[ { "id": 204748, "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-1964", "page_number": 51, "title": "RAS-1964", "content_text": "40 \n\nW. C. HUNTER \n\nat Samarang where he served for 3 years. He died at Delft in 1863. (L.T.R.) \n\n32 Viceroy. The Governor-General of Kwangtung and Kwangsi at this time was Teng Ting-chen who held this post from early 1836 until early 1840. See Hummel, op. cit., II, 716. (J.L.C-B.) \n\n33 Hoppo. The Superintendent of Maritime Customs at Canton in 1839 was Yu (?). (J.L.C-B.) \n\n34 The Yum Chae. Cantonese pronunciation for the characters (mandarin Ch'in-ch'ai) meaning \"an Imperial Commissioner”. (J.L.C-B.) \n\n35 Innes, James Innes (1787-1841), the \"storm petrel\" of Canton was the 7th Chieftain of the Inneses of Dunkinty, Scotland. He came out to China about 1825 and operated as a Free Trader mostly on his own, but for a time in the firm of Innes, Fletcher & Co. His dealings in opium had not a little to do with precipitating the trouble in 1839. He died in July 1841 and was buried in the Old Protestant Cemetery, Macao. (L.T.R.) \n\n36 Chaye Beale. Thomas Chaye Beale was a member of the firm of Magniac & Co. in Canton as early as 1826. He severed his connections with this firm in the early thirties, and operated on his own till 1845 when he set up a house of agency in Shanghai with Lancelot Dent under the name of Dent, Beale & Co. In 1851 he was Portuguese Consul and Vice-Consul for the Netherlands at Shanghai. (L.T.R.) \n\n37 Se-yin. This is probably a reference to the characters Ssu-ying, the officer in command of a ying which corresponded in some ways to a battalion. However, the rank of a ying commander corresponded more to the Western rank of captain or major. (J.L.C-B.) \n\n38 Ta-lao-yeh. The phrase ta-lao-yeh signifies \"revered elder”. (J.L.C-B.) \n\n39 The linguists. Linguists (t'ung shih) were supposed to be able to act as interpreters between the Canton officials and the foreign merchants when instructions needed to be conveyed. The foreigners, for their part, usually enlisted the help of the Hong merchants when they wanted a document translated into Chinese or they needed an interpreter at an important interview. They repeatedly declared that the linguists were useless when it came to linguistic matters. In fact, the linguists appear to have been rather low-grade men of not much education, and able to speak only pidgin English. However, by law a foreign merchant trading at Canton was bound to employ a linguist. Since it was forbidden by the statutes of the Ch'ing dynasty to teach the Chinese language to foreigners, it was reasonable that linguists should be licensed to cope with their language problems. However, in order that the foreigners should not learn much about affairs in the interior, the qualifications needed by a linguist were low and their pidgin vocabulary was restricted to matters of trade. This was part of a deliberate policy which grew up among the officials at Canton, and the linguists merely acted as another cog in the mechanism whereby communication between the foreign merchants and the officials, however minor, was prevented, and the foreigners dealt instead with a number of different unofficial functionaries such as the compradores and linguists. Thus, the foreign merchants were kept at an arm's length and also kept in ignorance. \n\nThe linguists and their servants mentioned in this journal appear to have acted as general clerks and messengers, as much as linguists. The prefix A or Ah (ya) signifies the status of servant. (J.L.C-B.)", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1964.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/qz20zx09r", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 204757, "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-1964", "page_number": 60, "title": "RAS-1964", "content_text": "HONG KONG BEFORE THE CHINESE \n\n49 \n\nexperimental stations. And there is literary evidence for stating that all the hills between here and Canton were densely forested, as hills of similar geological structure still are in countries such as Japan, where the population does not destroy every tree before it is ten years old as they have been doing in South China for several centuries. Exactly what trees grew in these forests I cannot say; here is another missing piece in the puzzle which can probably be filled, as I shall soon suggest. The forests are supposed to have had two different kinds of human inhabitants, or at this time perhaps more than two, (a document of the early Yuan Dynasty mentions two types of hill-dwellers by name) but until further evidence comes to light, I suggest that in view of the small size of this territory, there is little reason to pre-suppose the existence of a third, and as I shall indicate later, my own preference is for a view that only one people lived here. \n\nOf the two non-Chinese peoples mentioned, one, the Yaos, are well-known and documented from South and Southwest China, Vietnam and Laos. Their languages have been studied, not an easy matter since their society comprises many small units, each possessing its own dialect and none having any form of writing; and work has been done on their customs and religion. There is an exhibit in the National Ethnological Museum at Leiden in Holland which shows the principal elements of their cultural and social life, including the type of house and the traditional patterns which they weave into their cloth, which in South China is made of wool. The exhibit at Leiden is particularly interesting because the adjoining showcase contains, or did contain when I visited that museum, an exhibit of a people from the island of Celebes who, although physically dissimilar in appearance, built somewhat similar houses and used almost identical patterns in their cloth, which however is bark-cloth. I asked the Assistant Curator whether the juxtaposition of the two exhibits was accidental or whether they had evidence of some connection between the Yao and the people of Celebes; he said that it was not fortuitous, because the resemblances were considerable, but there was no actual evidence of any connection and, as far as he knew, the peoples were of different racial types and spoke unrelated languages. Here is another gap to be closed. \n\nPage 60\n\nPage 61", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1964.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/qz20zx09r", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 204835, "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-1964", "page_number": 138, "title": "RAS-1964", "content_text": "Old Chinese Customs House dating from 1897\n\nTemple at Ma Wan village", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1964.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/qz20zx09r", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 204841, "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-1964", "page_number": 144, "title": "RAS-1964", "content_text": "A RECONNAISSANCE OF MA WAN\n\n119\n\nIn 1897, two years before the lease of the New Territories by China to Britain, the Chinese Imperial Maritime Customs set up a small customs house on Ma Wan in order to supervise trade between the Pearl River Delta and Hong Kong. The building used still stands. See photograph on p. 28 Ma Wan and a very small hamlet called Tin Liu. The total population of Ma Wan island at the 1911 census was 473. Papers laid before the Legislative Council of Hong Kong (H.K. Government Printer, 1911) p. 103 (36).\n\n29 Morse, op. cit., I, 178. The name Kapsingmun appears to have been used by foreigners as an alternative for Kapsuimun which should be preferred.\n\n30 Joseph Thomson, Review of Considerations Respecting the Trade with China (London, 1835). At this period both Lord Napier and after him Captain Charles Elliot spoke of obtaining an island and raising the flag somewhere.\n\n31 The Chinese Repository, IV (1835-6), 548.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1964.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/qz20zx09r", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 205328, "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-1967", "page_number": 90, "title": "RAS-1967", "content_text": "THE CHINA COASTERS\n\n83\n\nessential; although there was a point beyond which these could be detrimental to the owner.\n\nThe rent which the compradore paid to the owners for the deck passenger space depended on the number of passengers usually carried in that particular trade. It was adjusted periodically according to fluctuations in trade and other factors, and was the subject of keen bargaining between owners and compradore — the latter naturally putting a much lower evaluation on the ship's passenger potentiality than the owners. At irregular intervals the owners sent someone to travel on the ship, and check the number of passengers and the amount of cargo carried. These men were known as 'pidgin snatchers' and were very unpopular with the floating staff. If the captain and compradore were good friends and either knew in advance of the 'pidgin snatcher's' movements, the other was warned, and co-operative counter measures instituted in good time.\n\nMost China coasters called at their home port of Hong Kong or Shanghai at least once a month, so that their officers were in much closer touch with life ashore than their contemporaries on overseas ships. During the inter-war period, normal tours of service on the coast were five years, in the course of which officers would serve in several of their company's ships. Many senior officers were married, and had wives and families in Hong Kong or Shanghai, or in a few cases Hankow. Long home leave was granted after a five years tour, but the attractions of life on the coast made many officers and their wives reluctant to go on leave. Captains and mates on ships where 'pidgin' were plentiful, were afraid they might be posted to less profitable ships on their return; while wives were loath to exchange their smoothly-run homes for the doubtful comforts of furnished rooms or boarding houses in Britain. European homes in Hong Kong, Shanghai, or the treaty ports, were sparsely staffed by African or Indian standards, but run much more efficiently. A cook and house boy, sometimes only a cook boy, sufficed for a small house or flat, supplemented by a baby amah or gardener if circumstance warranted this. A similar establishment in India would have been indifferently served by a staff twice as large. Although the taipans of the big foreign companies and senior customs commissioners lived in considerable style, life on the coast was in general much less ostentatious than in India, and much more pleasant.\n\nPage 90\n\nPage 91", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1967.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/0c488p70g", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 208045, "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-1977", "page_number": 84, "title": "RAS-1977", "content_text": "68\n\nJ. T. KAMM\n\nsystem of land distribution had its origins several centuries ago. At the time when the land was distributed, the tenant paid the landlord a certain sum; this sum represented the rent which the tenant thereafter handed over each year. The landlord could not increase the rent, nor could the tenant refuse to pay it. Furthermore, the landlord could not investigate his tenants in order to take back the land.” (G236).\n\n28 Data from the land memorials, which register sales of subsurface values, indicate that a one-mow plot of land seldom exceeded 6 taels during the late 18th century. As we shall see later in the text, these prices necessarily remained constant into the 19th century. In the Hong Kong Almanack and Directory for 1846, we learn that the tenants valued each mow of rice paddy at $40.00 (1 tael = 1.11 Mexican dollars in 1846). Granted that tenants made good profits from the sale of land, still this example tends to illustrate the great potential disparity between the two values. (Hong Kong Almanack and Directory for 1846, Note on the Island of Hong Kong by A. R. Johnston; written in 1843).\n\n29 Correspondence Respecting Affairs in China, ibid., p 7.\n\n30 CSO306/1899 Extension; \"With reference to the petition of Tang Yung Ping and others they naturally, at present, prefer the old feudal system of payment of rent in kind.\"\n\n31 HKTCSMTC: Hong Kong Almanack, “Note on the Island of HK”.\n\n32 CSO150/1901 gives a detailed account of these negotiations.\n\n33 In general, the maintenance of perpetual tenancy systems presupposes the existence of communal landownership. The British found over 25% of all lots held in clan names in 1898; later Chinese sources place the estimate at 30%. These figures are probably not reliable for the earlier part of the century. The Tangs, as we have seen, held landlord rights over all of Hong Kong Island. They similarly held over 60% of the territory in Kowloon ceded to Britain in 1860, Land in North Kowloon was lost by \"fraudulent sale” in 1898 (CSO2982/1898). Other clans, besides the Tangs, apparently lost sizable tracts as “individual initiative” replaced clan solidarity throughout the period,\n\n34 CSO150/1901.\n\n35 CSO109/1902.\n\n36 Nan Yang Tang Shih Tsu P'u, \"Notes on Land Tax.\"\n\n37 Correspondence Respecting Affairs in China, ibid., p 18.\n\nESSAY II: TAXLORDISM\n\nThe peasants and gentry of Hsin-An witnessed two concrete manifestations of the growing power of foreign countries in China during the waning years of the nineteenth century. In April 1887, the Kowloon Customs House of the Imperial Maritime Customs was established under provisions of the Anglo-Chinese Opium Agreement of September 1886. As was the case with all customs houses established during the era, supervision of the revenue stations was entrusted to a European career officer in Sir Robert Hart's service, J. McLeavy Brown. A great expansion in customs activity", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1977.