[
    {
        "id": 206483,
        "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-1972",
        "page_number": 31,
        "title": "RAS-1972",
        "content_text": "NINETEENTH CENTURY WATER-COLOURS OF CANTON\n\n25\n\nwhilst our original attackers were in our rear. There was no time to be lost, so we skirted along the base of the White Cloud Mountains, for then we knew we had only one flank to watch. In case of being hard pushed, we could get up and make a stand, and the struggle might be seen from the city walls, and relief be sent to us.\n\nThe fellows came out after us with their flags and their jingalls, running along at our side, and following in our rear, and banging away with really wonderfully bad luck they never could hit any one even by chance. Meanwhile we posted on as fast as we could, firing a shot every now and then, and when they came too near, sometimes making a little charge towards them, when, of course, away they scampered. But time was everything to us, and we could not afford to chase them, for as we passed each village we saw armed men turning out, and flags hoisted on the mandarin poles. One or two of the marine artillerymen got knocked up from fatigue and had to be put on the ponies; at last, after some five miles of this fun, on turning the corner of a hill, the pagodas of Canton rose before our eyes to our immense relief. Our pursuers evidently thought they had gone far enough and hauled off, and we sat down on the grass, and finished our cold chickens and beer, determined not to be done out of our pic-nic. We got in about five o'clock, after ten hours' enjoyment of rather mixed feelings.\n\nPresumably the artist was among the officers who took part in the 'picnic'. Unfortunately Col. Fisher does not name them.\n\nContinuing his account of events in Canton in the spring of 1858, Fisher states that \"in the middle of May some troops moved off for the expedition to the Pei-ho under Sir Michael Seymour; a company of Engineers went on the 11th from Canton; the 59th were taken up from Hong Kong, and on the 16th of June a detachment of Marine Artillery was removed from Canton for the same purpose.\" Again he mentions no names, but this corresponds with the departure of the Adventure from Hong Kong for the Peiho river on 22nd June 1858, and with paintings XX, XXV and XXVI of the present collection. The gunboat in painting number XX was the Slaney, commanded by a Lieutenant Hoskens. For the remainder of 1858, it seems, the artist stayed in or around Canton.\n\nFrom the information deduced from the paintings, the artist was almost certainly the Major Schomberg who arrived in Hong Kong on board the Adelaide on December 1st, 1857.",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1972.txt",
        "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/gm80qf99h",
        "rank": 0
    },
    {
        "id": 207036,
        "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-1974",
        "page_number": 107,
        "title": "RAS-1974",
        "content_text": "The Monuments of Vientiane and Luang Prabang\n\nMichael Smithies*\n\nThe second international tour organized by the Royal Asiatic Society, Hong Kong Branch, went over the Chinese (Lunar) New Year 1974 to Laos. 41 members and their guests visited Vientiane and Luang Prabang from 23 to 27 January, flying directly between Hong Kong and the Laotian capital. Some persons on the tour went ahead to visit Chiengmai in Thailand or Vat Phu in southern Laos and joined up with the main group later.\n\nThe attractions of the monuments of Vientiane, the administrative capital of the Kingdom of Laos, are slight in comparison to those in the royal capital of Luang Prabang. This is less a reflection of the religious fervour or artistic sensibility of the inhabitants of Vientiane, but a proof of the efficiency of the Siamese sack of the city in 1828 as a reprisal for Chao Anou's attempted attack on Bangkok two years previously and his subsequent alliance with Hué.\n\nVientiane's position in relation to Luang Prabang is ambivalent. Luang Prabang was the original capital of the Kingdom of Lane Xang (a million elephants) which was founded in 1353 by Fa Ngum, the son of a Lao chief who had been in exile in Angkor. King Potisarat moved the capital to Vientiane in 1520 and it was from the more central position of the kingdom, which then included much of the territory now in northeast Thailand, that the most famous Lao monarch, Souligna Vongsa, ruled from 1637-1694. On his death, however, the kingdom split into three, not counting the semi-independent existence of Xieng Khouang in the northeast: Vientiane, in alliance with Burma and a vassal of Annam; Luang Prabang, which at first drew support from China and later Siam; and in the south Champassak, which drew ever closer to Siam. The devastation of Vientiane by the Siamese in 1828 and the elimination of the line of Vientiane left in the centre a power vacuum, which the...\n\nMr. Smithies, at the time of this visit and report, Lecturer in French at the University of Hong Kong, was Secretary of the Hong Kong Branch 1972-73 and Councillor until his departure from the Colony in 1974. He organized and led this visit to Laos.",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1974.txt",
        "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/x633mp077",
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    },
    {
        "id": 213555,
        "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-1995",
        "page_number": 151,
        "title": "RAS-1995",
        "content_text": "120\n\nHe told me his name was Ayou and that he had lived two years in Boston; that formerly he was a comprador to Mr. Cushing at Canton, and afterwards lived with him in America. Preferring his own country, he returned, and now has a large alum establishment, in which, he says, he is doing good business; he added that a Chinaman who speaks both English and Chinese can make \"plenty money\" in China.\n\nThe many critics of Pidgin have, I think, missed the point: Pidgin worked. It allowed people to communicate quite effectively in a situation where to learn or teach standard English would have been totally impractical. I believe that Pidgin had, in addition to the advantage of overcoming superficial communication problems, the subtle advantage of bringing together people from totally different socio-linguistic backgrounds to speak in a language that was native to neither—that was not a minefield of cultural conventions which could make normal communication break down.\n\nSources of Pidgin\n\nSome readers will, I am sure, have had personal experience of China Coast Pidgin. I am indebted to a number of old people who have told me anecdotes of Pidgin from before the Pacific War. Unfortunately, this anecdotal evidence is very limited. I have only been able to obtain it from Europeans: we have not yet come across a Chinese who still has a working knowledge of the language. What we have taken down from native English speakers has often been \"normalized\" towards standard English. We shall now take some time to cover some of the more important written sources available to us.\n\nThe most frequently cited sources for Pidgin are by native English speakers. W.C. Hunter's books, mentioned earlier on, quote extensively from conversations in Pidgin.\n\nHunter's quotations cover an early period (1806-1854) and are generally consistent in style. They are, however, part of two books written for the casual reader. All the spelling is normalized to standard English; but they form a useful source and I have found his quotations in Pidgin generally consistent with other, unrelated sources.\n\nAnother source with a quantity of quotations from Pidgin is B. L.",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1995.txt",
        "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/95941j25g",
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    },
    {
        "id": 213572,
        "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-1995",
        "page_number": 168,
        "title": "RAS-1995",
