Directory_and_Chronicle_1902 — Page 851

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SAMSHUI-WUCHOW-FU

Indo-China Steam Navigation Co.

China Navigation Company

Canton Insurance Office

Hongkong Fire Insurance Company

局政郵 消大

POST OFFICE—IMPERIAL Chinese

Clerk-Cheung Man-ling

F

局報電國中

TELEGRAPHS-IMPERIAL CHINESE, Sainam

Clerk-Chow Hok-shü

得 同

TUNG TAK, Merchant

司公和怡

E. Wo & Co., Merchs. and Comsn. Agents

WUCHOW-FU

h đã Wi-chau

州梧

Wuchow-fu, opened to foreign trade by the Special Article of the Burmese Frontier Convention, is situated on the Sikiang (West River) at a distance of about 220 miles, by the present authorised routes, from Canton or Hongkong. It is the principal city of the prefecture bearing the same name, and is also the seat of the district magistrate of Ts'ang Wu. The scenery of the West River is interesting and in many places tine The first portion which demands attention in the voyage up stream is the Shui Hing Gorge. Here the river, which lower down is about a mile wide, flowing through level land, suddenly narrows to about a quarter of that width, and winds through a pass about five miles long where mountains rise on each side to a height of two thousand feet. On leaving the gorge the river again widens, but hills line the sides all the way to Wuchow, now and then closing in and forming tortuous defiles, in some of which the stream appears as a mountain lake, entrance and exit being alike undistinguishable when the middle is reached.

The city of Wuchow is situated on the left bank of the West River at its junction with the Fu or Kweilin River, a navigable stream which affords communication with the provincial capital. The population of the place is about 50,000. The city wall, which climbs the hills in rear, is about a mile and a half in circumference. The streets are for the most part mean and dirty. The business quarter comprises the best. This consists of two or three streets, which round the corner outside the city walls at the junction of the two rivers. The principal would compare favourably with a second rate street in Canton, the others are inferior. The annual inundations which take place here are a peculiar feature of the place. The West River is affected to a very great degree by the rainfall, so much so that the difference between the winter and summer levels of the water is as much as sixty feet. The summer freshets are a great source of inconvenience. When the water rises, sometimes half of the streets and the lower storeys of the houses in them are flooded, the people have to move all their belongings upstairs, communication has to be carried on in boats, and business is seriously interfered with. But the Chinese do not seem to mind the inconvenience much. They have gone on century after century submitting to the same yearly invasion of their dwellings by the water without the slightest attempt to improve matters. They simply suspend business and retire to their upper storeys when the inundations come, wait there till they subside, and then resume work. The foreigners who establish themselves here will hardly be content to take things so easily; they will require houses above high water mark, and in a year or 80 we may expect to see the city adorned by a few buildings really suited to the necessities of the place.

The history of Wuchow presents some points of interest. The mythical emperor Shun (2,200 B.C.) while on a tour of inspection of his southern domains, died in the wilds of Ts'ang Wu, and one tradition relates that his grave is to be found in the Great Cloud Mountain, three miles to the east of the city. Of the nine divisions into which the Great Yu (2,250 B.C.) divided the empire, Ching Chow was the region lying between the Tungting Lake and the southern kingdom of Yüeh, the present Annam, and of Ching Chow, Tsang Wu was an important sub-division. When the rule of the house of the First Emperor, Chin Shih Huang, came to an end in 206 B.C., a certain official known as Chao To took possession of Southern Yüeh and appointed

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