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/np198x23n", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 208201, "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-1977", "page_number": 240, "title": "RAS-1977", "content_text": "224 \n\nNOTES AND QUERIES \n\nment. Here is also a letter from an army doctor, which is as follows: Dear Sir, my regiment stayed in Pakhoi. The officers and soldiers were not accustomed to this new place, therefore most of them became sick. Fortunately, the doctor has the heart of Jesus and gave us treatment free of charge, so I have the honour to write and thank \n\nyou. \n\nSince Sept. 1938, I have been acting again as Customs Medical officer. I have also been the only doctor for the hospital and Leper Settlement about 3 miles away, and I would like to point out that without the self-sacrificing help of the hospital staff, I could never have been able to fulfil this work. We were most thankful for all the help Bishop Hall gave us through the British Relief Council, and we were also most grateful for all the help and inspiration from Deaconess Vincent, who was with us for 7 months, and are glad to welcome Miss Bradley, who is as eager and successful in the Maternity and Hospital work as Matron and interpreter, as in her pastoral work among the lepers. On March 6th, Bishop Hall paid us a visit on his way to Kunming; we were very glad to see him, and although his visit was short, it proved a great blessing both spiritually & practically. \n\nOur hearts are full of gratitude and thanks to God for the help we have received in so many ways through many people, both Chinese and foreigners. \n\nPakhoi, August 19th, 1939. Po Yan Hospital. \n\nAfter nearly 3 months of relative quietness, with only occasional alarms and machine-gun skirmishes with planes on their way or from the scene of real activity, we began to think that we were safe and quiet again. \n\nOn the 15th of July, some of the hospital's staff went down to the beach for a bathe in the late afternoon. We had not been there long, however, before the alarm signal sounded in the town. Two planes came up over the horizon very quickly, and before we could get ashore, they were flying overhead. Their real object of attack was a group of large fishing junks lying about 200 yards away, but it was unpleasantly near to us, and we were forced to take cover under the wooden frame of the diving board until the worst was over; some of the swimmers had managed to get ashore in time and took refuge in the bathing house. On the 14th of August, we had a \n\nPage 240\n\nPage 241", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1977.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/np198x23n", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 208366, "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-1978", "page_number": 90, "title": "RAS-1978", "content_text": "74\n\nGÖRAN AIJMER\n\nconnection between the rice growth cycle, the agricultural activities and the grave ancestors, a connection suggested already by the information from Wuchang and Chongyang, quoted above, that grave worship was conducted on She ri.\n\n9. Willow Twigs.\n\nIn Wuling people inserted willow twigs over their doors and also carried willow twigs in their hair. There was a term for this custom: neng pixie 'ability to punish evil'. The same convention was observed in other places in the Dongting area, like Taoyuan,80 Hanzhou,81 Jingshan,82 Chongyang, where it was called 'nun lo'83 'tender willow', and Yingshan.84 It seems as if the twigs were protective and their function was to guard the house, or doorways, and the individuals living behind them. It is hard to say against what willow provided protection. It is interesting, though, to note that willow twigs were used in Jiangling on the full moon day of the first moon when, again, they were inserted above the doors.85\n\n10. Strolling in the Wilderness and Treading on the Green.\n\nSeveral chroniclers report that Qingming was an occasion for strolls and wanderings away from built-up areas. These excursions may well be seen in connection with the visits to the graves, the latter being situated outside the villages. Such ramblings in the countryside are recorded from the prefecture Changde (around Wuling),86 Hanzhou,87 Chongyang,88 and Wuchang.89 From the latter two places it is also reported that men and women 'tread on the green', ta qing, in connection with their strolls in the 'wilderness'. The latter term seems to be a name for strolling and eating al fresco. Earlier I have interpreted this practice as a feature which stresses periphery as contrasted with centre, the latter being emphasized, for instance, at Duanwu. It is interesting to note that the chronicler of Changde says that there were no such customs in that area as ta qing or qui qian 'swinging'. Swinging is reported as part of the Lantern Festival in Zhongxiang,91 Swings are referred to in a Liang dynasty calendar, Jingchu suishi ji,92 in connection with the Cold Food festival. Ta qing was part of the Flower Dawn celebrations in Zhongxiang,93 in this area generally observed on the second full moon of the lunar year. It is probable that a number of notions were expressed in such\n\n90\n\nPage 90\n\nPage 91", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1978.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/8g84t8593", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 209028, "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-1980", "page_number": 190, "title": "RAS-1980", "content_text": "158\n\nNOTES AND QUERIES\n\nYET ANOTHER LIBRARY\n\nIn his Korea, published by William Heinemann of London in 1904, Angus Hamilton has a good deal to say about John McLeavy Brown, C.M.G., LL.D., formerly Treasurer-General of that Kingdom and, when he wrote, Chief Commissioner of Customs, that is, of the Korean Customs.\n\nHamilton writes (pp. 85-86):\n\nIn his official life he represents a type of Englishman that is rapidly disappearing from our public services. His private life reflects the culture and the grace of an attractive personality. They say, in Seoul, that Mr. McLeavy Brown is more skilful as a diplomatist than as an administrator; and his brilliant conversational powers give some colour to the assertion. Upon arrival in Seoul, newcomers are apt to hear that \"Brown is a walking encyclopædia.\" He speaks, reads and writes with equal facility French, German, Italian and Chinese. It will be remembered that he is in the service of the Korean Government, a sphere of utility and activity which demands fluency in yet another language. His library attests the breadth of his culture; it numbers some 7000 volumes, and fills the walls of the rooms and corridors of his house at Seoul from floor to ceiling. Boxes of new books arrive by every mail. When he reads them it is difficult to conjecture. At night, as one strolls from the British Legation to the Station Hotel, the lights in his study window may be seen burning brightly. He is believed to sit up with his books very often until dawn. It would be typical of this silent self-contained man if he found in the pleasures of his library the antidote to much which takes place in Seoul.\n\nMcLeavy Brown appears in the contemporary Who's Who in the Far East 1906-7 published by the China Mail, Hong Kong, in June 1906, where he appears as 'ex-Head of Customs and Controller of Finance, Corea', having resigned in 1905 and gone on tour abroad in April following. He had been appointed a Student Interpreter in China in 1861 and was Acting Chinese Secretary in the British Legation at Peking 1871-72, resigning in 1872. He was later appointed a Commissioner in the Chinese Customs and appointed Commissioner-General of Customs, Corea.\n\nI am here less concerned with the man himself, despite his stature and later career which can be followed in the Dictionary of", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1980.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/kh04md207", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 209292, "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-1981", "page_number": 195, "title": "RAS-1981", "content_text": "BRO. TSUNG LAI SHUN IN MASSACHUSETTS\n\n181\n\nThe entry for the following year is identical, with the three addresses changed to \"34 Bay street.\" For 1875-6 it is simply:\n\nLaisun Chan, Chinese commissioner of education, house 34 Bay street\n\nThe following incomplete newspaper extracts indicate the effect that our brother had on the daily life of Springfield residents just over a hundred years ago.\n\nCHINESE RESIDENTS RECALLED, THE LAI-SUNS AND THEIR CHILDREN.\n\nA Picturesque and Interesting Family Who Lived in Springfield 25 years Ago. They Now Dwell in Shanghai.\n\nMany of the older residents of the city, and not a few who are unwilling to consider themselves old yet, will recall Mr Lai-Sun, the Chairman, who with his wife, and six children made his home in Springfield about 25 years ago. Mr Lai-Sun came to this city as a member of the commission appointed by the Chinese government to take charge of the Chinese youths who were to be educated in this vicinity. The head man of this commission was stationed in Hartford, but Mr Lai-Sun, acting as guardian for several of the young Mongolians, came to this city and homes were found for his wards in this neighbourhood.\n\nThis remarkable and picturesque family (for they continued to wear their Chinese costumes and to live up to many of their racial customs) are recalled just now by the news of an honor which has recently been bestowed upon one of the daughters by the Chinese government. The woman in question (who is now Mrs N.P. Anderson, living in Shanghai) will be remembered as Miss Annie Lai-Sun. She has recently been given an “imperial tablet” as a recognition of her services to the Chinese people in establishing a branch of the Red Cross society for work among the wounded during the recent war between China and Japan. Just what this tablet is we are unable to say, a copy of the Daily China Times containing a description of the memento and its significance having failed to reach this office. Our informant concerning the presentation of the tablet is Revd R.G. Keyes of Water... who roomed with Mr Lai-Sun when the latter was a student in Hamden college in Clinton, N.Y., about 50 years ago. Mr Keyes is now in communication with Mrs Anderson and his mention of the tablet suggests that it was a testimonial which brings a great honor to its recipient.\n\nPage 195\n\nPage 196", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1981.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/ff36bt18m", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 209294, "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-1981", "page_number": 197, "title": "RAS-1981", "content_text": "BRO. TSUNG LAI SHUN IN MASSACHUSETTS\n\n183\n\nrobe. Their headgear was particularly ill-adapted to our winters, and after a while they were forced to make application to their rulers in China for permission to adopt hats which would give them better protection. In due time the permission came and in consequence, a few days later, the Lai-Sun women appeared on the streets waving masses of Chinese clothes crowned by the very latest creations of the up-to-date American milliner. And the combinations were often startling.\n\n+\n\nThe family were punctilious in the discharge of their social obligations, in this respect, too, living up to their Chinese customs. It seems that the social customs of China demand that the ordinary \"call\" be repaid as soon as possible. The Lai-Suns were very particular about this matter. They usually returned a call on the following day, and commonly the entire family participated in this function. Persons who received these visitations describe them as decidedly novel and interesting. And the appearance at the door of a house of the eight smiling Celestials was a spectacle whose general significance strongly suggested the sallying forth of the famous Peterkin family—\"Mr. and Mrs. Peterkin, Elizabeth Eliza, Solomon John and the two little boys in their India-rubber boots.\"\n\nDuring the latter part of their residence in this city the Lai-Suns lived in a house on Bay street, Mr. Lai-Sun having at that time returned to China. The exact reason for his return was not made public at that time, but the general explanation was that the conservative element in the Chinese government had succeeded in discrediting the policy that had sent the Chinese young men to this country. And so Mr. Lai-Sun went back to China, and in the course of a year or so his family followed him.\n\n[The first page of the following article is missing]\n\nCHINESE STUDENTS FAMOUS AT HOME\n\n(continued From First Page)\n\nsilk rustling, they made an imposing procession. Mr. Lai-Sun had impressive dignity and the family were punctilious in the extreme regarding their social obligations, there never being any neglect of the proper etiquette, if the Lai-Suns were able to ascertain precisely what the occasion demanded.\n\nThe Lai-Suns spoke English fluently and were evidently people of means. The daughters of the family were amiable and attractive and made a remarkable record of marrying out of their race. One, Annie,", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1981.