        "content_text": "137\n\nRambles in Eastern Asia. B. L. Ball MD. Pb. James French & Co. Boston, 1855\n\n79 (1848) Capem, hab pilort? Capem, hab pilort?\n\n85 The Chinese servants are called \"boys\". It makes no difference if they are fifty years old; they are still called boys\n\n87 Boy, go catchee two piecey tea\n\n87 No can; that no my pigeon. My talkee that cooly man, he belong that pigeon... No can, no can I no sarvey that cooly man pigeon. I talkee he-he come chop-chop.\n\n91 I saw a Chinaman who spoke good English, and appeared so polite that I stopped a while, and entered into conversation with him. He told me his name was Ayou, and that he had lived two years in Boston; that formerly he was a comprador to Mr. Cushing at Canton, and afterwards lived with him in America. Preferring his own country, he returned, and now has a large alum establishment, in which, he says, he is doing good business; he added that a Chinaman who speaks both English and Chinese can make \"plenty money\" in China.\n\n95 Pay my money! Pay my money!\n\n100 Goo' morning, Sar! Kom in my shop? Have got plenty pooty things! Can sell um chipp! Kom make see, spose likee can do, spose no likee marsakec.\n\n107 Goo' morning, sair! How do, sair? Kum min' my shop now? Muchy curious thing, Ivery, motherer purl Kum make see litty!\n\n108 I no likey too muchy boberry my, I too muchy fear bad man have catchee you; hai ya, I too much glad you no makee spile 'um.\n\n118 Bum bye you kum my housy second teem. Two piecey man have got one teem. (there are two gentlemen together to see you.).\n\n127 I thinkee no makee boberry you, s'pose Cheenaman sarvey you. You `Mercky man; but no can sarvy true; alla same fashion, same facey, same closey, same lookey, no different fashion that Ingliss.",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1995.txt",
        "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/95941j25g",
        "rank": 0
    },
    {
        "id": 216355,
        "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-2003",
        "page_number": 114,
        "title": "RAS-2003",
        "content_text": "63\n\nA NEW DISCOVERY AND ITS SIGNIFICANCE: THE STATUTORY DECLARATIONS MADE BY SIR ROBERT HART CONCERNING HIS SECRET DOMESTIC LIFE IN 19TH CENTURY CHINA\n\nLAN LI AND DEIRDRE WILDY\n\n[Hon Editor: See also NOTES ON THE ROBERT HART PAPERS AT THE UNIVERSITY OF HONG KONG LIBRARY, JHKBRAS, Vol. 29, pp. 367-382]\n\nIntroduction\n\nSir Robert Hart (1835-1911) was one of the extraordinary Westerners who made a substantial contribution to both early China's modernisation and its foreign relations with the West. He was the only Westerner in the latter half of the nineteenth century to occupy an official post in the metropolitan bureaucracy—a position that allowed him daily access to China's highest officials in the Grand Council and Zongli Yamen. He built the first modern institution in China, the Chinese Imperial Maritime Custom (CIMC), and he also played a crucial role in China's imperial politics, significantly influencing its internal reform and diplomatic policy.\n\nDuring the early period of his life in China (1857-1865) Hart was involved in a sexual relationship with a Chinese girl called Ayaou. The relationship had a significant influence on Hart in that it immersed him deeper in Chinese society. Hart's success in China has been attributed to his good understanding of Chinese tradition. He acquired this capacity in a number of ways, one of which included a long-term intimate relationship with the Chinese girl Ayaou. Hence, Hart's secret domestic life is not simply the personal life of a Western man, who, according to the prevailing custom in the colonial Asia of the 1850s, kept a Chinese girl; it is more significant and, as Bruner, Fairbank, and Smith point out, \"does him credit as a human being\" and \"also shows his capacity for immersion in Chinese society and culture.\" (1986: 232)\n\nThe paper will examine and analyse the recently discovered statutory declarations made by Hart in 1905 and 1911. These documents provide us with new primary and significant material about Hart's relationship with Ayaou and his three children by her. This will address",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2003.txt",
        "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/2v242g390",
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    },
    {
        "id": 216356,
        "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-2003",
        "page_number": 115,
        "title": "RAS-2003",
        "content_text": "64\n\nsome of the vagueness that has been apparent in previous research on Hart's secret domestic life.\n\nDiscovery and transcription of the statutory declarations\n\nThe statutory declarations written by Sir Robert Hart were discovered in 2002 in the Special Collections, Queen's University Belfast (QUB). They are part of Hart's papers, which were donated to Queen's University Belfast by Hart's great-grandson, the last Sir Robert who died in 1970 without an heir.\n\nOne of the statutory declarations was produced by Hart on 19th August 1905 when he was in China; it details his previous non-marital relationship with the Chinese girl Ayaou and the three children from that relationship, and his marital relationship with Hester (Hessie) Jane Bredon and his son, Edgar Bruce from their marriage (this shall be known as \"Declaration 1\"). The other two statutory declarations were written by Hart at a later date on 20th December 1910 - exactly nine months before he died - at his London home (38 Cadogan Place). The content of one of these declarations is similar to that of Declaration 1, but this time Hart changes the way he describes the relationships (this shall be known as \"Declaration 2\"). A third statutory declaration details his marital relationship with Hester Jane Bredon, his three children from their marriage, and their subsequent marriages (this shall be known as \"Declaration 3\"). Four documents are attached to Declaration 2 and 3, marked \"A\", \"B\", \"C\", and \"D\" respectively. The document marked \"A\" is the marriage certificate of Hart and Hester Jane Bredon, and the documents marked respectively \"B\", \"C\", and \"D\" are birth certificates for the children from Hart's marriage to Hester Jane Bredon.\n\nTo give readers a clearer and more general idea about the contents of the declarations, we have transcribed the relevant items as follows.\n\nDeclaration 1:\n\nWhen I arrived in China in 1854, I found that any acquaintance I made kept his Chinese girl, and in 1857 I fell into the habit myself. The girl kept by me was a Cantonese named Ayaou. She was with me at Ningpo during 1857 and went with me when transferred to Canton in February 1858; I left her then at Macao, and, although",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2003.txt",
        "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/2v242g390",
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    },
    {
        "id": 216357,
        "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-2003",
        "page_number": 116,
        "title": "RAS-2003",
        "content_text": "65\n\nshe continued to be kept i.e. paid ($30 a month) by me till I went home on leave in 1866, we never lived together afterwards and very rarely met. Between 1858 & 1864 she gave birth to three children. In 1866 the connection was dissolved and Ayaou was then presented with $3000 when she surrendered her children to my agent and herself married a Chinaman. The children were sent to England and it was arranged that W. Hutchins my lawyer should take charge of them: I then entrusted him with £6000 for their benefit. They were described as my wards and were named respectively Anna, Herbert and Arthur. At the time W. Hutchins took charge they were lodging with one of the employees of Smith, Elder & Co. Anna died some years ago: [,] Arthur went about the same time to Canada and recently Herbert left England to join him there. I never saw any of the children of Ayaou's since they left China, and, while in China, I believe I only saw Anna twice or three times, Herbert once, and Arthur never. As they were all born while Ayaou was kept by me I decided to provide them respectably, and did so, rather than leave them to their fate in China. Ayaou was a very good little girl & well-behaved but we were not married, and she was not my wife, and her children were illegitimate.\n\nI was married to Hester Jane Bredon in 1866: [,] she is my wife: [.] I was never married to any other: [,] her son Edgar Bruce is my only legitimate son, and is the legitimate heir to the Baronetcy!\n\nI certify the above statement to be true in every respect,\n\nRobert Hart (signature) Peitaiho, 19th August 1905\n\nDeclaration 2., Item 12:\n\n1. In the year 1857 when in China I formed a connection with a Chinese girl named Ayaon.* At that time it was a common practice",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2003.txt",
        "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/2v242g390",
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    },
    {
        "id": 216358,
