Directory_and_Chronicle_1919 — Page 850

Directories & Chronicles 香港指南 All

783

HANGCHOW

tree, and maple in rich profusion, all help to make the scene very pretty. The western wall of the city has been pulled down and made into a promenade along the West Lake, and two hotels, foreign style, have been opened, one near to the city railway station and the other near the Public Gardens on the Lake,

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 are 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 1917 was Hk. Tls. 21,020,832 as compared with Hk. Tls. 21,157,747 in 1916, Hk. Tls. 19,991,474 in 1915 and Hk. Tls. 17,144,758 in 1914. In 1900 it was Hk. 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 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 feet 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_1919 — Page 850

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