[
    {
        "id": 210787,
        "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-1986",
        "page_number": 138,
        "title": "RAS-1986",
        "content_text": "121\n\nBritish Navy stationed at Hong Kong which eradicated free-booting from the China coast. Equipped with the newest steam gun-boats designed for navigation in shallow water, the British commenced a blitz on piracy in 1863, and in a short period rousted the privateers from their haunts in Hainan's shallow river estuaries. To prevent a revival of piracy, the Guangdong provincial government was provided with similar gunboats officered by Englishmen, to patrol the waters surrounding Hainan,\n\nRestoration of trade\n\nThe quashing of piracy led to a rapid restoration of trade between Hainan and the mainland, which in turn, aroused for the first time the interest of foreign merchants in this unknown island which had previously been dismissed as merely a sanctuary for pirates and banditti. This interest resulted in the opening of K'iungchow as a treaty port in 1876 and the development of a thriving trade with Hong Kong. A steamer link with the British colony was established and Hainan produce was ferried on the regular service. Raw sugar, vegetable oils and livestock (cattle, pigs, ducks, chickens and frogs) were the chief exports, while betel nut, copra, rattan, sisal hemp, hides, tallow, medical herbs and incense timber were shipped in small quantities (Henry, 1886; Moninger, 1919). Unfortunately, Hainan did not escape the baneful effects of opium which became the island's principal import (Henry, 1886), its use being justified in warding off the deadly malaria endemic throughout the island (Swinhoe, 1872a).\n\nWith the flurry of business activity, companies formed with foreign and Cantonese capital mushroomed everywhere in Hainan, each striving to secure as large a share as possible of the agricultural and mineral resources of the island. Unfortunately, Hainan did not surrender its untapped wealth easily, and the harshness of the tropical climate sent most enterprises quickly into bankruptcy. Those that did succeed were large, well-financed operations such as the K'iu Hing Kunz Sz, a large plantation near Nada involved in the production of rubber, coffee and tobacco (McClure, 1922). Even this company with over 20,000 rubber trees and 300,000 mature coffee bushes experienced hardship mainly caused by labour shortages, although these may have been",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1986.txt",
        "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/jq08c7063",
        "rank": 0
    },
    {
        "id": 211687,
        "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-1989",
        "page_number": 102,
        "title": "RAS-1989",
        "content_text": "HONG KONG, DECEMBER 1941 — JULY 1942\n\nA. D. BLACKBURN*\n\n77\n\nThe following is an account of the personal experiences of my wife and myself at Hongkong during the Japanese attack and afterwards.\n\nI was still in Queen Mary Hospital when hostilities began. My leg had so far recovered that I was able to hobble about on crutches and the doctor had decided that he could now safely proceed to operate on my ear which had become completely obstructed with scar tissue. The operation was fixed for 8 a.m. on December 8th. I was waiting to be taken to the theatre when, almost exactly at 8 a.m., the wailing of the sirens and the noise of planes announced the beginning of the blitz and the operation had to be abandoned.\n\nMeanwhile my wife was at the War Memorial Nursing Home recovering from an operation for appendicitis. All patients whom it was possible to remove were evicted from the hospitals to make room for war casualties. My wife was turned out on December 10th and I on December 12th and Witham (Tea Adviser to the Chinese Government and a friend of ours) arranged for us to be billeted with him and his wife in their flat on the Peak, which the Hongkong Government had declared an evacuation area. There we stayed throughout the hostilities.\n\nThere was fairly heavy artillery fire and air bombing but the Japanese seemed to be concentrating on military objectives (particularly Mt. Austin barracks and two field gun batteries in our neighbourhood), and civilian property around us was not\n\n* Editor's Note. Sir Arthur Blackburn was Counsellor of the British Embassy in Chungking in 1941. On June 29th, 1941, his house there was totally destroyed by a Japanese bomb. Two people were killed, and fifteen injured, including Sir Arthur, who received injuries to his knee and ear. The injury to the ear required operation, as did the injury to the knee, which had become infected. Sir Arthur and his wife were evacuated to Hong Kong to enable these operations to take place, arriving at the end of November, 1941. Sir Arthur was a witness to the Japanese attack on Hong Kong in December, 1941, and he and his wife were interned from January 22nd to the end of July 1942 in Stanley Camp. He and his wife with other captured diplomatic staff were then repatriated, leaving Shanghai on August 17th, 1942. Sir Arthur was asked by both the Foreign Office and the Red Cross to report on conditions in Hong Kong and in Stanley Camp. These reports were completed by the end of September, 1942, even before the Blackburns docked in England. Because of the general interest of these reports, and particularly because of their contemporary character and absence of post-war hindsight, it is felt useful to print them here. The Journal owes copies of these interesting documents to the kindness of Mr. C. Blackburn.",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1989.txt",
        "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/8336pm92h",
        "rank": 0
    },
    {
        "id": 214952,
        "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-2000",
        "page_number": 48,
        "title": "RAS-2000",
        "content_text": "had become a mere staple drink. May be so, but no one would doubt its importance to the Chinese people. 'The cup that cheers but not inebriates' as the Chinese describe it, remains one of the pillars of Chinese social customs.\n\nTea and the British\n\nThe British people's love of tea is proverbial, but it came late, centuries after its pleasures were known to the Chinese. Who introduced tea to the western world? Thoughts naturally turn to Marco Polo. But the Venetian traveller, who wrote vividly and at times with exaggeration of the many marvels of Cathay, did not mention tea; perhaps it was not a favourite drink in the court of Kublai Khan. Instead, credit is sometimes given to another Venetian called Ramusio who in the 16th century wrote enthusiastically about tea. However, this lies in the realms of conjecture. Historically, it is the Dutch who are credited with introducing tea to Europe, around 1610 AD. Europe was slow to respond. Opinions swayed as to its merits or demerits. Within the next hundred years, Europe accepted tea as its best loved beverage, and while it has remained popular in Holland and the rest of Europe, it had never reached the level of popularity it enjoyed in Britain.\n\nStories abound as to when Britain took to tea, but all are agreed that 1660 was a milestone - when Samuel Pepys, that inveterate diarist and Admiralty official, took his first cup of tea and so noted in his diary. It had infiltrated into Britain slowly. First drunk in tea houses, then favoured by the Court, by the beginning of the 18th century, tea had found its way into the home and to the daily table of the common man. It seemed to permeate every aspect of British life. It became a panacea for a multitude of ills and support in difficult times. Confronted by an emergency, tea was the immediate remedy. The Army made its own particular brand of strong sweet tea. 'Let's have a brew' was a great encouraging cry during a lull in fighting. Some would go as far as to assert that it helped the people of Britain to endure the blitz during the Second World War.\n\nBy the end of the 18th century, the rise in tea consumption in Britain was phenomenal. To the British people tea had come to be almost a necessity of life. Afternoon tea had become a treasured custom in every British household, and a whole ritual had evolved as to how to prepare",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2000.txt",
        "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/nk328168n",
        "rank": 0
    }
]