBRAHIM & Co., Merchants | BHESANIA & Co., J. B., Merchants and

and Commission Agents, Honam

Sui-kee

ARNHOLD, KARBERG & Co., Merchants

W. Helms, signs per pro.

J. Rommy, silk inspector

A. Ulrich,

A. Metzler

W. Goetz

J. de Britto

A. H. Ribeiro

Agencies

do.

Pacific Mail Steamship Company Occidental & Oriental Steamship Co. Toyo Kisen Kabushiki Kaisha Shell Transport and Trading Co., Ld. Lancashire Insurance Company South British Fire & Marine Insce. Co. New York Life Insurance Company Magdeburg Fire Insurance Co.

Be-san-na

BHESANIA & Co., C. M., Silk Mercers,

Shameer

C. M. Bhesa (Bombay) F. C. Bhesianiana

Commission Agents, 149, Shameen

J. E. Bhesania (Bombay)

C. F. Bhesania, do.

B. B. Bhesania

BISHOP & Co., Merchants and Commission

Agents, Shameen

BƆMANJEE & Co., Merchants and Com-

mission Agents, Shameen

S. N. Karanjia H. J. Karanjia

H. N. Karanjia

Agency

Steamship "Hoi-tong "

BRITISH EPISCOPAL CHURCH ESTABLISH-

MENT-CHRIST CHURCH

Trustees B. S. Ringer, J. Naismith,

G. D. Fearon

Hon. Secty, and Treas.-G. I). Fearon

古太 Tai-kou

BUTTERFIELD & SWIRE, Merchants

J. R. Greaves, signs per pro.