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/ff36bt18m", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 209652, "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-1982", "page_number": 309, "title": "RAS-1982", "content_text": "Notes and QUERIES\n\n287\n\nIt is possible to trace the history of Mr. Herton's unhappy experience in the matter of transit passes in the consular correspondence from Kiungchow (H) or Hoihow (now Hai-k’ou), the port of Hainan Island facing the mainland. Briefly, the facts appear to be as follows. On 7th June 1877 the British firm of Herton, Ebell & Co. applied for transit passes to bring sugar from the interior. The reply from the Chinese customs authorities was that regulations for issue of transit passes had not yet been drawn up, so none could be issued. Edward Herton decided nevertheless to go and buy sugar and galangal (or galingale), for which he paid duty at Hai-Ant customs house. Further purchases were made in July and November 1877, on each occasion transit passes being applied for and refused, and duties at a higher rate than would have been due under the transit scheme were paid.\n\nOn 8th May 1878, Messrs. Herton, Ebell & Co. made a formal complaint to H.M. Consul at Kiungchow, claiming $20,000 against the Chinese Government for excess duty paid and losses incurred due to the non-issue of transit passes. The acting consul, James Scott, forwarded this to Hugh Fraser, H.M. Chargé d'Affaires in Peking on 30th May (F.O.228, v.612, p.273-4), with his comment that there was insufficient supporting evidence for such a large claim. Scott had previously submitted to Fraser on 8th May (F.O.228, v.612, p.267-71) a claim on behalf of Messrs. Herton, Ebell for excess duty amounting to $909.57, for which there was supporting documentation. What happened to this earlier claim is not clear, but Fraser forwarded the larger claim, which was in the form of a petition to the Secretary of State with supporting documents, to the Foreign Office on September 25 (F.O.228, v.603, p.262-3) with the comment:\n\n“British traders may perhaps not unjustly ask to be reimbursed the amount actually paid by them as Transit duty over and above that which they would have had to pay had passes been allowed them; but I am not prepared to support any such demand for an additional ‘indemnity’ as that which is made in Mr. Herton's letter to acting Vice Consul Scott of the 8th August last.”", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1982.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/mk61z420p", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 209747, "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": 6, "title": "RAS-1983", "content_text": "CONTENTS\n\nPage\n\nPRESIDENT'S REPORT viii\n\nTREASURER'S REPORT xv\n\nLIBRARIAN'S REPORT xvii\n\nOBITUARY xviii\n\nARTICLES:\n\nField Trip to Maryknoll House, Stanley by the Hong Kong Royal Asiatic Society Dec. 8, 1984 - M. MCKIERNAN 1\n\nSo Kon Po: Notes for the Visit Made by Member of the Society, 26th November 1983 — J. W. HAYES 7\n\nNotes on the So Kon Po Valley and Village - REVD. CARL T. SMITH 12\n\nDisfunction of Chinese Rural Society - RAMON H. MYERS 18\n\nThe Self-Perception of Buddhist Monks in Hong Kong Today - BARTHOLOMEW P. M. TSUI 23\n\nNotes on Some Chinese Customs in the New Territories - B. D. WILSON 41\n\nOf Hongs and Tongs and All That Jazz: A Note on Lexical Borrowing from Chinese in English with Special Reference to H.K. - MIMI CHAN 62\n\nThe Islands Around Hong Kong — W. SCHOFIELD 91\n\nSecular Non-Gentry Leadership of Temple and Shrine Organisations in Urban British H. K. - J. W. HAYES 113\n\nBusiness Ideology of Chinese Industrialists in Hong Kong - WONG SIU-LUN 137\n\nVariation Technique in the Formal Structure of the Music of Taoist Jiao-Shi in Hong Kong - PEN-YEH TSAO 172\n\nV", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1983.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/j9607p61v", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 210314, "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-1984", "page_number": 285, "title": "RAS-1984", "content_text": "264\n\nNotes and Queries\n\nTRADITIONAL TEA GROWING IN THE NEW TERRITORIES\n\nP.H. HASE, J.W. HAYES, K.C. Iu*\n\nFollowing the establishment of the Flagstaff House Museum of Tea Ware interest was expressed in the indigenous tea growing and preparation customs in the New Territories. A visit was paid to one of the villages where traditional tea growing is still practised to ensure that a photographic record of the process was taken. A written record was also taken, which appears below as section 1 of this Note. Section 2 is a selection of notes on traditional tea growing elsewhere in the southern part of the New Territories, and section 3 is a note on the Mountain Begonia, which was also used to make tea, at least on Lantau.\n\n(1) Traditional Tea Growing in Mau Tso Ngam (PHH)\n\nMau Tso Ngam Village is a Hakka village inhabited by members of the Cheng and Lau clans situated high up on the slopes of Kowloon Peak in the upper reaches of a stream that eventually reaches the sea at Siu Lek Yuen in Sha Tin. This village is one of the few left in the New Territories which still grows and prepares its own tea in the traditional way. This note briefly describes the tea preparation processes in use at Mau Tso Ngam as seen by the author on a visit to the village on 26th April 1986 and as described further to him by the Village Representative, Mr. Cheng Kau-hung.'\n\nTea trees2 are planted here and there on the edge of the hills near the village: most families own a few trees, while others are owned by the Ancestral Trusts of the village. Tea from the trees owned by the Ancestral Trusts is used for offerings to the gods and spirits. There are no tea plantations as such, since each family keeps its trees scattered at traditional sites on the hills near its\n\nSee Plates 33-41\n\nPage 265\n\nPage 285\n\nPage 286", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1984.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/5h73wh572", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 210582, "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-1985", "page_number": 189, "title": "RAS-1985", "content_text": "170\n\nWEI PEH T'I\n\nRees made that right. And then when we arrived at Yangchow it was as dark as any night could be and only two or three little Chinese lanterns that were not more than will-o-the-wisps in the darkness. We were soon surrounded, when we landed ourselves and our much luggage on the muddy bank, and then if it had not been for Miss Rees I would have felt like turning back in despair. The missionaries at Chinkiang knew what we would have to encounter and I suppose laughed at me when I said it was too bad to take Miss Rees.\n\nWe found our way or rather our chair bearers did through the gate of the city and through such narrow streets that the poles grazed the walls as we turned the corners, and we, in sedan chairs and our luggage on barrows, arrived safely at the Yangchow House Friday night, December 26th and our long journey was at an end.\n\nThere are nineteen girls here, most all from England. And we have everything as comfortable as can be in China, and what we appreciate most of all is a large garden enclosed in a high brick wall, where we take our exercise without going on the street. So I do not come in contact with the people yet, except as I go to the Chapel every other Sunday. Then I see that the streets are mere alleys, very dirty, sometimes blocked with a pig and full of small boys looking like dirty rag dolls in their wadded clothes. Today as they have come here they are quite elegant; for the day before New Year is the day for the annual bath and new clothes to celebrate the event the next day. The people dress in blue and you see nothing but blue, except on New Year's day when red is a favourite colour or pink or green according to the wealth of the family. I can see from my room a thoroughfare, it can hardly be called a street, and I get so interested in the people sometimes that it is hard to study. Chinese material is very cheap here and they think cloth must be very dear in our home countries because the people wear their clothes so tight. I could tell you some very funny stories if I had the time to write them all out. When we look at home customs with Chinese eyes they seem very queer even to us.\n\nI have made slow progress with the language and I have been", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1985.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/gt54s866x", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 210841, "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": 192, "title": "RAS-1986", "content_text": "175\n\nJust because Ng Mun-sow was implicated in dubious activities in Hongkong it does not warrant our accusing him of profiting by corruption that might have been operative in the Customs Service, but it does suggest the possibility. At any rate he remained with the service until his death in 1881.\n\nIn 1850 he had married Oi-lin, the eldest daughter of Ho A-sun, also known as Ho Ye-tong. He had been a printer at the Malacca press and accompanied the mission to Hongkong in 1843. He was a devout and earnest Christian, an original member of the London Missionary Society's Chinese congregation in Hongkong.\n\nThe waywardness of his son-in-law grieved him. Just as Dr. Legge had hoped A-sow had turned over a new leaf after the episode of the bills of exchange, so in 1859 his father-in-law had expressed a similar hope. At a prayer meeting, he arose and with tears in his eyes spoke in a voice trembling with emotion. “You know my son-in-law, A-sow. Formerly he was one of us, but we had to expel him from the church. Of the life which he has been living for several years I need not now speak. He has been very bad, and he was as hardened as he was dissipated, and repulsed me when I tried to advise him. Lately he was taken ill, and thinking his heart might be softened, I ventured to speak to him about his soul. He heard me quietly, and today he rose and came to this place of worship.\n\n\"It is the first time he has been in God's house for years. Far as he was gone astray, and deeply as he was sinned, perhaps God will have mercy upon him yet. I feel it is in my heart to ask you all to pray with me that he may be brought back to the fold.”\n\nDr. Legge remarked: “May it be done for the backslider as we asked.”\n\nUnfortunately, for all the interest and concern of those who had known A-sow as a boy and young man and had such high expectations for him, there is little evidence that his resolve to change his ways was permanent.\n\nOne wonders what A-sow's life may have been like had...", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1986.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/jq08c7063", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 210866, "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": 217, "title": "RAS-1986", "content_text": "200\n\nCARL SMITH\n\nof the China Mail had been unfriendly to both him and his brother and was ready to publish any unfavourable report concerning the Tong family.\n\n-\n\nIn September 1856, the editor commented: \"Numbers of the Tong family connected with the Hongkong Government have an unfortunate knack of getting themselves into scrapes, for we are told that A-chick... has latterly been rendering himself obnoxious to his countrymen in California as head of one of the hway (associations), and that even his life is in danger. We have heard that it is A-chick's intention to return to Hongkong.”\n\nA-chick did not spend all his time visiting the Governor as representative of the Chinese, acting as community peacemaker, drafting letters setting forth the Chinese side of a controversy, or appearing in court. He was also a successful businessman.\n\nNotices relating to his first arrival in California speak of him as an associate of his uncle. Their firm was that of Tun Wo and Company. Soon, however, Tong A-chick was the manager of the Sam Wo Company. There may have been an amalgamation of the two firms. The store of Sam Wo was on Sacramento Street above Kearny. It was in the heart of the Chinese commercial centre.\n\nAn 1853 account of the Chinese section says it was \"the spot on which they first located their canvas houses in 1849, and they have stuck to it with remarkable tenacity.\"\n\nThe San Francisco establishment had direct links with a firm in Hongkong owned by the Tong family. The United States Customs House records for the port of San Francisco contain several ship manifests of goods shipped by the Hongkong firm and consigned to Tong A-chick.\n\nThese manifests show the kind of commodity in demand by the Chinese in California, items which could not be procured easily locally. Without these familiar products the sojourner would have felt more estranged and homesick.\n\nThe most popular imports were waterchestnuts, oranges,", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1986.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/jq08c7063", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 210937, "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": 287, "title": "RAS-1986", "content_text": "270\n\nChinese Customs and Festivals, pp. 133-138, published by Kelly and Walsh, Shanghai in 1927 but reprinted recently by O.U.P. Hong Kong.\n\n2\n\nI did not have the characters for this term in 1971 and recent attempts to obtain them, and to get an explanation, were met with mystified looks from persons who came with me in the visits. Rather than delete, or guess, I leave as is.