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six parts sea", an exaggeration which none the less makes its point.24
Hardly part of the fishing fleet as such, but a contribution to Peng Chau's sea-faring activity was the recovery of coral from the sea bed. The coral was used in the production of lime which was required in the building trade for making mortar. This was a major undertaking by the end of the century; it was, in fact, the largest in the New Territories at the time its numbers were reported in 1901.25 Twenty junks each carrying eighteen men and sixty boats each carrying six men, that is 720 men between them, were said to have been engaged in this work which took place within three square miles of sea between Peng Chau and Nei Kwu Chau, the present Hei Ling Chau leprosarium. Fishing, and the recovery of coral for the lime kilns, was such a large scale enterprise in Peng Chau waters at this time that, as two elders have put it to me on different occasions, you could walk on boats as far as the adjacent shore of Lantau, a distance of almost a mile.
The land dwellers on Peng Chau were of two kinds: Cantonese, whose principal outlet was business, and Hakkas who had settled down to farm there in the decades before and after 1800. The history and origins of the latter are well-defined by family graves and the recollections of their present descendants but the influx of the Cantonese, and the time and manner of their coming — because in many cases they probably came and went without making a permanent settlement — is more of a mystery.
Chinese land deeds of the Ching period are often useful since they sometimes uncover facts not recorded in the earliest land records of the British administration. I have seen such a deed dated 188226 which records the transfer of a shop from one party to another. Naturally this is a common enough transaction, but this particular deed provides interesting information about land ownership on Peng Chau at an earlier date. It relates how the CHAN Yan Hop Tong ✰✰ of San On district had, at a prior but unknown date, leased land sufficient to build ten houses to the CHAN Yee Ka Tong of Tung Kwun district, who in turn sold one shop built on this land to another person. There are actually two differently worded deeds of the same date relating to the same shop and the same transaction, and they
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78
J. W. HAYES
six parts sea", an exaggeration which none the less makes its point.24
Hardly part of the fishing fleet as such, but a contribution to Peng Chau's sea-faring activity was the recovery of coral from the sea bed. The coral was used in the production of lime which was required in the building trade for making mortar. This was a major undertaking by the end of the century; it was, in fact, the largest in the New Territories at the time its numbers were reported in 1901.25 Twenty junks each carrying eighteen men and sixty boats each carrying six men, that is 720 men between them, were said to have been engaged in this work which took place within three square miles of sea between Peng Chau and Nei Kwu Chau, the present Hei Ling Chau leprosarium. Fishing, and the recovery of coral for the lime kilns, was such a large scale enterprise in Peng Chau waters at this time that, as two elders have put it to me on different occasions, you could walk on boats as far as the adjacent shore of Lantau, a distance of almost a mile.
The land dwellers on Peng Chau were of two kinds: Cantonese, whose principal outlet was business, and Hakkas who had settled down to farm there in the decades before and after 1800. The history and origins of the latter are well-defined by family graves and the recollections of their present descendants but the influx of the Cantonese, and the time and manner of their coming — because in many cases they probably came and went without making a permanent settlement is more of a mystery.
Chinese land deeds of the Ching period are often useful since they sometimes uncover facts not recorded in the earliest land records of the British administration. I have seen such a deed dated 188226 which records the transfer of a shop from one party to another. Naturally this is a common enough transaction, but this particular deed provides interesting information about land ownership on Peng Chau at an earlier date. It relates how the CHAN Yan Hop Tong ✰✰ of San On district had, at a prior but unknown date, leased land sufficient to build ten houses to the CHAN Yee Ka Tong of Tung Kwun district, who in turn sold one shop built on this land to another person. There are actually two differently worded deeds of the same date relating to the same shop and the same transaction, and they
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