        "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-2003",
        "page_number": 117,
        "title": "RAS-2003",
        "content_text": "66\n\nfor unmarried Englishmen resident in China to keep a Chinese girl and I did as others did. Ayaon lived with me at Ningpo during 1857 and went with me when I was transferred to Canton in February 1858. Later in the same year I left her at Macao and from that time ceased to live with her and saw her but seldom, though I continued to pay her monthly sum of thirty dollars for her support down to the time of our connection being finally terminated as after mentioned. Between 1858 and 1864 she gave birth to three children. In 1866 I went home on leave and on that occasion the connection between Ayaon and myself was finally dissolved. I paid her the sum of three thousand dollars and she married a Chinaman. As all the children were born while Ayaon was being kept by me I decided to provide for them respectably and accordingly I made it part of the arrangement for separation that she should surrender her children to my Agent and she did so. I had the children sent to England to be educated and launched in the world and I settled a sum of six thousand pounds for their benefit which sum has long since been divided and distributed between them. Their names were Anna, Herbert and Arthur. To the best of my recollection and belief I have seen Anna twice or thrice only and Herbert once only. This was in China. I have never seen Arthur. Anna died some seventeen years ago and about the same time Arthur went to Canada, Herbert married and in or about the year 1905 went to Canada to join Arthur.\n\nHart's main purpose for producing the documents\n\nBetween 1904 and 1905, Hart was troubled by two of his children by Ayaou, Herbert and Arthur. The Court and Personal Column of the Morning Post for June 30, 1905, reported (ibid: 1480): \"Mr. Herbert Hart, eldest son of Sir Robert Hart, Bart., of Hong Kong, together with Mrs Hart and their only son left Liverpool by the steamer Bavarian yesterday for Ontario, Canada”. Hart's wife, Lady Hart visited the Morning Post soon after she learnt the news and the next day the newspaper made the following correction (ibid): \"We find that the paragraph in our issue of yesterday announcing the departure of Mr Herbert Hart for Canada does not relate to the only son of Sir Robert Hart, Bart., Inspector General of Chinese Imperial Maritime Customs, Peking.\"",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2003.txt",
        "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/2v242g390",
        "rank": 0
    },
    {
        "id": 216359,
        "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-2003",
        "page_number": 118,
        "title": "RAS-2003",
        "content_text": "67\n\nShortly after this incident in his letter to his London agent and confidant, James Duncan Campbell (ibid: 1478), Hart responded to the attempts at blackmail by one of his wards, Herbert, who demanded money from him:\n\nMy principle, in a general sense, is to \"face the music\" and pay no \"blackmail\" - but this has to be whittled into fitting form so as to cause as little worry as possible to others. I wish you had dipped deeper into my purse and sent off Herbert with £100 instead of only a \"Five Pound Note\".\n\nIn the same letter, Hart also referred to an incident in 1904 involving the two wards (ibid: 1479):\n\nI dare say we shall hear more of Herbert and Arthur from Canada: already a year ago someone who signed \"E. B. Hart\" wrote me from Canada saying a young man was moving about using my name (possibly Arthur) and asking me to authorise denial!\n\nIn the end of the letter Hart also wrote a post script mentioning that Lady Hart and her daughter, Nollie, planned to visit America, even this caused him disquiet (ibid);\n\nLady H. and Nollie propose visiting America this autumn: I don't want to dissuade them, but it is possible Herbert may find them out and something disagreeable may occur.\n\nIt indicates that Hart was concerned by these recurring troubles. He realised the repercussions of his 'mistake' were far from over. It is in this context that he wrote the first statutory declaration - Declaration 1, dated 19th August 1905, only 8 days after he wrote the letter mentioned above to Campbell. In the declaration, Hart, after detailing his non-marital relationship with Ayaou and the illegitimacy of his three children by her, declares clearly that \"I was married to Hester Jane Bredon in 1866; she is my wife: her son Edgar Bruce is my only legitimate son, and is the legitimate heir to the Baronetcy!\" It is obvious that although Hart was annoyed with Herbert for his attempts at blackmail, Hart's main concern is not money but the inheritance of his title. The fact that Herbert himself made claim in the newspaper - \"eldest son of Sir Robert Hart\" - and also the possibility that Arthur moved about using Hart's",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2003.txt",
        "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/2v242g390",
        "rank": 0
    },
    {
        "id": 216360,
        "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-2003",
        "page_number": 119,
        "title": "RAS-2003",
        "content_text": "68\n\nJ\n\nname must have caused him deep concern. According to the common law prevailing at the time Hart wrote the document, “a child was illegitimate if it was not born in wedlock” and “the illegitimate child had no rights of succession\" (R. H. Graveson and F. R. Crane 1957: 42-3). However, Hart's arrangements for Ayaou and his three children by her after the termination of their relationship could lead to confusion if there was a court case. From Declaration 1 and 2, we know that Hart took custody of his three wards by Ayaou and spent a huge sum of money supporting their living and education in England. He also provided Ayaou with a large sum of money when they separated. If Hart had not made a legal statement detailing his non-marital relationship with Ayaou and the illegitimacy of his three children by her, it may have been difficult to prove, after his death, that his three wards by Ayaou were definitely illegitimate and consequently without legal rights of succession.\n\nDeclaration 1 was written on Hart's own official writing paper and it is much less formal than Declaration 2 and 3, the latter were formally declared before a Commissioner for Oaths and with the words \"do solemnly and sincerely declare as follows\". In fact, when Hart made Declaration 2 and 3 in 1910, two of his wards by Ayaou, Anna and Herbert had already died; however, past experience must have made him alert to the possibility that his surviving ward, Arthur and any grandchildren from his three wards might cause some trouble for his family after his death. In Declaration 2, he stresses what he stated in his previous declaration - Declaration 1: \"Ayaou and I were never married. She was not my wife. Her three children above referred to were illegitimate\". It indicates that Hart wants to make sure that his three children from his marriage to Hester Jane Bredon are his only descendents with legal rights of succession.\n\nHart's wife, Lady Hart may have encouraged him to prepare such a document. As mentioned above, she herself had experienced trouble from one of Hart's wards, Herbert, and she visited the Morning Post immediately after she learnt the news that Herbert had announced, in that newspaper, his departure from England by calling himself \"eldest son of Sir Robert Hart\". Lady Hart's prompt reaction to the issue indicates that she was conscious enough of Hart's relationship with Ayaou and his three children by her. From Hart's letter to Campbell we know that Hart didn't think Lady Hart's visit to the Morning Post a good idea and he worried that her visit might be \"good 'fuel' for a",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2003.txt",
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    {
        "id": 216361,
        "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-2003",
        "page_number": 120,
        "title": "RAS-2003",