\n\nEnd note: This was the last but one occasion on which separate shows were held by associations. The present leaders have told me recently that, beginning in 1973, a centrally organized show, provided through the Rural Committee which is also responsible for fund-raising, has been presented instead.\n\nVISIT TO THE MITSUKOSHI DEPARTMENT STORE,\n\nMUROMACHI, TOKYO, JAPAN, JUNE 1986\n\nThe highlight of our recent four-day visit to Tokyo (seeing my daughter Suki and my wife Mabel's resounding success with buying clothes apart) was undoubtedly our morning walk from Marunouchi Hotel to Mitsukoshi Department Store and being there in time for the opening ceremony. Unlike the short walk to the old and rather grimy Tokyo (Central) Station, the walk to the Tokyu and Mitsukoshi department stores in the Nihombashi/Muromachi districts is mostly along the broad Eitai-dori Avenue which is lined with banks and business houses on either side. The buildings are large and impressive, and many have been planted out completely at front and side with trees and shrubs. At this time of year some azaleas are still in flower in Tokyo, and the bushes are pruned low and shaped in interesting ways.\n\nWe arrived at Mitsukoshi before opening time at 10 a.m. We thought we were going to a branch of the main store, and therefore were not surprised to find a relatively small building. However, behind it, separated by a narrow street, was the main building, built in the 1920s or even before, and from its grandeur and solidity reminiscent of B. Altmann, Saks and similar large department stores on Fifth Avenue in New York City. The gold logo, a flower on which is superimposed the Yuet (@) character, was placed on the building and on the house flags, also in gold, that hung from it at intervals. As we waited at the main entrance, chauffeur-driven limousines arrived to line up beside the already parked vehicles of leading executives. Inside, two trim, smart-looking girls in stylish grey-white uniforms with elegant hats to match waited at a", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1986.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/jq08c7063", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 211134, "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": 195, "title": "RAS-1987", "content_text": "170\n\nRobertson readily admitted that there had been cases of hardship, but in view of the large number of junks which entered and left Hongkong, he believed they were few and far between.\n\nIn his view, one of the main difficulties China faced in collecting its duties were the violations by junks which sailed from certain ports along the west coast of China which did not have customs stations.\n\nThe Chinese regulations required such vessels to proceed to the nearest Customs House that they might there pay the proper duties and get a receipt with a “Grand Chop.”\n\nInstead of complying with the regulations, many junks proceeded directly to Hongkong. Here their cargoes, for which they had paid no export or transit duties, could be sold or transhipped.\n\nThe perennial problem of smuggling demanded attention. In commenting on the Commission's contention that the junk trade of Hongkong had been injured by the blockade, Robertson remarked that, “unquestionably the contraband portion of it is likely to be so, but I am not aware that that affords a matter for regret; on the contrary if the Colony consulted their own interests instead of those of a number of Chinese who make the Colony the base for their operations and take no manner of interest in its prosperity except as far as affects themselves, they would see that the less smuggling there was the better and sounder would be the trade and the more respectable the class of Chinese traders who would resort to it.”\n\nIt was not only opium that was being smuggled into China. Hongkong also served as a base for illegal trade in salt, arms and ammunition, along with sulphur and saltpetre used as ingredients of explosives.\n\nThe foreign importation of arms had been prohibited as a measure to keep them out of the hands of bandits and pirates. It was hoped that a ban of traffic in arms would assist the Kwangtung authorities in controlling clan feuds and the ever present danger of open conflict between Punti and Hakka.\n\nPage 195\n\nPage 196", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1987.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/rx919b522", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 211314, "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-1988", "page_number": 30, "title": "RAS-1988", "content_text": "6\n\nher the confederation grew until, at its height in 1809, it comprised between 50,000 and 70,000 individuals and the 1,200 junks referred to in the introduction.\n\nThe Confederation in action\n\nBy mid-1808 the military success of the confederation was such that the Ch'ing government's policy of sea war had been soundly defeated. The deaths of the Brigade-General of the Bocca Tigris, Lin Kuo-liang, and the Lieutenant-Colonel, Lin Fa, coupled with their losses of material resulted in the reduction of the provincial fleet by half and an even greater penetration of the Pearl River Delta by the pirates.\n\nLin Kuo-liang's replacement, Hsu T'ing-kuei, was defeated in July 1809. Although he managed to destroy most of the White Flag Fleet in the process, he himself was killed and he lost ten of the thirty-five mi-t'ing or rice carriers in his war fleet. The situation was now desperate as pirates were able to destroy government war junks faster than the dockyards could build them, and most of the provincial fleet's auxiliary salt and fishing vessels were out of commission as well.\n\nPirates were now able to bring their penetration of the Pearl River to new heights as Black Flag Fleet leader, Kuo P'o-tai, set out at once on a six-week foray into the inner passage that resulted in the deaths of 10,000 individuals. On August 11, 1809, he burned the customs house at Tzu-ni, ten miles from Canton and sent messengers to the Governor-General warning that if ransom was not forthcoming, the city would be attacked.\n\nAt the same time, the Red Flag Fleet leader, Chang Pao, worked the **outer passage** or main channel of the Pearl River and destroyed two forts near its mouth. At the Second Bar, he sent a fleet of Chinese war junks running, destroyed towns and villages all the way to Pan-yu and Nan-hai counties, and defeated the government's newly-constructed vessels at Sha-wan.\n\nForeigners, too, were alarmed at the strength and audacity of the pirates, who, on September 5, 1809, simultaneously detained the vessels of the Siamese tribute mission in the mouth of the Pearl River and sent\n\nPage 30\nPage 31", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1988.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/ft84gb83q", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 211677, "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": 92, "title": "RAS-1989", "content_text": "67\n\nanti-British propaganda, which the facile Eugene Chen* was then addressing to a gullible American press.\n\nSet back from the Bund behind a heavy hand-wrought iron fence of ugly design, the Consulate building was typical of those erected in the 1860s, when the Concession was first opened. The two-storied thick brick walls, shaded all round by wide arched verandahs, in the style affected in India, housed both the office and the residence of the Consul. Upstairs, parts of the verandah had been boarded in to provide bathrooms in accordance with modern practice. From the bedroom windows the view carried across the Yangtze to the flat north shore, a mile away, where the farmers were already cutting down for fuel the tall reeds, which yearly grew along the banks of the river. We would often cross over at this season with our guns and our dogs to beat the pheasant out of the smaller clumps left by the reed-cutters.\n\nHaving completed their inspection, the plotters moved on down the Bund, past the godowns of Messrs. Butterfield and Swire, past the Customs House, past the Roman Catholic Church to the Bund gate, through which they trouped a little self-consciously under the eye of the steel-helmeted gentleman, who stood there with his rifle at the slope, in the blue uniform, the khaki webb equipment, and the spats of the Royal Navy.\n\nTheir plans soon matured. Some afternoons later a political meeting was called on the foreshore outside the Bund gate, which the Navy had left open to avoid any accusation of provocation. By the offer of a ten cents inducement to the loafers and riff-raff of the Chinese city an adequate attendance was ensured. Orators stood on the Bund wall whipping up the temper of the crowd: they shouted slogans in which the words \"Beat down” and “Kill\" echoed frequently. The crowd soon responded and parties began trickling into the Concession. Stones flew through the air. The sentry at the gate discreetly withdrew and sounded the alarm. The British Naval guard turned off: they had strict orders not to fire, but to protect themselves by dropping their rifle butts on the toes of any rioters who pressed them too closely. This method of defence is not very effective against stones. Reinforcements were brought ashore from the meagre crew of the destroyer; they were joined by some dozen\n\n* (Trinidad born journalist. At this time Minister for Foreign Affairs of the Kuo Min Tang Revolutionary Government.)", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1989.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/8336pm92h", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 211694, "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": 109, "title": "RAS-1989", "content_text": "84\n\nanti-aircraft fire, but as far as I could see, they were completely unscathed. The bombing seemed to me to be directed entirely against what were, or might be taken to be, military objectives, and this indeed may be said of the artillery fire also. During the 18 days fighting Queen Mary Hospital, 400 yards from Mt. Davis Fort, did not receive a single direct hit. The two hospitals on the Peak (i.e. the Matilda Hospital and the War Memorial Nursing Home) were repeatedly hit by shells, but I think this was due to the fact that the Japanese were searching for two field batteries which were located uncomfortably close to the two hospitals: this, at any rate, was the explanation given by a Japanese officer who came to the War Memorial Nursing Home while I was there after the surrender. One point which struck me very forcibly was the small size of the bombs and shells which the Japanese were using. I saw many direct hits by bombs on buildings on the Peak but in no case did I see any building completely demolished as my house in Chungking was; and the shells, which I am told were mostly from field guns and trench mortars, did not seem to have much penetrating power: they hardly scarred modern reinforced concrete buildings such as the Hongkong and Shanghai Bank building and the block of flats where my wife and I were living. I am told that the Japanese were using heavier weapons elsewhere, but my general impression was that the Japanese were mainly using what I think Mr. Hore-Belisha called “Woolworth” material.\n\nAs regards the behaviour of the Japanese in Hongkong I think I must distinguish between two phases, i.e. the actual attack and afterwards. There are many well-authenticated stories of the shooting or bayoneting of British prisoners during the attack, though how general the practice was I have no means of judging. (A Commissioner of Customs, Mr. Flanagan, who is in the \"Narkunda\", told me he had seen a number of corpses of British soldiers still with their hands tied behind their backs). There was also a very nasty affair at Stanley where two doctors, three nurses and a number of Canadian officers and possibly others were massacred. There were also apparently numerous cases of rape including a few European women and girls. The situation however was quickly brought under control and there was nothing at all resembling the licensed disorder which followed the capture of Nanking in 1937. We were indeed told by people who were in Kowloon when the Japanese came in, that the behaviour of the latter towards European women was good though numbers of Chinese and half-caste girls were taken off, obviously for ...\n\n* The staff repatriated via the \"Kamakura Maru\" were transferred to the \"Narkunda\" in Lourenço Marques. (Editor's Note)", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1989.