46.
Immediately on the other side of Pedder Street, across the road from the Hongkong Club, we see the roof and part of the upper storey of the old Post Office (the site at present occupied by China Building).
It is hoped this will give a better identification of Bruce's drawing; also an idea of the sylvan attractions even in the heart of the city in those old days.
A detailed description of "Green Bank", and other comments by Fortune, will be given in the next article.
References have been made before, in the course of these articles, to the lawlessness that prevailed for a long time. Most of the records we have of this are mere paragraphs in reference books, but the contemporary press has details of robberies in broad daylight, right up to the late Sixties, which tell their own story of the condition of affairs at one period of the Colony's history, as well as the inadequate forces of law and order. We have already dealt with Police reform and the steps that were taken to bring the riff-raff of the city under control - more severe prison terms, flogging, and so forth - while a curfew order also operated for a time.
That Hongkong must have suffered for a long period from an evil reputation for lawlessness - just as it was notorious for its unhealthy climate of the early years - is also evident from various comments by travellers who visited this place. I intend to deal fairly fully with this aspect of the question to-day, and will quote extracts from published accounts of the time.
For instance, it is interesting to find that the Illustrated London News correspondent who was sent out here at the time of the second China War in 1857 mentions as a well-known fact that the Taipingshan neighbourhood of Hongkong (at West Point) was a dangerous place for a foreigner to be abroad in. Quite incidentally, as it were, he states in the course of comments published in that journal in October, 1857: "Ty-ping-Shan is decidedly picturesque in an artistic point of view, containing as it does the refuse, the scum, of China; but, as there is a price on our heads, the study of that interesting locality becomes less fascinating.
In another part of his article there is a pen-picture of the city after nightfall. "In Hongkong at eight at night the streets are deserted, save now and then a solitary Chinese, with his paper lantern, or an Englishman returning home! The dusky looking policeman, armed with a loaded musket, is seen in every part of the town. Not a sound is heard; it is like a town of the dead...
For actual experience of violent crime, however, we might quote the case of Dr. Cuthbert Collingwood, a learned man who visited this Colony in 1867. He published a book entitled "Rambles of a Naturalist," the year following, and in this devotes a whole chapter to crime in Hongkong: naturally, for he was the victim of a brutal attack and robbery by footpads. There are severe denunciations of the authorities, a declaration that the criminal classes are not sufficiently punished, and a claim that in China proper, owing to severe measures with lawless elements, it was actually safer to be about the streets than in this British Colony! The worthy Doctor also gives as an
*
46.
Immediately the other side of Pedder Street, across the road from the Hongkong Club, we see the roof and part of the upper storey of the old Post Office (the site at present. occupied by China Building).
It is hoped this will give a better identification of Bruce's drawing; also an idea of the sylvan attractions even in the heart of the city in those old days./
days./.
A detailed description of "Green Bank", and other comments by Fortune, will be given in the next article.
References have heen made before, in the course of these articles, to the lawlessness that prevailed for a long time. Most of the records we have of this are nere paragraphs in reference books, but the contemporary press has details of robberies in broad daylight, right up to the late Sixties, which tell their own story of the condition of affairs at one period of the Colony's history, as well as the inadequate forces of law and order. We have already dealt with Police reform and the steps that were taken to bring the riff-raff of the city under control more severe prison terms, flogging, and so forth - while a curfew order also operated for a tine.
That Hongkong must have suffered for a long period from an evil reputation for lawlessness - just as it was notorius for its unhealthy climate of the early years is also evident from various comments by travellers who visited this place. I intend to deal fairly fully with this aspect of the question to-day, and will quote extracts from published accounts of the time.
For instance, it is interesting to find that the Illustrated London News correspondent who was sent out here at the time of the second China War in 1857 mentions as a well- known fact that the Taipingshan neighbourhood of hongkong (at West Point) was a dangerous place for a foreigner to be abroad in. Quite incidentally, as it were, he states in the course of comments published in that journal in October, 1857. - "Ty-ping-Shan is decidedly picturesque in an artistic point of view, containing as it does the refuse, the scum, of China; but, as there is a price on our heads, the study of that interesting locality becomes less fasincating.
In another part of his article there is a pen-picture of the city after nightfall. "In Hongkong at eight at night the streets are deserted, save now and then a solitary Chinese, with his paper lantern, or an Englishman returning home! The dusky looking policeman, armed with a loaded musket, is seen in every part of the town. Not a sound is heard; it is like a town of the dead...
For actual experience of violent crime, however, we might quote the case of Dr. Cuthbert Collingwood, a learned man who visited this Colony in 1867. He published a book entitled "Ranbles of a Naturalist," the year following, and in this devotes a whole chapter tó, crime in Hongkong: naturally, for he was the victim of a brutal attack and robbery by footpads. There are severe denunciations of the authorities, a declaration that the criminal classes are not sufficiently punished, and a claim that in China proper, owing to severe measures with lawless elements, it was actually safer to be about the streets than in this British Colony! The worthy Doctor also gives as an
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