        "content_text": "69\n\n6\n\npossible conflagration” (ibid: 1478). Although both Hart and Lady Hart were deeply concerned about the issue, they may each have had a different focus. For Hart, his main priority was his considerable reputation as Inspector General (I.G.) of the CIMC - a position of importance spanning almost forty years at this stage (1905) and inheritance of his title - the Baronetcy, while Lady Hart's main concerns were domestic matters and family interest. She married Hart in 1866 when she was 18 and Hart was 31 years of age (Bell, 1985: 24). After marriage, she spent ten years living with Hart in Beijing and then prepared herself to see the wider world. She left China in 1882 and did not return again until 1906. She “enjoyed living alone” (Bell, 1903), “a house in a good part of London, together with a handsome allowance and costly presents, all provided by Hart” (Bruner, Fairbank and Smith 1986: 323). Although Hart did not tell her anything about Ayaou and his three children by her in the first few months of their falling in love, he did later confess to the \"mistakes\" he made. She took Hart's advice and married him for the future and established a firm marital relationship with him. However, she certainly did not want to see the previous relationship between Hart and Ayaou causing any trouble during her married life. The incident orchestrated by Herbert must have worried her and made her feel the need for a legal document to prevent her family from being troubled by the wards or their descendants after Hart's death, perhaps particularly, with regard to the inheritance of his title and property.\n\nHart's confession to the relationship with Ayaou\n\nIn Declaration 1 and 2, Hart gives a full statement of his relationship with Ayaou. This provides us with a version of his confession that might well indicate the way in which he confessed to the relationship before. Although Hart completely severed his relationship with Ayaou before returning home on leave in 1866, it seemed it was not possible for him to look to the future without some shadow of the past. Hart felt all the awkwardness of his position when confessing to his fiancée Miss Hester Jane Bredon. In his diary, 13 June 1866, Hart writes:\n\n“Let the dead past bury its dead:”- that is easy enough: what is not so easy is to keep the future free from intrusiveness on the part of the products of the past. Does complete confidence mean “to have no secrets for the future”, or “to reveal all that has been done in the past”? (Smith, Fairbank, Burner 1991: 384)\n\nPage 120\n\nPage 121",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2003.txt",
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    {
        "id": 216362,
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        "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine",
        "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊",
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        "document_key": "RAS-2003",
        "page_number": 121,
        "title": "RAS-2003",
        "content_text": "70\n\nIn his letter to Hester on 15 August 1866 he confessed to an impetuous engagement in 1856 to an English young lady at Ningpo. This was quickly broken up by her father's refusal to accept a young consular employee so lacking in material goods and worldly prospects. However, Hart did not mention his long relationship with Ayaou and fathering three children (ibid: 364). In the letter Hart's dilemma is apparent - he wanted to be truthful to Hester on one hand, but, on the other hand, he felt too embarrassed to tell her the full truth. He repeated what he said to her before: \"Remember, Hessie, you are marrying me for the future\" (Smith, Fairbank, and Bruner 1991: 428), and also convinced her to accept the reality that \"men generally don't attain my age without having gone through both fire and water; I have gone through both, but I flatter myself the result has been of a kind which burns out sores, and washes out stains.\" (ibid: 428-9)\n\nLater in the same year, however, Hart did confess to his relationship with Ayaou. In his letter to Campbell on 11 August 1905, Hart writes: \"I proffered the information in 1866, but was told the past was the past and the future the future: so I said no more.\" (Fairbank, Bruner and Matheson 1975: 1479) The fact that Lady Hart visited the Morning Post when she learnt that Herbert was mentioned in the newspaper also indicates that she knew of Hart's relationship with Ayaou and his three children by her.\n\nHowever, it is not known to what Hart confessed or how he did so. In Declaration 1 and 2 we find, for the first time, a version of Hart's confession to his relationship with Ayaou and three children by her. Firstly he said:\n\nWhen I arrived China in 1854 I found that any acquaintance I made kept his Chinese girl and in 1857 I fell into the habit myself. The girl kept by me was a Cantonese named Ayaou. (Declaration 1)\n\nIn Declaration 2, he makes a similar statement:\n\nIn the year 1857 when in China I formed a connection with a Chinese girl named Ayaou. At that time it was a common practice for unmarried Englishmen resident in China to keep a Chinese girl and I did as others did.",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2003.txt",
        "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/2v242g390",
        "rank": 0
    },
    {
        "id": 216363,
        "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-2003",
        "page_number": 122,
        "title": "RAS-2003",
        "content_text": "71\n\nHart referred to his conduct as \"a common practice\" at that time and confessed that he just \"fell into the habit myself\" and \"did as others did\", which is, unfortunately, no excuse at all. Bruner, Fairbank and Smith suggest, \"one of the many perquisites of the Westerner's higher living standard in China was his being supplied with Chinese women. Thus, \"Robert Hart's solution to his problem of solitude was nothing unusual and followed established norm\". (1986: 153) Bickers also suggests that \"In the earlier stage of the British presence concubinage with Chinese women was common, and not considered abnormal; indeed, it appears to have been encouraged, as a sort of release\". (1999: 98) Paul King, an Englishman who joined CIMC in 1874, writes in his book In the Chinese Custom Service (1980: 25):\n\nIn those days the only \"social\" intercourse between Chinese and foreigners was conducted by women of the \"Mui-tsai\" class. In justice it must be recalled that the Chinese housekeeper often did a good deal to keep her temporary lord and master straight, especially in matters of drink, or tendency to stray off to less supervised and possibly dangerous-to-health pastures.\n\nPerhaps Hart knew that the most convincing point he could make, to avoid too much embarrassment when he confessed to his relationship with Ayaou, would be the explanation that his conduct was not simply a personal sin or weakness, but a mistake anyone, in the given circumstances at that time, would possibly, or even inevitably, have made. Following this point, Hart confessed:\n\nAyaou lived with me at Ningpo during 1857 and went with me when I was transferred to Canton in February 1858. Later in the same year I left her at Macao and from that time ceased to live with her and saw her but seldom though I continued to pay her monthly sum of thirty dollars for her support down to the time of our connection being finally terminated as after mentioned. (Declaration 2)\n\nIf it was true that Hart \"ceased to live with her and saw her but seldom\" from 1858, it is difficult to understand how Ayaou gave birth to his three children after 1858 and why Hart left the second gap in his diaries between 6 December 1858 and 6 June 1863 - a period during which he must have had an intimate relationship with Ayaou. Indeed,",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2003.txt",
        "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/2v242g390",
        "rank": 0
    },
    {
        "id": 216364,
        "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-2003",
        "page_number": 123,
        "title": "RAS-2003",