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/8336pm92h", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 212223, "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-1990", "page_number": 165, "title": "RAS-1990", "content_text": "142 \n\nnumber of bicycles, and despite having to dismount frequently to cross ditches, alleged to be anti-tank but too narrow to be effective for the purpose, made forty miles in a day along the footpaths amongst the hills. \n\nTens of thousands of coolies were carrying loads over the track from Mirs Bay to the East River: it shewed what a large flow of supplies still entered China from Hongkong despite the Japanese blockade. I even saw the parts of wholly dismantled lorries being carried along, four coolies to each pole on the heavier loads, such as the frame. Unfortunately a cholera epidemic was raging, and the Chinese government appeared to have made no effort to provide medical and sanitary supervision, on what was one of the few remaining routes of entry into China. A plague of flies hovered over the human excreta which defiled the edges of the road along its whole length. Coolies were dying by the dozen. They would collapse by the side of the road and crawl off to expire in the scrub. In places the stench was so strong as to make you retch. On arrival next day at Mirs Bay we were offered tea at the little Chinese customs house, while waiting for the launch. As the bay was entirely inside Hongkong territorial waters, Japanese ships could not enter, and the launches ran twice a day with impunity. \n\nI stepped ashore at Taipo, a village in the New Territory, in time to catch the evening train from Fanling, but I was now feeling ill myself and half wondering whether I too had not caught cholera. I was unable to join the golfing fraternity in the saloon car to listen to the highlights of the day's sport, or to partake of refreshment, and on arrival at the Gloucester I retired to my bed. \n\nThe luxury, however, of a modern hotel soon put me on my legs, and I was further fortified by the comfort of a passage to Shanghai in one of the Canadian-Pacific Company's liners. \n\nIt was November. Many of the younger men had left to join up, either in Malaya or in India, where it was thought their services might prove more useful than in England. Nevertheless with the addition of the people who had been brought in from the outports, there was no shortage of staff in the offices; and the Clubs, if anything, appeared rather crowded. Owing to the stagnation in trade, people had not much to do. Yet managers seemed reluctant to release their young men, too many of whom, as it appeared to me, seemed quite content to stay; while, surprisingly, older middle-aged men were being allowed \n\nPage 165\n\nPage 166", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1990.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/d79206299", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 212298, "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-1990", "page_number": 240, "title": "RAS-1990", "content_text": "217\n\nhe testified that there was hardly a house in Victoria except the brothels - where he had not repeatedly been and where he was not known as a friend. See James Legge. \"The Colony of Hong Kong\", The China Review, op. cit., pp. 168-169. Unfortunately, these remarks were edited out of the reprint of this talk found in The Journal of the Hong Kong Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society 11 (1971), op. cit.\n\nSee n. 26\n\nM5 The impact and importance of Legge's life as a Non-Conformist academic has been summarized in my article in Ching Feng, “The 'Failures' of James Legge's Fruitful Life for China', op. cit. Another more general point about dissenting churches should be made: in late nineteenth century Great Britain, the academic circles of academics who were dissenters appear to have functioned as a contrapuntal voice in the mainstream of English society. The publication of The British Quarterly became an organ for dissenting viewpoints which illustrates this point. Another factor involved in the influence of dissenting believers was the fact that many of the children of these people married into major families within English society. A perfect example is one of Legge's daughters from his first marriage, Eliza, who married a gentleman who later became the first Inspector-General of the Chinese Maritime Customs, Horatio Nelson Lay. See Lindsay Ride, op. cit., p. 9.\n\nC\n\nSee the case of Dr. Wong Foon, London Missionary Society Archives. Letters from South China, dated April 12, 1856. Further discussion occurs in letters of October 12, 1859, April 14, 1860, and November 28, 1860.\n\n47 Legge's opposition to opium and coolie trades, among other problems, was stated publicly in his address at the Hong Kong City Hall in 1872. See \"The Colony of Hong Kong\", The Journal of the Hong Kong Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society, op. cit., pp. 190-191. In 1870, Legge had joined his Chinese pastoral colleague Ho Jinshan in promoting a petition which opposed the newly legalized gambling opened by the Hong Kong government primarily for the sake of revenue. Over one thousand two hundred names, most of whom were Chinese, signed the petitions presented to the government on February 21st and March 6th, 1871. See Hong Kong Government Office, Colonial Office Records, CO129/149, 5, pp. 188-197 and 8, pp. 208-234.\n\n100\n\nSee the letter addressed to James Legge by Sir W. G. Liddell, the appointed representative of Oxford University, dated February 27, 1875 (Bodleian Library archives). Liddell makes it clear to Legge in the letter that his Non-Conformist background should not be a source of turmoil if he were admitted to the University. Although the letter also includes the qualification that Legge's credentials indicate a person of high standing, the doubt in Liddell's mind about the character of anyone from a dissenting tradition is explicit. It may be the case, as Mary Dominica Legge claimed, that James Legge was the first non-Anglican professor admitted to Oxford after 1871, but I have not yet found a way to verify this.\n\n69\n\nR. F. Horton commented, however, that Prof. Legge's involvement with the Non-Conformist Union was minimal. See his comments in his text, An Autobiography (London: 1918).\n\n*0\n\nAmong those with whom Prof. Legge had some direct spiritual interaction was the famous Hegelian philosopher, T. H. Green. In a letter dated April 29 (no year, but probably 1879, when both men were on the provisional committee of Somerville College), Green responds to a lengthy rejoinder Prof. Legge had given to a book Green had written. Green had sent the letter because, apparently, the professor had treated him like an orthodox believer,\" and Green felt there was a sort of hypocrisy in allowing you to continue under that impression\". The letter ends with Green politely defending his philosophical position, but also mirroring some sense of challenge to alter his views which must have been expressed by Prof. Legge. This letter is found\n\n4\n\nIL\n\nPage 240\n\nPage 241", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1990.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/d79206299", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 212374, "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-1990", "page_number": 316, "title": "RAS-1990", "content_text": "admit. They do not shy away from work, no matter how troublesome or strenuous it may be. They are not ashamed of any kind of labour, not even if it is as lowly or debased as may be, so long as they can make money.\n\nI should like to make a few remarks about the physique of the Chinese, before I continue with my description of their customs and way of life. The Chinese are the same size as Europeans, but they have less muscle power. They are slender and well-proportioned. The features of the face are in between those of a Negro and those of a European. The face is more angular than a European's, and comes closer to a right-angle than does a Negro's. The cheek-bone protrudes less than does that of a Negro, and the lips are less thick and protruding. The nose, as a rule, is flat and thick, the eyebrows and eyes are black, and the eyes are set obliquely, which means that they lie lower towards the nose than to the outside of the face. The hair is black, rough, and thick, but the growth of the beard is very slight. The colour of the face varies according to the different longitudes. In this region, the colour is mostly a pale ochre, which turns brown in people who live mostly in the open, and are exposed to the sun. No Chinese would be browner than a Portuguese who lives in Hong Kong — at least I have not seen any such.\n\nThe face of a Chinese shows little animation, or freshness. Partly, this is, surely, due to physical reasons, but, partly the reason is also that the places where they live are so dark, musty, and smoky. Besides, there is the fact that they never wash themselves in cold, but only in warm water. Furthermore, the rag with which they wash themselves is always grubby, or even dirty. After they have washed themselves, they always hang the rag in any odd place — very often in front of their house-door — and leave it there until they next need it. As soon as a child is born, it is straightaway washed in hot water. Later they do not seem to be washed in either warm water or cold water, because all the small children I have seen were, without exception, dirty and unclean.\n\nI should also remark that Chinese ladies are smaller than\n\nPage 293", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1990.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/d79206299", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 212472, "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-1991", "page_number": 26, "title": "RAS-1991", "content_text": "6\n\nCantonese Compradors\n\nCanton, the first Chinese city opened for foreign trade, has a long history of interacting with the West. The Co-hong which was set up by the Qing government, had created a system of hong merchants, linguists and compradors in response to the quest for foreign trade. As William Hunter mentions, the position of a comprador in a foreign mercantile house was important. Almost everything around the house, varying from examining silver, internal accounting, employing servants, cooks and coolies, to interpreting and even mediating with Chinese merchants were the responsibility of the comprador. Though the Co-hong system was terminated after the first Opium War, compradors still survived and started a new era of development. It was natural that Cantonese compradors formed a dominant group at the beginning of the Canton system, since most of the Chinese foreign trade was conducted in Canton. However, to account for the rise of Cantonese compradors in modern China, several factors should not be ignored. First, recruitment of new compradors by personal or regional ties, when compradors became private merchants. Before 1843, compradors had been licensed by the government and guaranteed under the officially dictated hong merchant hierarchy. Second, the disappearance of the limited trading system in Canton and opening of Hong Kong and other Chinese coastal cities accelerated the increase in the number of Western mercantile firms. Third, Western merchants, particularly the British, relied upon Chinese compradors in conducting business.\n\nGuarantorship\n\nHow did a person qualify as a comprador? First, proficiency in English was preferred but business connection was considered more important by the Western merchants. Personal trust was usually critical. The Nanjing Treaty privatized Chinese foreign trade. Compradors replaced the hong merchants as agents for foreign firms and as guarantors for Chinese merchants doing business with foreign merchants. After 1842 with the abolition of the Co-hong system, some of the former hong merchants engaged in private tea or silk business, and compradors became private agents for foreign firms rather than government-mandated agents. Former linguists, after leaving the hong merchants, served mostly as clerks of the new maritime customs or as customs brokers. As scholars pointed out, more than a mere recommendation from a former hong merchant or another Cantonese known to the agency house, personal guarantee\n\n1", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1991.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/k356gt84j", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 212586, "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-1991", "page_number": 140, "title": "RAS-1991", "content_text": "120\n\nperson's house, overnight, for her spirit to return. In death, mother is able to influence things by her spiritual clout. This vigil was preceded by a family visit, at 4.00 pm, to the Buddhist Hall. After crossing the Harbour back to the dead woman's home, formalities were performed. The table was set with her favourite food and cigarettes. She would invite demons to this meal. Western candles and incense sticks were lit in the passage. A pair of scissors, again signifying lei hei (##), meaning 'weapon', and also ‘gain, interest or profit', was placed on the floor near the door to prevent unwanted spirits entering. Yellow papers with symbols on were lit and, while in flames, circles were made with them around all persons present to ward off evil. Copies of the Buddhist prayer, mentioned earlier, had to be removed from the flat. It is powerful and could keep the dead person's spirit away. This was expected to return between 3.00 and 5.00 am with two companions, one with a cow's head and the other with a horse's face. They could cause trouble.\n\nAll mourners dozed off in the early hours although one dreamed of the deceased. Second daughter remarked the following morning, ‘If even it didn't happen, it is better to believe it happened and the mother visited us.\" That was the attitude throughout the mourning period. This family wanted to do the correct thing and gave the impression of believing, totally, in what it was doing.\n\nAn old colleague of the author recounts how an artist relative of his, who specialised in painting bamboo, died. While awaiting the return of his spirit, family members spread a dusting of incense ash on part of the floor. When they awoke the following morning, the old colleague alleges, there were marks in the dust depicting bamboo.\n\nOther Funeral Services\n\nTradition has it that it is possible, with rituals, to help the departed spirit by holding up to seven further services, one every seven days, for 49 days. These assist a soul with its tribulations through the '10 courts of the underworld'. But with present customs, and to reduce expense, usually not all seven are celebrated. The important ones are 21, 35 and 49 days after demise. For Chinese Catholics, masses can be said once a week to replace them.