[
    {
        "id": 206881,
        "series_id": 26,
        "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine",
        "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊",
        "series_use_hku_proxy": false,
        "document_key": "RAS-1973",
        "page_number": 158,
        "title": "RAS-1973",
        "content_text": "152\n\nNOTES AND QUERIES\n\nThe making of verses was a gentlemanly pursuit in early Victorian days, encouraged of course by the system of classical education which emphasised translation from Latin and Greek and hence a detailed knowledge of the rules—or mechanics—of prosody. Mercer received such a traditional education: he was educated at Exeter College, Oxford, where he took a B.A. degree, and for a time was at the Inner Temple, though he did not take the Bar examination. When he came to Hong Kong as his uncle's private secretary, he sought solace from the chores of day-to-day colonial administration in his poetic exercises and the result was Under the Peak.\n\nThere are five poems in this book—‘a string of sonnets’—which refer specifically to Hong Kong. They are, respectively: The Peak; The Bay; The Triads' Cave; The Water Fall; The Temple on Taplichow; The Pic Nic Cottage at Heong-Kong; and The Chinaman's Grave on the Lonely Hill Side. According to Mercer's note on the poem, The Triads' Cave, ‘a cavern romantically situated, has now disappeared before the utilitarian demand for granite. It was long the chosen resort of the members of the infamous San hop hwai, or Triad Society', where:\n\nThe robber horde oath-bound to mutual aid\n\nWould plan foul murder and unpitying raid\n\nO'er midnight counsel in their secret den?\n\nThe gem among these sonnets is without doubt The Chinaman's Grave, and should be given in extenso:\n\nOh Chow, or Wong! or by whatever name\n\nMen call'd thee, or the Gods may call thee now,\n\nWhy so extravagantly vast thy claim\n\nTo mortuary earth upon the brow\n\nOf yon fair hill? If all men spread as thou\n\nNo room for things created would be found\n\nThroughout the Seric land, but all the ground\n\nWould teem with graves, and well might it be said\n\nThat living ones were push'd from off their stools\n\nBy men all useless, now that they are dead\n\nAnd vanish'd. Did Confucius leave no rules\n\nTo bind a soul's ambition by the tomb?\n\nThen let survivors show themselves no fools,\n\nBut dig thy bones up to make elbow-room",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1973.txt",
        "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/8910rj06r",
        "rank": 0
    },
    {
        "id": 209880,
        "series_id": 26,
        "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine",
        "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊",
        "series_use_hku_proxy": false,
        "document_key": "RAS-1983",
        "page_number": 139,
        "title": "RAS-1983",
        "content_text": "117\n\nand rocky sides, and there were only a few places where agriculture could be carried on.\n\nThe population was of mixed origin, and for long was largely male. As late as 1911 the number of males to females, including children, was 1,041 to 396. However, like the number of boats and boat people in the anchorage, the numbers and proportions fluctuated. In 1897, the respective numbers had been 783 to 340,14\n\nThis population of landsmen came from the nearby districts of Kwangtung province. Their interests were looked after by three organizations named the Fuk Hing Fong, Luk Hing Fong and Sau Hing Fong (*****). They were formed by the (福祿壽慶坊) men of San On, Tung Kwun and a mixed group of men from other districts respectively.15 It is not known when they were established, but the available evidence points to the earlier part of the settlement's history. For reasons that will be given below, they amalgamated about 1930, when they took the name of Tung Hing Kung She (東興公社), meaning the Society of the Combined 'Hings', retaining the common part of their old names.10\n\nThe leaders of the three Fongs managed the affairs of the small Ap Lei Chau community. They looked after the structure of the local temples and came together to discuss district affairs whenever circumstances warranted. It was to the shops of the leaders that persons in need of assistance went in time of need. The connection between the main temple, the Fongs, and the Kaifong (街坊) of Ap Lei Chau is shown in a petition to the Director of Public Works dated 17 April 1893, which is styled 'the petition of Chung Tat Chi and others, Committees of the Hong Shing Temple at Aplichow and the Kaifong of Aplichow' (English translation of a Chinese text not now available). Chung is recalled locally as a prominent shopkeeper and the leader of one of the Fongs. Again, at a hearing to determine ownership of the Hung Shing temple in 1893, one witness said 'The Kaifong are the shopkeepers', and for our present purposes he might have added \"The shopkeepers are the leaders of the three Fongs.\"17\n\nHowever, I am more concerned here with the three Fongs. Religious duties were the most regular of their functions, and",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1983.txt",
        "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/j9607p61v",
        "rank": 0
    }
]