        "content_text": "72\n\nhe did want to sever the relationship with Ayaou in 1858 when she first became pregnant. In his diary entry for 26 May 1858 he writes \"Ayaou two months\n\n\"Then, on 16 September \"I went to see Ayaou who came back from Macao the night before last... I must cut the connection. He even started managing a new native partner named Ayi. On 22 September he wrote: \"...Went to see Ayi near N.E. gate.\" 23 September: \"Settle for Ayi $100 and $22Ch. ...\" 26 September: \"Again Ayi.” The arrangement, as it is suggested by Bruner, Fairbank and Smith, is \"undoubtedly quite according to custom in the colonial Asia of the 1850s”. (1986: 232)\n\nHowever, Hart's diary entries stop two months and ten days later when Ayaou would have given, or be about to give, birth to their daughter Anna. \"The fact of fatherhood suddenly makes a difference to Robert Hart. There is no other way to account for the record, for he resumes the connection with Ayaou and they have two more children.\" (ibid) Hart might have changed the way in which he maintained the relationship since he left her at Macao - as he states in Declaration 1: \"we never lived together afterwards\" - and in that sense he could say he \"ceased to live with her\". But, it is by no means obvious that he terminated the relationship and only \"saw her but seldom”. His emotional and physical involvement in the relationship is much deeper than that which he describes above, it is significant that in Declaration 1 we find the statement: \"Ayaou was a very good little girl & well-behaved.\" Almost ten years after he finally terminated the relationship and married Hester Jane Bredon, he received photographs of his three wards from England. He wrote to Campbell (Fairbank, Bruner and Matheson 1975: 205);\n\nAnna is very like what her mother was when I first saw her in 1857: only her mother was not pock-marked. I want Anna to stay at school four years more, and I hope she will be a nice, presentable girl by that time. Her mother was one of the most amiable and sensible people imaginable.\"\n\nThe records show that Hart did not only treat Ayaou and his three children by her with kindness and generosity, but also with love. As Bruner, Fairbank and Smith have argued (1986: 154):\n\nIndeed, looking ahead at his twenty years of married life with",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2003.txt",
        "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/2v242g390",
        "rank": 0
    },
    {
        "id": 216365,
        "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-2003",
        "page_number": 124,
        "title": "RAS-2003",
        "content_text": "73\n\nHester Jane Bredon (1866-1886) and the subsequent twenty-two years of living alone in Peking after Lady Hart moved back to enjoy life in London, we may surmise that Hart's years of liaison with Ayaou (roughly 1857-1865) gave him his fill of romance, including both his satisfactions and its limitations. For whatever reason, after that his need for feminine companionship declined as he steadily and inexorably became more enamoured of managing the Chinese Imperial Maritime Custom Service.\n\nThis point can be proved by what Hart says in his diary entry for 23 July 1864:\n\nMerely, I presume, that I have gotten through the \"love-fever, 20@30, term of life, and that for the future something other than woman will chiefly attract me. (Smith, Fairbank, Bruner 1991: 384)\n\nHart, of course, did not want to embarrass his family by confessing to a long relationship with Ayaou, a relationship that affected his life in so many ways, including his first experience of fatherhood. Thus, in Declaration 1 and 2 he attempted to reduce the extent of his relationship with Ayaou. He even covered up the year when his third child by Ayaou was born so that the duration of his sexual relationship with Ayaou was made even shorter. (We will give a more detailed analysis of this issue later in the paper.)\n\nHart also attempted to reduce the extent of his relationship with his children by Ayaou. In Declaration 2 he stated: \"To the best of my recollection and belief I have seen Anna twice or three times only and Herbert once only. This was in China. I have never seen Arthur.\" It might be true that, as suggested before, Hart never had a chance to see his youngest son Arthur, as his intimate relationship with Ayaou might have ceased before the boy was born. However, it seems unlikely that he saw Anna \"twice or three times only and Herbert once only\". It was fatherhood that made Hart cease his relationship with his new native partner Ayi and resume his relationship with Ayaou. If he had not had both enjoyment with and responsibility for his children by Ayaou, particularly the girl Anna, he would have already abandoned Ayaou in 1858. It has been argued that (Bruner, Fairbank, Smith 1986: 232) Hart “was a man of conscience and in later life affectionate, almost doting, toward little girls and young women. One can imagine how his baby",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2003.txt",
        "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/2v242g390",
        "rank": 0
    },
    {
        "id": 216366,
        "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-2003",
        "page_number": 125,
        "title": "RAS-2003",
        "content_text": "74\n\ndaughter Anna must have entranced him.\" Many years later when he wrote to Campbell, he still revealed his paternal care for the wards. He wanted Anna to attend a good boarding school where not only “she can devote herself to music, French, and German\", but also \"where she will be comfortably lodged and kindly treated.” (Fairbank, Bruner, Matheson 1975: 192-3)\n\n5.\n\nAlthough Hart did not confess, perhaps in his lifetime he had never confessed, fully to his relationship with Ayaou and his three children by her, what he states in Declaration 1 and 2 has given us a clearer idea of his secret domestic life in late 19th China. It indicates that Hart felt affection for Ayaou, though the relationship was initially established for a temporary relief of sexual desire. It also indicates that such a relationship caused considerable hardship to those involved. It should be noted that Hart made his statement concerning his sexual relationship with the Chinese girl Ayaou when the social norms concerning mixed-race relationships between British men and Chinese women had changed fundamentally. When describing his life in the treaty port, Swatow during 1874 to 1878, Paul King states (1980:25);\n\nHappily, all this is changed and gone for ever. The number of marriageable girls of his own race all over China gives no excuse to a white man seeking a helpmeet to risk entangling alliances with native blood; but as a temporary measure in the old dark days—well, perhaps better not to hazard an opinion.\n\nBickers also suggests (1999: 98)\n\nThe twentieth-century treaty ports were still largely bachelor societies, although the proportion of families settled there grew steadily. As elsewhere in the colonial world, British men took native partners when there was a shortage of fellow Britons or other Europeans. The presence of European women—and after 1917 especially the influx of White Russian refugees—made stable sexual relations with Chinese as much as 'unnecessary' as taboo.\n\nThe change of social norms meant that Hart's relationship with Ayaou was no longer simply a personal secret or a private matter, but an issue with regard to social conceptions, norms, and even rules which were followed by British society in China in the early twentieth century. Thus, in the declarations Hart had to make the new version of his",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2003.txt",
        "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/2v242g390",
        "rank": 0
    },
    {
        "id": 216367,
        "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-2003",
        "page_number": 126,
        "title": "RAS-2003",
        "content_text": "75\n\nconfession as similar as possible to that which he made in 1866 to his fiancée Miss Hester Jane Bredon, but also acceptable at this later date - almost half a century after his relationship with Ayaou.\n\nHart's ceasing and resuming his sexual relationship with Ayaou\n\nThe duration of Hart's sexual relationship with Ayaou has long been vague to researchers due to limited primary sources concerned with this matter. It has only been possible to give a rough idea: \"Hart's years of liaison with Ayaou (roughly 1857-1865)...\" (Bruner, Fairbank, Smith 1986: 154)\n\nIn Declaration 2 Hart himself states: \"Ayaou lived with me at Ningpo during 1857 and went with me when I was transferred to Canton in February 1858. ... In 1866 I went home on leave and on that occasion the connection between Ayaou and myself was finally dissolved.\" This confirms that Hart did indeed start his relationship with Ayaou in 1857, but it was not finally terminated until 1866. This, however, does not necessarily mean that Hart maintained a sexual relationship with Ayaou for this time. In his diary entry for 6 August 1864 Hart writes:\n\nTemptation to get a concubine is very strong, I must confess: nothing bothers me so much, as my liking for women. It is, however, more than a year since I even touched one! (Smith, Fairbank, Bruner 1991: 171)\n\nIn his diaries entry for the 14 August 1864 he also writes: \"Now, for a whole year, I have on principle abstained from womanising.” (ibid: 179) These records give us a clue to the time when he ceased his sexual relationship with Ayaou. If \"more than a year\" is traced from 6 August 1864 back or “a whole year\" from 14 August 1864 back, we are talking about the summer of 1863. This tallies with the time indicated in the second gap left in Hart's diaries: it starts on 6 December 1858 and ends on 6 June 1863 - ending at the exact time when he started to abstain from womanising. It indicates that Hart did not have a sexual relationship with Ayaou between the early summer 1863 and the late August 1864.\n\nIn both Declaration 1 and 2, Hart states: \"Between 1858 and 1864",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2003.txt",