\n\nIn this study, the second tsat (meaning seventh) was celebrated, but the eldest daughter and her husband did not attend. It was close to his", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1991.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/k356gt84j", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 213111, "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-1993", "page_number": 179, "title": "RAS-1993", "content_text": "161\n\ncontinued without break until 1932, when the street was completely lined with shops on the New Territories side. The border street, however, could not provide sufficient space for all the shops of the market. In 1931, a reclamation project began just west of the town, along the frontier, to allow a second border street to be built. This was completed, and the shops on San Lau Street built, in 1933-1934. This project included a new pier and fish market, and allowed the fish wholesalers in the market to cross over into the New Territories as well. By 1935 only a few shops were left operating in the old market in Chinese territory, mostly those (like the pawnshop, the boatyard, and the opium divan) which could not move because of physical or legal restraints. A terrible typhoon and storm-surge on 2nd September 1937 destroyed most of what was left of the old market: it never recovered.\n\nThe effect on the market of the new frontier was not, however, entirely negative. In 1899 it is unlikely that the town housed more than about 500 people; the 100 Customs staff, 30 or so soldiers, and 25 or so Hong Kong Police who became stationed there represented a significant increase in the town's population. The local market for fuel, vegetables, and daily necessities grew sharply, bringing benefits to both the market shopkeepers and to the villagers. Uniforms required repair, bringing work to tailors and cobblers. Even blacksmiths and carpenters found increased work opportunities. The Customs steam-launch brought new engineering skills to the town, and provided a new market in coal. Shortly after the Customs steam-launch was domiciled in the town, the Sha Yue Chung Ferry took advantage of the presence of these new skills and converted to a steam vessel - one of the earliest regular steam ferries in the New Territories area.\n\nOther modern developments reached Sha Tau Kok early because of the needs of the frontier. Thus, the telegraph line reached the town in 1899, and the telephone in 1900. Electric light was provided to the town in 1933. While the construction of the railway was predominantly due to economic factors, again the needs of the frontier were among the reasons for this early extension of modern facilities to the town. 47\n\nAs in most garrison towns, however, it was the entertainment industry which most benefited from the new frontier. Very soon after the new frontier was established, prostitutes from Hong Kong saw the opportunities, and set up house in the market. From the present-day elders' recollections", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1993.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/66833t302", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 213112, "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-1993", "page_number": 180, "title": "RAS-1993", "content_text": "162\n\nof what they were told by their fathers, there had been no prostitutes here before 1898. The prostitutes' clients were mostly soldiers and Customs staff - the prostitutes spoke Cantonese, not the Hakka spoken by all the locals. A gambling house (opened in 1904), and an opium divan came at about the same time as the prostitutes - these served people from Hong Kong as well as the garrison. Most New Territories towns had at most one or two winemakers; Sha Tau Kok in the 1920s had four at least, of which one was solely in the wine trade, unlike most local distillers, who combined this business with a general grocery. Similarly, Sha Tau Kok's three restaurants (including a cold drink and coffee shop), two tobacco dealers, and two cakeshops, is more than is found in most of the local towns at this period. The three or four guesthouses in Sha Tau Kok were also more than usually found - when military officers of rank came to Sha Tau Kok on inspection, they did not share the barracks with their men, but stayed in the private rooms in the guesthouses, so here, too, the presence of the garrison probably led to an economic expansion. Some of these service industries had been in Sha Tau Kok before 1898. There had certainly been a guesthouse here in the 1850s, and a noodle shop in the 1880s. **It is unlikely that there were prostitutes, or a full-time gambling house or opium divan there then, although gambling and opium smoking certainly took place in the town at that date. The early presence of some service industries in the town before 1898 was a consequence of traffic on the Sha Yue Chung Ferry, but it is reasonable to see the establishment of the new frontier as having led to an economic growth in the town in the years following 1898. The smuggling industry also produced considerable profit, especially during the 1930s.\n\nThe new frontier, therefore, caused many problems. To the villagers, the need to pay duty on day-to-day purchases far outweighed any advantages gained from having a larger population to sell things to. For the shopkeepers, the economic advantages were similarly more than offset by the prevailing political chaos and uncertainty. It is not surprising that the main effect of the exclusion of Sha Tau Kok Market from the New Territories in 1898 was to force a re-location of the market over the frontier into the New Territories a generation later,\n\nRoads and Ferries: Sha Tau Kok and its Hinterland\n\nSha Tau Kok stood at a nodal point in the local road system, and it was this factor which brought about the town's prosperity in the century after\n\nPage 180\n\nPage 181", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1993.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/66833t302", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 213121, "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-1993", "page_number": 189, "title": "RAS-1993", "content_text": "171\n\nHowever, the move towards Wang Tau Street had only led to building on the area immediately west of the old walled market by 1898. When the gambling house was established in Sha Tau Kok (about 1904), it found the area immediately south of the walls empty and ready for development. This area was quickly built over - a row of houses for prostitutes being built to the east, connected by a new alleyway through the walls with Lower Street, and the gambling house nearby to the west, closer to Wang Tau Street, was a long wooden building, set awkwardly at an angle to the street, which was used as a restaurant serving noodles (especially dog-meat noodles, for which Sha Tau Kok was famous). Between the noodle restaurant and the gambling house Wang Tau Street formed a small irregular triangular open space.\n\nNone of the elders claims to know anything of what the prostitutes' houses were like inside, except to say that it was generally believed that the prostitutes also offered opium to their customers. The prostitutes' houses were small, however, and probably consisted of two main rooms only: a front room where guests could take opium, and a bed-chamber.\n\n4).\n\nThis\n\nMore is remembered about the gambling houses. It was approximately square - about 40 feet by 50 - and two-storeyed. The western part of the ground floor was one big square room, of about 40 feet square. This had doors leading directly to the street on the north (leading to the street of the prostitutes' houses), west (leading to Wang Tau Street), and south (leading to the guesthouses and Customs Station). Of these, the west door was the main one. This ground floor square room was the main gambling hall. It contained four tables, where the game offered was Po Tau (which consisted of the manipulation of small, nested brass boxes). The game was very popular, and the room was often crowded. The eastern side of the ground floor comprises stores, service rooms, and the staircase up to the second floor. This contained (on the east) the residence of the manager, and, on the west, a second gambling hall, with wide windows overlooking Wang Tau Street. This second gambling hall was half the size of the ground floor one, and had two tables, at which Tsz Fa (七花) was offered. In addition, tables for Pai Kau (牌九) were set up in the street outside the main entrance, under an awning. The gambling house was a very prosperous business, and the little open space in front of its door was one of the central spots of the town - wood and grass for fuel were sold here.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1993.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/66833t302", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 213122, "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-1993", "page_number": 190, "title": "RAS-1993", "content_text": "172\n\nThe guesthouses (), lower down Wang Tau Street from the gambling house, were three-storeyed shop-houses. The ground floor was the residence of the owner; sometimes a small shop was run as well. Above, on the first floor, was a dormitory for villagers and poor travellers staying the night in town. A few large beds stood here - for one or two cents, you could share a bed with whoever else was looking for a place to stay. For the more fastidious and wealthy, small cubicles on the top floor offered privacy and an unshared bed. Military officers visiting the town would stay in these private cubicles. The guesthouses did not serve meals; guests took food at the adjacent noodle restaurant. The 'totally comfortless' guesthouse used by the Basel missionaries in 1859 must have been of this type.\n\nThere was only one full-time opium divan in the market, although opium could be taken in the prostitutes' houses as well. Up until 1917, there had also been several low-class opium divans in sheds in British Sha Tau Kok - these were closed in that year, as part of the agreement to end trade in opium between Hong Kong and China which, it was hoped, would allow the Chinese Government to end all opium imports, and to control the sale of opium in China. The chaos in the border area, however, made it impossible for the trade on the Chinese side of the frontier to be effectively controlled, and the Sha Tau Kok opium divan continued to trade unmolested until 1951. Opium could also be bought for home consumption from the two tobacco shops in the market. These shops were also heavily engaged in smuggling opium into Hong Kong.\n\nNext to the opium divan was the market barber. In 1853 there had only been itinerant barbers in the town. This shop should be seen, to a large degree, as one of the service trades attracted by the opportunities brought about by the new frontier and garrison, like the prostitutes and the gambling house.\n\nBeyond the guesthouses, near the sea, Wang Tau Street was occupied by the fish laans and the Kowloon Customs Station. The Customs Station was rebuilt several times during this period. The Station building in existence in the 1920s was a solidly built, European style, single-storey structure, with a verandah, built of brick and tile. One end was the residence of the Assistant Superintendent. In the middle were the offices, and the barrack quarters for the junior staff were at the further end. The Customs also rented some nearby houses for stores and quarters. After the Station", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1993.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/66833t302", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 213124, "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-1993", "page_number": 192, "title": "RAS-1993", "content_text": "174\n\n-\n\nBetween the grain market and the fish laans was a broad open space. This was used for drying grain and fish, and other things. This was where the matsheds for the local Ta Tsiu were put up - the gambling house also put on opera here at the New Year, partly as a gesture of thanks to patrons, but also to cope with increased demand at this season (gambling tables were set up in the matshed). This space was where the execution of about 1935 mentioned above took place.\n\nWest of the Tin Hau Temple, the village of Sha Lan Ha (Shalandia, [] F) stretched along the shore. This was predominantly a residential village, mostly of the Ng (A) family, genealogically connected with the Ngs of Tam Shui Hang. There were no shops here, just houses, for the boatyard, 4 and one of the town tobacconists, who found except this site, close to the Customs Station, profitable. The boatyard was a large concern, with associated ropeworks and sailyards within the village.\n\n叫\n\nThe biggest and most prestigious building in the town was the Tung Wo School and Man Mo Temple at the north-east corner of the town. This was a well-built brick building, with three courtyards, and, as mentioned above, had been built shortly after 1854 by the Shap Yeuk as the district school and also their office and Meeting Hall. The temple was at the seaward end of the complex. It was built several steps higher than the school, and it had a higher roof. The whole building was essentially single-storeyed, but there were cocklofts for resident students. The original main entrance was facing the bridge, but after the soldiers took over the attached gun-tower as their barracks they used the open space in front of the main door as part of the barracks, and the villagers disliked passing that way. New side doors were, therefore, provided on the side facing the sea, both for the school and the temple, and these were the normal entrances in the 1920s. Between the school and the sea a four-foot high wall with a gate delimited the school and temple yard.