[
    {
        "id": 204533,
        "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-1963",
        "page_number": 14,
        "title": "RAS-1963",
        "content_text": "THE OLD PROTESTANT CEMETERY IN MACAO\n\nA lecture delivered on 7 May, 1962\n\nLINDSAY RIDE, C.B.E., E.D., D.M., LL.D.*\n\nThere are worse ways of occupying leisure than tours on foot through noteworthy cemeteries — EDMUND BLUNDEN in Cricket Country.\n\nMacao is of fundamental interest to all of us here tonight because, in the eighteenth and the early part of the nineteenth centuries, as well as being a Portuguese base, it was the Far Eastern home of those who were unconsciously but surely laying the foundations of the community which was to become known as the Colony of Hong Kong. It was also the main gateway through which flowed the influence that the west was exerting on the whole of China; and of all its non-Portuguese foreign residents responsible for this influence, the most valuable cross-section accessible to us today is the group of 162 members of many nations who lie buried in its Old Protestant Cemetery. Their personal histories, read in and between the lines carved on their weathering memorials, give us the most accurate picture it is possible to paint today of the parent community they represent; deciphering these lines and filling in their gaps, has been the spare-time hobby of my wife and myself now for over seven years; it has given us interest in members of divers nationalities and professions, and has introduced us to the fascinating lives of scores of people who lived in earlier times. It has directed our searching into many corners of the globe, and earned us a host of interesting friends and correspondents the world over.†\n\nIn the time at my disposal this evening it is impossible to describe in any detail any one of the life histories which it took individuals decades to weave and us years to unravel, but if I can give you even a general understanding of their community and their home, of their lives and their times, I shall be content.\n\n* Sir Lindsay Ride is Vice-Chancellor of the University of Hong Kong. †The results of these researches will be published shortly by the Hong Kong University Press in a volume provisionally entitled Macao's Old Protestant Cemetery.\n\nI",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1963.txt",
        "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/4m90m091v",
        "rank": 0
    },
    {
        "id": 211202,
        "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-1987",
        "page_number": 263,
        "title": "RAS-1987",
        "content_text": "238 \n\nIf the correspondent opposing the park scheme was not able to look very clearly into the future, a writer who adopted the pen-name \"Atalanta\" was a better seer. True, he had to wait until 1904 for his vision to become reality. He advocated the building of a tramway from east to west as a jubilee scheme. It would benefit every resident \"male or female, child or adult, Chinese or Portuguese, Indian or European.\"\n\nA tram would provide easy access to the proposed park. Without a convenient way of getting there, he too thought it would be useless. He was more interested, however, in the beneficial effect a tram would have both for health and recreation in general.\n\nTo the west were the cool airs of Pokfulam, “and those citizens who are not able to live at the Peak can be transported on hot summer evenings to the other side of the island, there to be refreshed by the western breezes and the health-giving and invigorating perfume of the fir trees.”\n\nTo the east was the beach at Shaukiwan, \"where the little ones might get health and amusement by ‘paddling' while their parents may enjoy bathing or boating.\"\n\nEasy access by tram to a good beach would be welcomed, so the writer claimed, by “hundreds and thousands of our humble English and Portuguese fellow residents who, by their narrow means, are denied the luxury of a country villa at the Gap or Kellett's Ridge.\"\n\nNot all Portuguese were deprived of a summer villa, but few had them at the Peak. In the current issue of the Boletim do Instituto Luis de Camoes published in Macau, an article entitled \"The Portuguese in Hongkong and China” by the late Jose Pedro Braga describes some of the villas built by members of the Portuguese community at Pokfulam and Kowloon.\n\nThe advocate for the tram took a different view of Chinese attitudes towards sport than the writer of the other letter. He said they and the Portuguese did not play cricket and tennis simply for want of space.",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1987.txt",
        "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/rx919b522",
        "rank": 0
    }
]