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artist but a very keen philatelist. He elaborated my rough design into a large scale drawing. The original dates we put on the stamp were rather optimistically chosen as 1941-1944; the last date of course had to be altered to 1945 when the stamps actually came to be printed. We toyed with other designs as well, but always came back to the original design as representing what we firmly believed would be a fact: the liberation and resurrection of our Colony to its former greatness.
I kept the design carefully and took it home with me. I travelled in one of His Majesty's ships, to which was attached a young Chinese naval officer of considerable literary attainments. I showed him the stamp in order to get his opinion on the suitability of the Chinese characters as I am no great Chinese scholar myself. He very kindly pointed out a rather serious mistake, i.e. in the two characters which I had chosen () for the last part of the inscription on the left hand. They mean literally "Great Peace," he pointed out that in classical Chinese they were also used to represent "Japan"! He substituted the two characters which now appear on the stamp.
When I reached home, I submitted the amended design to the Colonial Office and it was in due couurse approved.
It was originally intended that the stamps should be issued on August 15th, "VJ DAY", but owing to delay in their arrival in the Colony, the date was altered to commemorate the arrival of the British Fleet at the end of August 1945. I feel sure that the sym- bolical use of the Phoenix on this stamp will help to cement the friend- ship and understanding essential for neighbours such as the Great Republic of China and the Colony of Hong Kong.
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