        "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/2v242g390",
        "rank": 0
    },
    {
        "id": 216368,
        "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-2003",
        "page_number": 127,
        "title": "RAS-2003",
        "content_text": "76\n\nshe gave birth to three children.” It seems to tally with that stated above, indicating: Hart's sexual relationship with Ayaou starts in 1857 and ends in early summer 1863. However, On 5 June 1875 in a letter to Campbell, Hart mentions his wards, giving his third child's age: \"Arthur is almost ten years old\". (Fairbank, Bruner and Matheson 1975: 192) According to this Arthur should be born around June 1865, rather than in 1864 as Hart states. This can be further supported by 1881 British Census, which was taken on the evening of Sunday 3 April 1881 and shows that Arthur was 15.\nIt indicates that Hart must have had a sexual relationship with Ayaou some time between the end of August and the middle of September 1864 otherwise it would be impossible for Arthur to be born around June 1865. This raises the question: did Hart resume his sexual relationship with Ayaou even after he had struggled desperately with his natural desire for women for more than a year since the early summer of 1863?\n\n7\n\nIn Declaration 1 and 2, Hart states that he paid Ayaou $30 per month until their relationship finally terminated in 1866.\n\nShe was with me at Ningpo during 1857 and went with me when transferred to Canton in February 1858: [.] I left her then at Macao, and, although she continued to be kept i.e. paid ($30 a month) by me till I went home on leave in 1866...(Declaration 1)\n\nLater in the same year I left her at Macao and from that time ceased to live with her and saw her but seldom, though I continued to pay her monthly sum of thirty dollars for her support down to the time of our connection being finally terminated as after mentioned. (Declaration 2)\n\nIn his diary entry for 29 October 1854 Hart says: \"Now some of the China women are very good looking: you can make one your absolute possession for from 50 to 100 dollars and support her at a cost of 2 or 3 dollars per month.\" (Bruner, Fairbank, and Smith, 1986: 71) According to this, Hart obviously paid above the average for keeping a Chinese girl at that time, particularly after 1863 when he ceased the sexual relationship with Ayaou. In his diary entry for 25 November 1854 Hart tells us his monthly salary: “My salary is $71.65 per month\". (ibid: 84) We don't know how much Hart earned during 1857 and 1866, his salary probably increased considerably when he became LG, in November",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2003.txt",
        "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/2v242g390",
        "rank": 0
    },
    {
        "id": 216369,
        "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-2003",
        "page_number": 128,
        "title": "RAS-2003",
        "content_text": "77\n\n1863. However, $30 was still a lot of money at that time. If Hart had completely ceased his sexual relationship with Ayaou and never resumed it after 1863, it would not seem to be necessary for him to continue to pay Ayaou a monthly sum of $30 until 1866. Some may argue that Hart paid Ayaou the money not just to keep her, but also to contribute to the upbringing of their children; however, the words Hart uses in his statement do not give us any indication of this. He states that \"she continued to be kept i.e. paid ($30 a month) by me till I went home on leave in 1866 (Declaration 1)\"; it appears to refer to female companionship.\n\nIt may also be argued that in his diary entries between 1864 and 1866, there is no mention of his having resumed his sexual relationship with Ayaou, and if he had, he would have recorded it as he did in the missing volumes of his earlier diaries. Hart did tidy up his diaries after he was asked by reporter Hosea B. Morse for permission to see them in connection with a proposed biography in 1902, and he also left two substantial gaps in the earlier diaries. However, this fact does not necessarily mean that Hart \"was forced to destroy\" some of his earlier diaries, as has been suggested (Bruner, Fairbank, Smith 1986: 150-1). Hart actually left half of Volume 2 with empty pages and almost the same again with Volume 3; these form the two gaps in his diaries. This allows for the possibility that Hart simply did not write anything between 29 July 1855 and 20 March 1858, nor between 6 December 1858 and 9 May 1863. Hart himself states on the flyleaf of Volume 4 “Journals from 6 Dec. 1858 @ [to] May 1863 lost, probably in the Boxer siege 1900\", and this may be deliberately misleading on his part when one considers the empty pages. It is more likely that during his intimate involvement with Chinese women, more particularly with Ayaou, he simply stopped writing in his diary. This gives us an indication that Hart avoided mention of his intimate relationship in any depth in his diaries.\n\nHart's abstinence from womanising and his political ambition\n\nIt should be noted that Hart decided to cease his sexual relationship with Ayaou around early summer 1863—the exact time, if it is not simply a coincidence, when he knew almost for certain that he would be appointed as L.G. Hart was formally appointed as L.G. of the CIMC",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2003.txt",
        "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/2v242g390",
        "rank": 0
    },
    {
        "id": 216370,
        "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-2003",
        "page_number": 129,
        "title": "RAS-2003",
        "content_text": "78\n\non 15 November 1863. However, as Wright suggested, \"Hart's appointment as full Inspector-General was a foregone conclusion.\" (1950: 258) As early as June 11, 1863 a high-ranking Chinese official, Wen Xiang, gave Hart to understand that he would be the best candidate to replace Lay if he left (Wang, 2000: 63).\n\nHart took the position of I.G. very seriously and he was a man with great ambitions for power and honour. From his diaries, we know that between early summer 1863 and August 1864 he struggled desperately with his natural desire for womanising. This coincides directly with the period during which he prepared himself for and was finally appointed to the post of I.G. His expressions, such as \"They set my blood on fire\", \"desperate struggle\", \"This war of passion and principle is horrible”, and “I am mad upon the pleasure of the couch”, indicate that Hart's battle with his desire to womanise was a constant struggle. He even went so far as to say \"were I always to remain in China, I might do as the Chinese do - for though socially I consider polygamy inexpedient in the west, I do not think it inexpedient in China, nor do I consider it morally wrong in itself.\" (Smith, Fairbank, Bruner 1991:179) Although mention of his romantic chatting and pressing of hands with the girls next door is no longer present in his diaries after August 1864, it does not necessarily mean that he had finally won the battle. He still laments female intimacy and cannot stop dreaming of how happy his life would be if he could have a girl in the room with him:\n\nO Woman, lovely woman! And yet it is sexual desire - it is, I fear, more brute passion, than desire for the society of women. I like to have a girl in the room with me, to fondle when I please: and I like to have something to be affectionate with, for I have got a great stock of love in my nature. (ibid)\n\nHe chides himself constantly: \"If I don't care, passion will be off with me - confound it!\" (ibid: 180) It is obvious that during August 1864 Hart was not emotionally settled although he was determined not to go back to his old womanising ways. In this situation, the possibility that he resumed his sexual relationship with Ayaou, even occasionally, should not be ruled out, especially given the fact that their third child, Arthur, was born sometime after June 5th in 1865. Although Hart forced himself to terminate his intimate relationship with Ayaou when pursuing the position of I.G. during the period 1863 and 1864, he never disliked",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2003.txt",