\n\nWithin British Sha Tau Kok there were only a few buildings in 1925. On the saltpans, the workers lived in tiny huts - no more than 10 feet square. These workers were not local. The local villagers did not know how to make salt. The saltpans were owned by local villagers - mostly trusts and individuals from Tam Shui Hang village - but the owners merely rented the saltpans to overseers who brought teams of workers with them. The overseers and workers were Hoklos from Swabue (Shanwei, E) down the coast. The workers did not have their families with them.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1993.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/66833t302", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 213148, "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-1993", "page_number": 216, "title": "RAS-1993", "content_text": "198\n\ncommodities\n\n+\n\nThe boat-building and repair sheds at Sha Tau Kok had entirely disappeared, with great loss of life. Special encouragement [from a relief fund] was given to the boat-builders at Sha Tau Kok to start all over again. \"The Customs Station at Sha Tau Kok was destroyed in this typhoon - see Jiulonghaiguan Bamen Dashiji, op. cit., sub anno. In the 1945 aerial photograph, it can be seen that far fewer than half of the buildings in the old market were still standing; the site had been, effectively, abandoned even for residential purposes. Since the War, all vestiges of the old market have been removed for development, and nothing whatsoever now survives of it.\n\n-\n\n47 Papers Laid Before the Legislative Council of Hongkong, printed by Noronha & Co, Government Printers (Sessional Papers), 1900, \"Report on the First Year of Brush Administration of the New Territory, Laid Before the Legislative Council by Command of His Excellency the Governor” (No 15 of 1900), p. 257; 1901, \"Report for the New Territory for 1900, Laid before the Legislative Council by Command of His Excellency the Governor\" (no 28 of 1901), p. 6; Administrative Reports for the Year 1933, App. J, \"Report on the New Territories for 1933\", p. J3. In 1937, the Coronation was celebrated with electric light displays in Sha Tau Kok. Administrative Reports for the Year 1937, App. J, \"Report on the New Territories for the Year 1937\", p. J11.\n\n49\n\nA party from the Basel Mission stayed in a \"totally comfortless guesthouse\" in the town in 1859, Jahresberichte der Basler Mission, 1859, and a noodle shop \"at the entrance to the market\" is mentioned in 1882 (Basel Mission Archive, Doct. A1-16, Nr. 45).\n\n49 Basel Mission Archive, Doct. A1-2, Nr. 46 (1853), Doct. A1-16, Nr. 45 (1882), Jahresberichte der Basler Mission, 1859. \"I do not like taking a house in a market, for you always find wicked types there - thieves, opium smokers, gamblers - festering together and leading to predictable outcomes.\" In 1859, Sha Tau Kok was the only market where the Basel missionaries had attempted to set up a station. Between 1899 and 1902, the District Officer was very concerned about the huge amount of gambling going on at Yim Liu Ha, with over 300 arrests in 1901, but this dropped away to \"almost nothing\" later, after the gambling house became available in Sha Tau Kok. Paper Land Before the Legislative Council of Hongkong, printed by Noronha & Co, Government Printers, (Sessional Papers), 1901, \"Report on the New Territory for 1901, Laid Before the Legislative Council by Command of His Excellency the Governor\", App. 6, p. 20; 1902, App. 2, p. 342-344; Orme's Report, op. cit., para. 41, p. 49.\n\n50\n\nThe route is described in 1848 (Der Evangelische Heidenbote, March 1848); 1853 (Basel Mission Archive, Doct. A1-2, Nr. 44; see P.H. Hase, \"Sha Tau Kok in 1853\", op. cit.); 1858-1859 (Basel Mission Archive, Doct. A1-4, Nr. 11; Jahresberichte der Basler Mission, 1859; and Jahresberichte der Rheinischen Missionsgesellschaft, 1859); 1863 (Basel Mission Archive, Doct. A1-5, Nr. 5); 1884 (Basel Mission Archive, Doct. A1-19, Nr. 35); and 1893 (Basel Mission Archive, Doct. A1-27).\n\n* 1688 Gazetteer, ch. 3 passim; 1819 Gazetteer, ch. 4, Chung Lap Pao edition, 1879, p. 51. The 1688 Gazetteer specifically mentions several of the roads over the shoulders of Ng Tung Shan (b. 1); the road from Sha Tau Kok to Shu Yue Chung (this is probably the implication of the mentioned there) - this is the \"official road\" from which the village of Kwun Lo Ha (Guanlouxia, \"Below the Official Road\") takes", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1993.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/66833t302", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 213270, "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-1994", "page_number": 92, "title": "RAS-1994", "content_text": "72\n\nThus, although the doctrine has made a comeback among the citizens of the People's Republic (Superstition rife, 1989: 13), no thought was supposed to have been paid to it when the towering Bank of China was planned. The Chinese-American architect, I. M. Pei, insists, even though the building includes water features, geomancy was not a consideration.\n\nEugene Ho (Ho, 1987), in a letter to the South China Morning Post, wrote:\n\nI find the whole theory of fung shui wholly devoid of cognitive content.\n\n(For instance) that the sharp edges of the Bank of China in Central are allegedly bad luck.\n\n(It has been suggested) a triangle resembles a pyramid, called kam che tap in Cantonese, and this is similar to kam tap -- which means urns where the remains of the dead are kept.\n\nWhy (should) the mere resemblance between a triangle and a pyramid be sufficient implication of and invitation to bad luck?\n\nThere are those who maintain that paying attention to fung shui helps promote business and keeps staff contented. Few Chinese are likely to quibble over an office layout if it has been designed on the advice of a fung shui consultant. It is, one can argue, a branch of ergonomics. Altering the positions of furniture (which fung shui experts sensibly say should have rounded corners) and office paraphernalia can provide a better sense of space and convenience.\n\nCustoms in Other Countries\n\nChinese fung shui is more complex than most geomantic doctrines, yet there are comparable customs in other countries. A Hindu in India does not like building a house on a triangular site. The position of his bed is important. Such beliefs are more on account of spiritual reasons. Similarly, in the Philippines it is not good to construct a staircase or door facing the direction in which the sun will set because it signifies the disappearance of wealth. The front and back doors, as with Chinese belief, should, likewise, not be in a straight line through the building; otherwise, wealth can escape. You should also not face the door when you sleep.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1994.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/zk522640g", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 213304, "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-1994", "page_number": 126, "title": "RAS-1994", "content_text": "106\n\nwas made \"holy\". Now it is too commercialised. To think that by moving your desk by a few feet you can change your luck!' \n\n'One does not like to dispute anything to do with the \"cosmic arts\".' \n\n'Things like fung shui till a need, and people have to create something, like God, Allah or fung shui, to fill that need. Fung shui is also a rationalisation of good planning.' \n\n'I don't believe that fung shui really has any effect on anything. But it is an intelligent use of land, such as flow of water and siting of buildings etc.' \n\n'If your ancestors are comfortable in their graves then you are comfortable. My Chinese friend felt someone was trying to tell him something. He then went to the cemetery and found the family graves were flooded. Fung shui can be a source of terror.' \n\n'I'm sceptical, although, like some superstitions, much is commonsense. Like walking under a ladder. It may fall on you.' \n\n'I don't believe. But, as a government servant working in the New Territories, you have to go along with villagers' customs.' \n\n'Everyone has their own pattern of beliefs: and so they should.' \n\n'Fung shui is a good belief. People need beliefs. There are different kinds and degrees of belief.' \n\nlike Christianity. But \n\n'I don't believe in the mumbo jumbo. Fung shui has been distorted and commercialised. But the planning aspects are sensible. For instance, water is important. In village life you need to retain it, but, if it is a few inches too high, it can flood all your paddy.' \n\n'Yes, man needs things like fung shui to hang on to.' \n\n'My husband and I built a new house on the Peak in the late 1980s. But after we moved in I felt unwell, so we called in the fung shui man. He said there was not a great deal wrong but he put in the odd plant here and there and made minor changes. After that, we held a \"fung shui party\" and invited all our friends. I did not feel off-colour any more.'", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1994.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/zk522640g", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 213399, "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-1994", "page_number": 221, "title": "RAS-1994", "content_text": "209\n\nNevins, John Livingston (1829-1893), China and the Chinese, New York Harper, 1869\n\nNorthey, James E, People Go to Church the Story of Greater Lancashire, London Salvationist Publication and Supplies, 1973\n\nOliphant, Laurence (1829-1888), Narrative of the Earl of Elgin's Mission to China and Japan in the Years 1857, 1858, 1859, New York Harper, 1860\n\nOrleans, Pierre Joseph d' (1641-1698), History of the Two Tartar Conquerors of China. Including the two Journeys into Tartary of Father Ferdinand Verbiest, in the Suite of the Emperor Kang-Hi from the French, London printed for the Hakluyt Society, 1854\n\nOsbeck, Per (1723-1805), A Voyage to China and the East Indies Together with an Account of Chinese Husbandry by John Reinhold Forster - Appendix of Faunula and Flora Sinensis, London B White, 1771\n\nOwen, David Edward, British Opium Policy in China and India, London and Oxford Oxford University Press, 1934\n\nParker, Edward Harper, Chinese Customs, a Lecture, Shanghai Kelly and Walsh, 1899\n\nParliamentary Papers, House of Commons (1857) Session 2, No XLIII, papers relating to the opium trade in China 1842-56 (Opium Trade 1932, Correspondence Relating to China 1840, Additional Correspondence Relating to China 1840, Report from the Select Committee on the Trade with China 1840)\n\nPaterno, Roberto M, The Yangtze Valley anti-Missionary Riots of 1891, Harvard University PhD dissertation, 1967\n\nPelliot, Paul, Notes on Marco Polo, Paris Imprimerie Nationale, 1957-1963\n\n1\n\nLe voyage de MM Gabet et Huc a Lhasa (a reprint of 1850 article) in Toung Pao 24 133-78 (1926)\n\nPennell, Wilfred V, A Lifetime with the Chinese, Hong Kong Privately printed, 1974\n\nPercival, William Spencer, The Land of the Dragons, My Boating and Shooting Excursions to the Gorges of the Yangtze. London Hurst, 1889\n\nTwenty Years in the Far East, Sketches, London Simpkin, 1905\n\nPereira, Thomas, The Treaties and the Sino-Russian Treaty of Nerchinsk, 1689, the Diary of Thomas Pereira, SJ, Rome 1961 (Bibliotheca Instituti Historici S J vol 18)\n\nPlayfair, G M H, The Cities and Towns of China, a Geographical Dictionary, Shanghai Kelly and Walsh, 2nd edition, 1910 (Taipei Reprint Ch'eng-wen publishing)", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1994.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/zk522640g", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 213784, "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-1996", "page_number": 136, "title": "RAS-1996", "content_text": "107\n\nof the two names of the first generation ancestor of the Chens of Tsuen Wan Sam Tong Uk” as Jiu Shi Wu (95) and also Nian Wu Lang, an ordination name. The descendants who had ordination names include his son Fa You and a great grandson Fa Qiang, among others. The last to have an ordination name include a 10th generation ancestor who was to found a Buddhist monastery.\n\nHakka Sorcerers and Rituals Related to Ordained Ancestors\n\nAlthough the practice of ordination ended in probably the middle of the 19th century, related traditions manage to survive in the Hakka \"Daoist\" ritual specialist and a rite they perform for bridegrooms of some Hakka lineages before their wedding.\n\nHakka ritual specialists were of four main varieties, the male and female spirit mediums (stenpo and gongtung), Buddhist funeral specialists (known as wosong or nammo), and sang ritual specialists who claimed to be Daoist but are clearly more closely linked to Lù Shan and Mao Shan traditions. The sang specialists' rituals include the unique feature of an assistant who is a man dressed as a woman. They use the fa-prefixed style ordination names in the ritual documents and recitation and singing. This is true at least in the case of Mr. Miao, the only one living in Hong Kong in 1981. His family were in this profession for four generations, all using Fa-X style ritual names.76 Villagers have mentioned others, among them a Li of Shataukok and a Liao of Kat O, both died before the time of my interviews.77 When asked about langming and duming, a Hakka Buddhist funeral specialist told me that he never heard about them.78\n\nThe practice of the sang specialist is documented in some detail in Zhonghua Jiu Lisu (“Old Chinese Customs”) (ZHJLS) written by a Hakka Christian of Meixian county in the 1930s. It contains information on the rite of Su Yun (“Redemption of [A Child's] Soul”) and Anlong (“Pacification of the Dragon”). The latter I witnessed at the village of Cheng Lan Shue of the New Territories. The ZHJLS shows that the names of these sessions of the ritual its author knew from the Meixian and Xinning counties, indicating that the Anlong was celebrated once every five or six years for each \"old house,\" and the couplets and flag he copied indicate that the celebration there.