32
looking as though they would roll down any moment, it formed a dramatic and distinctive backdrop to the Walled City.
The City was primarily a garrison town. In 1898, the garrison numbered 544, with a civilian population of only 200, largely dependents of the military. By then the watch towers were being used as family dwellings. Besides the several official buildings there was also the Lung-chin i-hsüeh ## (Lung-chin Communal School), named after the small Lung-chin river nearby. The school's raison d'etre is significant. Just as the British presence in Hong Kong had necessitated strengthening the civil and military establishment at Kowloon, so had it highlighted the need to strengthen the inhabitants' moral fibres against Western decadence and materialism. The Hsin-an Magistrate, commenting on the founding of the school in 1847, declared that since Kowloon had become a point of interaction with barbarians, the inhabitants needed to be fortified morally, thus making a school necessary, and he even hoped that they might exert a civilizing influence on the intruders.
10
Built of blue baked bricks on a granite foundation, with granite lintels and frames to the entrance, the school was an imposing building with two main halls and two courtyards, much like the grander ancestral halls of the New Territories. Local literati were elected to the school board each year. The source of fund was irregular. A generous official occasionally made a donation; in the 1880s, a special rate was levied on the sale of suckling pig meat to subsidize the school expenses. Characteristically, public meetings, often attended by officials, were also held there. Its reflecting wall bore the characters "Hai-pin Tsou Lu" to denote a place of high moral and academic excellence by the sea, emphasizing how strongly Confucian orthodoxy still prevailed in this outpost of Empire. In 1897, an annex, a fine two-storeyed building called the K'uei-hsing ke (Kuei-hsing pavilion) was added, K'uei-hsing being the god who protected the literati. This shows that fifty years after its foundation, the school was still a going concern.
14
A small paper-burning pavilion stood near the East Gate. Traditionally, the Chinese literati revered the written word and, to
32
looking as though they would roll down any moment, it formed a dramatic and distinctive backdrop to the Walled City.
The City was primarily a garrison town. In 1898, the garrison numbered 544, with a civilian population of only 200, largely dependents of the military. By then the watch towers were being used as family dwellings.' Besides the several official buildings there was also the Lung-chin i-hsuch ## (Lung-chin Com- munal School), named after the small Lung-chin river nearby. The school's raison d'etre is significant. Just as the British presence in Hong Kong had necessitated strengthening the civil and military establishment at Kowloon, so had it highlighted the need to strengthen the inhabitants' moral fibres against Western deca- dence and materialism. The Hsin-an Magistrate, commenting on the founding of the school in 1847, declared that since Kowloon had become a point of interaction with barbarians, the inhabitants needed to be fortified morally, thus making a school necessary, and he even hoped that they might exert a civilizing influence on the intruders.
10
Built of blue baked bricks on a granite foundation, with granite lintels and frames to the entrance, the school was an imposing building with two main halls and two court yards, much like the grander ancestral halls of the New Territories." Local literati were elected to the school board each year. The source of fund was irregular. A generous official occasionally made a donation; in the 1880s, a special rate was levied on the sale of suckling pig meat to subsidize the school expenses." Characteristically, public meet- ings, often attended by officials, were also held there." Its reflect- ing wall bore the characters "Hai-pin Tsou Lu"
to de- note a place of high moral and academic excellence by the sea, emphasizing how strongly Confucian orthodoxy still prevailed in this outpost of Empire. In 1897, an annex, a fine two-storeyed building called the K'uei-hsing ke (Kuei-hsing pavilion)
was added, K'uei-hsing being the god who protected the literati. This shows that fifty years after its foundation, the school was still a going concern.
14
A small paper-burning pavilion stood near the East Gate. Tra- ditionally, the Chinese literati revered the written word and, to
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