        "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/2v242g390",
        "rank": 0
    },
    {
        "id": 216371,
        "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-2003",
        "page_number": 130,
        "title": "RAS-2003",
        "content_text": "79\n\nher in his lifetime12, almost forty years after Hart terminated his relationship with Ayaou he still said of her: “Ayaou is a very good little girl & well-behaved.”13\n\nHowever, although Hart seems to have resumed his sexual relationship with Ayaou in late 1864, he did not go back to his old ways. Hart increasingly thought more about something other than women. As early as 23 July 1864 he writes in his diary:\n\n“I used to revel in reveries about women; hour and hour could I spend without the slightest sense of weariness or satiety, in picturing to myself the delights and concomitants of female society. Now, however, when I attempt such a reverie, I soon lapse from it into something much serious, and cannot keep it up.” (Smith, Fairbank, Burner 1991; 160-1)\n\nHe presumes that “for the future some thing other than woman will chiefly attract me. I wonder what folly it will be: will it be love of money, ambition, or what?” (ibid) It indicates that between 1863 and 1864 Hart went through a crucial stage in his life: he transformed himself from an emotionally and psychologically unsettled youngster to a mature man. With this transition Hart was more resolute about his determination to refrain from womanising and in his diary entry for 4 February 1866, he writes: “Went to Church today, & took the sacrament. I am determined, with God's help, not to go back into my old ways, and I must fortify myself against the temptations I am so soon to meet by availing myself of those means of grace which Christians use.” (ibid: 344) Since then “The devils had met their match. For the next 45 years the I.G. would grow increasingly famous for his self-control in all circumstances.” (ibid: 130)\n\nThus it is possible to draw the following conclusions. Hart started his sexual relationship with Ayaou in 1857, the relationship ceased temporarily between early summer 1863 and late August 1864 - a crucial period of time in his life when he prepared himself to be and finally became I.G. However, Hart resumed his sexual relationship with Ayaou in the autumn of 1864 resulting in the birth of their third child sometime after June 5th 1865.",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2003.txt",
        "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/2v242g390",
        "rank": 0
    },
    {
        "id": 216372,
        "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-2003",
        "page_number": 131,
        "title": "RAS-2003",
        "content_text": "80\n\nHart's arrangements for separation\n\nHow the relationship between Hart and Ayaou was terminated has long been a cause of speculation. L. K. Little, successor of Maze as I. G., writes in the introduction to \"The I.G. in Peking\" - \"In a private letter to me the late Stanley Wright, author of Hart and the Chinese Customs, wrote, 'Hart was married to a Chinese lady in his early days, but she was dead before his marriage to Miss Bredon,' (1975; Introduction). B. Wang, the author of the book \"Biography of Sir Robert Hart\" also suggested that Hart's happy personal life in China ceased in 1865 when Ayaou suddenly died, and this is the main reason for Hart's decision to return home on leave and find a girl to marry (2000: 97). However, the scholars, who edited Hart's early journals, noticed that Hart received letters from Ayaou in 1870 and 1872, and they noted that she \"later married a Chinese\" (Smith, Fairbank, and Bruner, 1991: 363).\n\n15\n\nIn Declaration 1, referring to his separation from Ayaou, Hart declares, “she was then presented with $3000 when she surrendered her children to my Agent and herself married a Chinaman.\" In Declaration 2, a similar statement is made: \"I paid her the sum of three thousand dollars1 and she married a Chinaman.”15 This confirms that Ayaou certainly did not die in 1865 but married a Chinaman after receipt of a large sum of money from Hart, a condition of their separation. Ayaou probably did not want to sever the connection with Hart even though she must now have realised it was inevitable. Hart, who by this time was no longer a young and inexperienced assistant for the British Consulate at Canton, but a powerful man in both the CIMC and the Qing government, had to resolve the problem by making an arrangement acceptable to Ayaou. Money must have been given serious consideration, as it would have been a precondition of the relationship for both sides in the first instance. As Bruner, Fairbank, and Smith suggest: (1986:153)\n\nThe girl Ayaou was not a solitary adventuress but came undoubtedly from a proper though lower-class background under the sponsorship of a compradore or other reliable party. Hart's upkeep of her must have included a regular monetary payment, a portion of which reimbursed her family.\n\nIn Hart's diaries requests for money from Ayaou appear frequently.",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2003.txt",
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    },
    {
        "id": 216373,
        "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-2003",
        "page_number": 132,
        "title": "RAS-2003",
        "content_text": "81\n\nOn 26 July 1858 \"Sent Achih to Macao today: sent $20 to Ayaou.” On 15 August \"Modest request from Ayaou for $700 or at least $200 - 'no can' - “. Then on 16 September “I went to see Ayaou who came back from Macao the night before last. Demands $200.” Again on 19 September \"Paid Ayaou $125: I understand this closes the connection. \"For Hart, therefore, the best way to terminate the relationship peacefully and permanently must have been to give Ayaou a generous sum of money and this he did.\n\nHart's declarations concerning his separation from Ayaou also detail the arrangements made for their children. In Declaration 2 he states: \"As all the children were born while Ayaou was being kept by me I decided to provide for them respectably and accordingly I made it part of the arrangement for separation that she should surrender her children to my Agent and she did so.\" This indicates that some serious discussion and negotiation must have taken place between Hart and Ayaou concerning the arrangements for their children after the separation. Hart seems to have made it a clear precondition that Ayaou gave up custody of the three children and surrendered them to his London agent. Ayaou complied. For her, life must have become much easier without the burden of bringing up three children alone, even with financial support from Hart. For Hart, on the other hand, it seems to have been the best possible arrangement at the time. It was at considerable expense that he made such arrangements for his three wards. We now know, for the first time, that Hart \"settled a sum of six thousand pounds for their benefit which sum has long since been divided and distributed between them.\" Also in Declaration 1 he claims: “As they were all born while Ayaou was kept by me I decided to provide them respectably, and did so, rather than leave them to their fate in China.\" The details certainly support the commonly accepted viewpoint that \"Hart treated his wards generously\" (Little, 1975: Introduction) and \"By the standards of the day such behaviour was generous in the extreme\", as “many Westerners simply ignored and abandoned such children.” (Smith, Fairbank, Burner 1991: 363)\n\nHowever, these details may also support the suggestion that there must have been some other reason for Hart to make such an expensive arrangement: \"In the eyes of a later day, exiling three children from their native culture, even with the consent of their mother (who later married a Chinese), raises perplexing questions. But it was done with",
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    {
        "id": 216374,
        "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",
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        "document_key": "RAS-2003",
        "page_number": 133,
        "title": "RAS-2003",
