Directory_and_Chronicle_1908 — Page 995

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HANGCHOW

Steam Navigation Co., daily, via Huchow; these three companies formed a combination some years ago and have the monopoly of the trade. Several attempt of outsiders to come in have always failed after a few trips.

One of the sights of Hangchow is the famous western lake, dotted with islets crowned with shrines and memorial temples, and spanned by causeways joining island to island. The general picturesque effect is heightened by temples, pagodas, and similar monuments judiciously placed in effective spots, while the slopes

of the hills bordering the lake on the west are bright with azaleas, honey-suckle, and peach-bloom, and clusters of bamboos, several kinds of conifers, the stillignia, camphor tree, and maple in rich profusion, all help to make the scene very pretty.

The site selected for the Foreign Settlements extends for half a mile along the east bank of the Grand Canal; it covers over half a square mile and is about four miles from the city wall. The Japanese concession adjoins it on the North and is about the same size. The Custom-house and Commissioner's and assistants' residences are built on the Customs Lot, and an imposing Police Station has also been put up. A British Consulate has been built on the opposite side of the Japanese Concession, not in the settlement. On the west side, opposite the settlement, a cotton mill, owned by Chinese and built and worked on western lines, is in operation. The company has also a large factory for pressing oil out of cotton seed and they are now making Cigarettes and Ice by foreign machinery. A small flour mill has been put up and is working intermittently. The commodities chiefly dealt in are opium, tin, Japanese copper, kerosene oil, soap, sugar, prepared tobacco, varnish, paper fans, silk piece goods, raw silk and tea. The principal article of export is tea, about 110,395 piculs (including re-export) in 1906. The tea comes from Anhwei and Pingsuey near Shaohs- ing and from the neighbourhood of Hangchow, where the valuable Lungching tea is grown. Silk, paper fans, raw cotton, medicines and tinfoil are also exported. The import of foreign goods from Chinese ports amounted to Tls. 4,354,880 in 1906, against Tls. 4,334,125 in 1905, and Tls. 5,154,187 in 1904, and the exports to Tls.9,769,765, against Tls. 10,200,623 in 1905, and Tls. 9,158,519, in 1904. The net value of the trade of the port was Tls. 16,299,185 as compared with Tls. 17,496,980 in 1905, and Tls. 17,747,662 in 1904. In 1900 it was Tls. 9,433,771. Trade is improving generally.

Halfway between Hangchow and Shanghai is Kashing, where the Grand Canal joins the Whangpoo River on which Shanghai is situated. Kashing is a Customs Sta- tion under Hangchow and was first opened in 1-98 for collecting duties on Foreign opium owing to fiscal arrangements being against the collection at Hangchow. It now collects duties both on imports and exports and has become quite an important factor.

Cholera in 1902 killed 10,000 people. A railway to the further end of Hangchow City near the Chien Tang river was completed in Sept. 1907. It was built solely by Chinese and with Chinese capital. An extension to Shanghai via Kashing has been commenced.

DIRECTORY

BURIN YOKO, Commission Merchants and

Storekeepers

J. Mayejima

CONSULATES

GREAT BRITAIN

Acting Consul-T. Sundius

JAPAN

門衙事本日大

Ta-ji-pen-lin-sz Ya-men

Acting Vice-Consul-H. Yoshioka

Secretary-M. Fujii

Inspector of Police-H. Ishihara

關新州杭 CUSTOMS-IMPERIAL MARITIME

Commissioner-P. von Tanner Deputy do.-T. Macphail (Kashing) Assisants--C. Pape, A. C. Biesterfeld

Y. Kurematsu (Kashing), C. J. Gutt Medical Officers-D. D. Main, W. H.

Venable (Kashing) Tidesurveyor-L. Liedeke

Assistant Examiners-Z. L. Wilson,

N. Carlson, C. H. Hardy (Kashing)

Tidewaiters-C. Landers, R. Raiteri

(Kashing), J. Onken, O. Stromdähl

(Kashing) H. Halvorsen, C. M. G. Müller

LEKIN ADMINISTRATION, EASTERN CHEKIANG

Commisr.-in-charge-P. von Tanner

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