42.
the colonists and the musicians, contract with the dark Chinese nursemaids who congregate here with English children, and English and Portuguese ladies in full crinoline, which has reached every part of the world, and the Chinese girls will wear it in their turn. The Chinese is, without exception, the most modest of all known dresses. The natives, though their features are not quite Greek, have a very pleasing expression.
"We have perambulators here. Officers are collected in huts; sailors in pith hats walking in groups; Indians, Portuguese, and Parsees with their peculiar hats. Before you is the church or cathedral, an unsightly pile, quite destroying the Oriental appearance of the place.
"On the left are the 59th barracks, of which you gave a sketch some time back: behind is the harbour, filled with the shipping of all nations, and lighted up by the tropical sun till the sea sparkles again. Between the parade-ground and the sea is the road going into Hongkong, lined with banyan-trees, under which sit peripathetic vendors of aliments for the better organisation of the human stomach; and dealers in the beverage called 'cha' here, and tea elsewhere. Surrounding these same vendors are the absorbers of the above chow-chows some squatting, as they inhale the fragrant weed in calumets of bamboo; here a fortune-teller; further on a juggler (when the police is not there); charming maidens, three-and-three, two-and-two; white attired soldiers; dashing European carriages, some with Chinese drivers, some without; coolies carrying ladies and lazy gentlemen; Chinamen on horseback; sepoys in undress, looking as if they had tumbled out of bed in a hurry and put on their sheets and anything they could get; snobs in black hats such is a mild description of a band evening at Hongkong."
Not so very different from what one would expect to-day if a military band played again periodically on the parade ground: except that the Chinese girls, far from adopting the crinoline, have only within recent years changed their former dress, praised by the old writer for its extreme modesty, for the slit skirt. Again, the "unsightly pile," as he so sweepingly terms St. John's Cathedral, remains where it stood, changed to a mellow grey, and one of the few graceful reminders we have of the old days.
I give to-day another of the old sketches of Hongkong which were made in the late Fifties, by an artist who had been commissioned to report on the China situation to one of the leading London papers. It is evidently a pen-and-ink drawing, and was made apparently from the deck of a ship in harbour. The date is 1857, and it gives us to-day a clear insight to the appearance of the waterfront in those early days.
423
42.
the colonists and the musicians, contract' with the dark Chinese nursemaids who congregate here with English children, and English and Portuguese ladies in full crinoline, which has reached every part of the world, and the Chinese girls will wear it in their turn. The Chinese is, without exception, the most modest of all known dresses. The natives, though their features are not quite
дора Greek, have a very pleasing expression.
"We have perambulators here. Officers are collected in huts; sailors in pith hats walking in groups; Indians, Portuguese, and Parsees with their peculiar, hats. Before you is the church or cathedral, an unsightly pile, quite destroying the Oriental appearance of the place.
"On the left are the 59th. barracks, of which you gave a sketch some tine back: behind is the harbour, filled with the shipping of all nations, and lighted up by the tropical sun till the sea sparkles again. Between the parade-ground and the sea is the road going into Hongkong, lined with banyan-trees, under which sit peripathetic venders of aliments for the better organisation of the human stomach; and dealers in the beverage called "cha" here, and tea elsewhere. Surrounding these same venders are the absorbers of the above chow-chows sone squatting, as they inhale the fragrant weed in calumets of bamboo; here a fortune- teller; further on a juggler (when the police is not there); charming maidens, three-and-three, two- and-two; white attired soldiers; dashing European carriages, some with Chinese drivers, some without; coolies carrying ladies and lazy gentlenen; China- men on horseback; sepoys in undress, looking as if they had furmed out of bed in a hurry and put on their sheets and anything they could get; snobs in black hats such is a mild description of a band evening at Hongkong."
.
Not so very different from what one would expect to- day if a military band played again periodically on the parade ground: except that the Chinese girls, fur from adopting the crinoline, have only within recent years changed their former dress, praised by the old writer for its extreme modesty, for the slit skirt. again, the
unsightly pile," as he so sweepingly terus St. John's Cathedral, remains where it stood, changed to a mellow £rey, and one of the few graceful reminders we have of the old days.
I give to-day another of the old sketches of Hongkong which were made in the late Fifties, by an artist who had been commissioned to report on the China situation to one of the leading London papers. It is evidently a pon-and-ink – drawing, and was made apparently from the deck of a ship in harbour. The date is 1857, and it gives us to-day a clear insight to the appearance of the waterfront in those early days.
423
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