        "content_text": "82\n\nhigh intent, and for Hart it cleared the way, as honourably as he could, for a British marriage.” (ibid: 363) Hart saw his career as I.G. in China as a long-term commitment. He was proud to hold the position of I.G. at twenty-eight years of age and on 24 December 1863 writes in his diary: \"My life has been singularly successful: not yet twenty-nine, and at the head of a service which collects nearly three millions of revenue, in, - of all countries in the world! - the exclusive land of China. \" (ibid: 53) Thus, when he planned to find a European girl to marry during his home leave in 1866 he definitely hoped that his future wife would stay with him in China. His proposal to Miss Hester Jane Bredon bears this out: \"Could you find it in your heart to come to China with me?\" (Bell: 57) Planning his future like this, sending the children to England to be educated regardless of the expense seemed the best possible solution to sever all connection with the past and to clear the way for Hart's future married life and career in China.\n\nHart certainly could not foresee the future when he made such an arrangement for his children with Ayaou. At that time he probably didn't think that his future wife would eventually return to live in London permanently even though he accepted it when it did happen because he felt \"matrimony does interfere with a man's work at times\". In 1875 when Lady Hart decided to go home, Hart began to think of a new arrangement for his three wards. In his letter to Campbell on 5 June 1875, he asked him, on his private behalf, to make some rearrangements for his three wards who at that time still lived in London and were cared for by Mrs Davison whose husband was a bookkeeper in Smith, Elder & Co. He wanted the two boys to be sent to boarding school at Clifton College and \"when being placed at one of the boarding-houses I want it to be arranged that they shall spend their 1875-1876 vacations there\"; he wanted the girl \"to be sent for three years to a Protestant boarding school on the Continent\" and \"Her vacations will also have to be spent at school.” (Fairbank, Bruner, Matheson 1975: 192-3). It should be noted that 1875-1876 is when Lady Hart prepared and finally returned to Europe. Thus it may be argued that Hart's changed arrangements for his wards in 1875 was not simply a random act resulting from some past memory of Ayaou as suggested (Wang: 140). Less than a month later in a letter to Campbell on 2 July 1875 Hart tells his friend quite clearly: \"Mrs Hart has positively declared that she'll go home next spring\" (Fairbank, Bruner and Matherson 1975: 198) In this case, sending his wards to boarding school and arranging for them",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2003.txt",
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    {
        "id": 216376,
        "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-2003",
        "page_number": 135,
        "title": "RAS-2003",
        "content_text": "84\n\nfrom China. Hart complained that it was difficult to get proper private tutors for their elder daughter, Evey. In his letter to Campbell on 2 July 1875 he said: \"I fancy Evey will be a grandmother by the time you find my rara avis!” (ibid: 198) Hart also wanted to concentrate on his work without disturbance. When he was finally reunited with his wife and children after almost a quarter of a century's separation, he did not feel completely comfortable and even hoped that they would be gone soon \"for I want to be alone to attend to the hundred and one things.\" Thus, during the period 1879-1881 when Lady Hart lived with Hart in Beijing, the couple must have discussed seriously future plans for her to return to settle in London. This is when Hart wrote to Campbell and insisted that his three wards should not be sent back to London to live with the Davidson couple.\n\nFrom this it can be seen that it wasn't just a matter of kindness, generosity, or even love that motivated Hart to make such expensive provisions for his three wards by Ayaou. Hart had always been cautious and gave mature consideration to his arrangements for his wards, not just in 1866 when he prepared to go home and marry a European, but also during the period 1875 to 1879 when he began to make plans for his wife's return to live in London permanently. He was kind to his wards; but he was also rational and determined to prevent both his married life and his career from being troubled by the wards.\n\nREFERENCES\n\nBell, Stanley. 1985. Hart of Lisburn. Lisburn: Lisburn Historical Press.\n\nBell, Gertrude. 1903. The Gertrude Bell Archive.\n\nBickers, Robert. 1999. Britain in China. Manchester and New York: Manchester University Press.\n\nBruner, Katherine F, Fairbank, John K, Smith, Richard J. 1986. eds. Entering China's Service - Robert Hart's Journals, 1854-1863. Cambridge and London: Council on East Asian Studies, Harvard University.\n\nFairbank, John K, Bruner, Katherine F, Matheson, Elizabeth M. 1975. eds. The I.G. in Peking - Letters of Robert Hart, Chinese Maritime Customs 1868-1907. Cambridge: The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press.\n\nFerguson, Niall. 2002. Empire: the rise and demise of the British world order and the lessons for global power. London: Allan Lane. Pp 185\n\nPage 135\n\nPage 136",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2003.txt",
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    },
    {
        "id": 216378,
        "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",
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        "document_key": "RAS-2003",
        "page_number": 137,
        "title": "RAS-2003",
        "content_text": "86\n\nHart's house and photographed him: \"He was extremely friendly, asked us to dinner, kept us talking, assuring us that he was a man busy enough always to have time to give people. Month after month, year after year, for the last 50 years has found him always at work; for 25 years he has had no holiday; he never goes away and has never been even to the Great Wall. 'My wife used to do my sightseeing and my visiting for me' he said. 'She was very useful to me. It's difficult to live alone.' I didn't know what to answer as Lady Hart seems to find it more difficult not to live alone.\"\n\n*\n\n7 The marital relationship between Hart and Lady Hart, as Bruner, Fairbank and Smith argued (1986: 322), is that \"each offered something the other was seeking.\" In his journal entry for 22 August 1867 - their first anniversary - he wrote: \"No one could have a better wife than I have got & so far, we have got on well together.\" Then he added: “At the same time, matrimony does interfere a man's work at times.\" (Volume 9, Transcribed by Deirdre Wildy, 15 September 2003)\n\n$\n\n* Similar statement can also be seen in Declaration 1\n\n\"Census place: Cliffton, Gloucester, England. Source: FHL film 1341597, PRO Ref RG11, Piece 2482, Folio 38, Page 22.\n\n10 See Bruner, Fairbank, and Smith edited “Entering China's Service” (1986: 150): \"Volume 3, as it now exists, begins on 20 March 1858, after a lapse of almost three years. The first pages of this new book, however, were torn out by Hart, who then wrote on the flyleaf '20 March to 6 Dec. 1858' as if that were the normal content of the volume.\" \"It seems evident that Hart did some tidying-up of his journals years later, perhaps in 1902 when Hosea B. Morse asked\n\n11\n\npermission to see them in connection with a proposed biography.\"\n\nIn March 1866 Hart left for home on leave and in late May he fell in love with Miss Hester Jane Bredon. This happened less than a year after Hart's third child was born. Hart was very determined to find a European girl to marry during his visit home. He knew that his proposal to Hester might be refused if he told her the truth, particularly the year when Arthur was born - giving proof to the fact that he continued his sexual relationship with Ayaou until at least late 1864. For Hart the best way to convince Hester to accept the reality of the situation was to let her believe that all these events had taken place a long time ago and she could therefore \"forget the past and welcome the future\". Perhaps it is for this reason that there are contradictions between Hart's statements concerning the year of Arthur's birth in Declaration 1 and 2 and those in his letter to Campbell as well as that which is recorded in 1881 British Census,\n\n12 Hart only felt a bit annoyed when he received two letters from her in 1870 and 1872 and troubled by two of his wards by her between 1904 and 1905.\n\n17\n\n13 See Declaration I.\n\n14 The sum of money equals £28,704, as $5 at that time roughly equals £1. In his",
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