Directory_and_Chronicle_1917 — Page 1056

Directories & Chronicles 香港指南 All

954

HANGCHOW

The site selected for the Foreign Settlement extends for half a mile along the east bank of the Grand Canal; it covers over half a square mile and is four miles from the nearest point of the city wall. The Japanese concession adjoins it on the North and is about the same size. The Customs-house and Commissioner's and assistants' residences are built on the Customs Lot, and an imposing Chinese 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. The commodities chiefly dealt in arc tin, Japanese copper, kerosene oil, soap, sugar, prepared tobacco, varnish, paper fans, silk piecegoods, raw silk and tea. The principal article of export is tea. The tea comes from Anhwei and Pingsuey near Shaohsing and from the neighbourhood of Hangchow, where the valuable Lungching tea is grown. The net value of the trade of the port in 1915 was Tls. 19,991,474 as compared with Tls. 17,144,758 in 1914, Tls. 20,205,949 in 1912, and Tls. 17,698,031 in 1911. In 1900 it was Tls. 9,433,771.

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 1898 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 but has not yet acquired the status of a Treaty Port.

Cholera in 1902 killed 10,000 people. A railway from the Settlement to the fur- ther end of Hangchow City near the Chien Tang river was completed in Sept., 1907. It was built solely by Chinese and with Chinese capital. There is now railway connection with Shanghai via Kashing. Twenty-eight miles north of Hangchow is situated the now well-known summer resort Mokanshan. It can be reached from Shanghai by way of the railway and a motor-boat in ten hours. There are now over two hundred houses on the slope of a hill about 3,000 fect high. The scenery is magnificent and the view unequalled. Bamboo forests cover the mountain and afford shade to all the roads. Clear mountain springs abound, chairs and coolies for baggage are always available, and are under contract with the Mokanshan Association. Houses more or less completely furnished can be rented at Tls. 100 to 350 per season (four months).. The Shanghai Municipality has lately purchased two houses as a sanatorium for their employes, and a competent nurse is in charge. The difference in temperature from the plain amounts to 10° in the day and 15° at night.

Directory_and_Chronicle_1917 — Page 1056

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