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1996.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/3n209j641", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 213816, "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-1996", "page_number": 168, "title": "RAS-1996", "content_text": "140\n\nat the top was another of these tea houses and here we called a halt. I soon got into a chat with an old priest with his clean-shaven head. His temple, or rather hovel, was close there and he got his living by begging. He was stone blind. It was a mendicant Friar, and a wandering Friarð in argument. He freely acknowledged the absurdity of his creed. He is a Buddhist: and offered me on the spot to go with me and learn my creed if I would feed and clothe him. Then I jeered him about his idols, and why he did not get them to help him. The worst of them is, they all acknowledge the absurdity of it, but say it is their custom. Western Foreigners have customs and celestial's have customs, and all creeds are good alike: here the matter ends.\n\nWe again got on our route, and descended the valley. Mr Stringer and myself were so long with the old priest that we were far behind the rest of the party; but we were armed and therefore there was no danger. When we again reached the valley at the bottom, our road lay along a small stream for a few miles. The rest of the party were out of sight, and we went on alone, partly uncertain that we were going right. At last, however, the road suddenly opened into a deep valley on the right, and at last we saw the German Mission House, just under the brow of the hill, and our companions seated very comfortably on the balcony [Ed.: An illustration of the Lilong Station accompanies this article.] So we put our best leg foremost, and at last tired of walking and riding we got in about 5 o'clock. The house is not a very grand affair. But it just has served their purpose. There is only one other house near it for a long way. The situation is beautiful in the extreme, and as healthy as possible. They have a little ground in front, and on the sides of the hills are plantations of tea shrubs, though nothing very bright about them.\n\nThe missionary staff consists of Mr Winnes, who has been in China nearly 20 years, and a fine young German, named Eitel\". I was much struck with him. There is a nobleness and firmness in him which I greatly admire. In fact, there is something almost severe about his look. But the animation with which he speaks, and the natural energy of his character, together with his pleasing and gentlemanly deportment, lead you soon to see he is not an ordinary person. [Ed.: Photographs of Lechler, Winnes and Eitel accompany this article.]\n\nWe took a short walk on the hills, and then came home to dinner, which by the bye I enjoyed with a keen relish. Then we sat a while on", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1996.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/3n209j641", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 214166, "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-1998", "page_number": 24, "title": "RAS-1998", "content_text": "Appendix C\n\nRASHKB Projects Undertaken during the 1998/9 Year\n\n(a) Photographic Exhibition: From 25 to 27 May, 1998, the RASHKB held a photographic exhibition on the overhead walkway leading from the Landmark building to Swire House. The RASHKB photographs of Western and Sheung Wan aroused considerable interest among the public. The main purpose of the exhibition was to boost RAS membership. Although many RAS members helped mount and man the exhibition, most of the planning and the bulk of the work was undertaken by Robert Nield and Tim Ko. Members Philip Bruce and Arthur Hacker also helped plan the recruitment drive, with the latter designing a new RAS brochure assisted by Dr Michael Lau for the Chinese translation. We are grateful to all who assisted in any way.\n\n(b) Tracing Graves: From July to September our Branch was involved with tracing seven graves for the British Association of Cemeteries in South Asia. The requests to trace these graves came from descendants of the deceased living in Britain. Four of the graves were traced in Happy Valley and Carl Smith was able to trace, from his card index system, that the fifth person had died in Ningbo. The bulk of the research in Hong Kong was undertaken by Dr Dan Waters with help from the Government Urban Services Department.\n\n(c) Samuel Cornell Plant (1866-1921): Commencing in September as an ongoing project, two of our overseas members, Captain A.C. Bromfield and Mrs Rosemary Lee, have been assisting the British Association of Cemeteries in South Asia research the life of Captain Plant. He was an inspector in the Chinese Maritime Customs on the dangerous upper section of the Yangtze River and he and his wife are buried in Happy Valley. The RASHKB has been involved at the Hong Kong end where research has been undertaken by Dr Dan Waters.\n\n(d) The National Library of China: From 17-24 January, 1999, RASHKB member Dr Kazimiera Gasztine worked in the National Library in Beijing, in an honorary capacity, assisting staff translate passages into English, and writing synopses of the contents of old and rare works. It is understood there is in the region of 4,000 such books in the Beijing library in languages about which the staff at the National Museum...\n\nxxiii", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1998.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/1g05n0794", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 214513, "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-1998", "page_number": 371, "title": "RAS-1998", "content_text": "340\n\ncommander's residence. Indeed, its present use is a naval canteen. The sleepy staff were somewhat surprised to see an invasion by foreign tourists, but they allowed us to wander all over the house as if it were our own. Later research pinned this house down as being the governor's residence, as opposed to \"Government House\".\n\nFrom this vantage point it is possible to look into the naval base. There is not much of interest, except for one smart but small building towards the northern end of the base that looks as though it could have been the former customs house. It has a four-storey tower with a very tall flagpole and a large verandah overlooking the sea. My previous visit in 1996 afforded me a closer look at this well-preserved building, but only by gaining unauthorised entry to the naval base. The front gates were, naturally, guarded - but a door into one of the external walls had a sign that a canteen was doing business up the stairs. Up I went - and then down I went on the other side, but only very briefly. Much as I liked what I saw, I did not fancy spending a few years there.\n\nBack at the governor's residence, comparing notes and old photographs with a naval officer who had just strolled up the hill for lunch, we established that the actual Government House still exists, but that it is firmly inside a military compound. Nothing daunted, we found the place - inland and a mile or so to the west of where we were. Unfortunately, but not surprisingly, no amount of pleading with the guards at the gate could get even a foot inside. But we could get a glimpse of the roof of the building in question - just through the gate and to the right - about 100 yards away, partially hidden by trees. The details that we could see confirmed it as being the former British governor's residence.\n\nDuring lunch, Jessie and a few others wandered off in search of the King's Hotel, the Hongkong Bank building and a few other places from her past. Unfortunately they did not find any.\n\nThe only other point of interest that we saw was an obelisk, in the middle of a traffic island near the seafront, commemorating \"the taking back of Wei Hai from the British after years of pain.\" Lucky, I suppose, that Wei Hai was not subjected to as much pain as Hong Kong.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1998.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/1g05n0794", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 214533, "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-1998", "page_number": 391, "title": "RAS-1998", "content_text": "360\n\nFormer customs house (?), Port Edward\n\n共鮪海", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1998.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/1g05n0794", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 214603, "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-1999", "page_number": 18, "title": "RAS-1999", "content_text": "first time that an RASHKB representative, in this case your President, has been invited to sit on a government committee of this nature.\n\nThe Branch has also been notified by various bodies who were searching for scholars: for instance the Urban Council which was looking for a Hong Kong Researcher(s) to compile a monograph on the history of the Urban Council. We have also received a number of queries from the media, scholars, students and members of the public. Such queries referred mainly to Hong Kong history, culture or customs. We were generally able to answer such enquiries. Subjects ranged from conditions in prisoner-of-war camps under the Japanese; to the retaking of Hong Kong in 1945 after World War Two; to a doctorate student seeking information about Wei Hai Wei. In another case the business house of Swire was trying to find out where the place, Bak Hin Hok, was. This was found to be, thanks to Dr Joseph Ting, a district in Canton as it was so named a century or so ago. In some cases, with such queries, a number of RAS members and considerable time, research and interviews have been necessary.\n\nThe RASHKB Volunteers\n\nThis working group of well over 20 members on roll has, for much of the year, gone off on expeditions every other week or so, to inspect and report on various buildings or sites. These have included such structures as the old Kai Tak Airport, military installations and Chinese shop-houses. There is no doubt that these inspections, which are another form of community service, are of significant value to the Government Antiquities and Monuments Office to whom reports are submitted. We are grateful to all our Volunteers many of whom put in a considerable amount of time and effort which includes research and writing up reports. A special vote of thanks must go to Bill Greaves and Bob Horsnell, both Chartered Surveyors, historians and long-time residents of Hong Kong, who lead our band of stalwart Volunteers.\n\n'Friends' of the RASHKB\n\nThis group of overseas RASHKB members has completed another successful year in Britain and a report, written by David Gilkes (RASHKB Immediate Past President), the 'Friends' Chairman, has been prepared. Your President was pleased to be able to attend their AGM in\n\nxvii", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1999.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/s178b887x", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 214825, "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-1999", "page_number": 240, "title": "RAS-1999", "content_text": "206\n\n8\n\nbeen affixed. A case of this kind from Chekiang in 1909 was cited in Lin Shao-yang, A Chinese Appeal to Christendom Concerning Christian Missions (London, Watts & Co., 1911), p.236.\n\n* Rev. S. Beal, Buddhism in China (London, Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge, 1884), p.241.\n\n? Holmes Welch, Buddhism under Mao (Cambridge, Mass., Harvard University Press, 1966), p.\n\nFor an updated statement on Buddhism in Hong Kong, see Bartholomew P.M. Tsui, \"Recent Developments in Buddhism in Hong Kong\" at pp.299-311 of Julian F.Pas (ed.) The Turning of the Tide, Religion in China Today (Hong Kong, Royal Asiatic Society, Hong Kong Branch, in association with Oxford University Press, 1989).\n\n10 During a recent visit with friends to a small religious house in the hills behind Tsuen Wan (the Sai Chuk Lam), the couplets in the hall dedicated to the care of ancestral tablets of former inmates and the departed relatives of its clients gave the following messages to visitors: Place Trust in Kuan Yin's Great Mercy and Kindness (right) and Relieve Those in Hardship and Suffering by Reciting Her Name (left); with (above) another scroll to the effect that the Mercy Boat will Carry All over the Cruel Sea. I am grateful to Mr. Simon C.P. Yeung for discussing this with me on the visit. Hong Kong persons, temples, deities and places in these Notes are given in Cantonese romanisation.\n\nA whole chapter on \"The Moral Tract Literature of China\" is devoted to this subject by Rev. John L. Nevius, China and the Chinese (Philadelphia, Presbyterian Board of Publication, revised edition, 1882), pp.226-236.\n\n12 H.A.Giles, Strange Stories from a Chinese Studio (Shanghai, Kelly and Walsh, 1915), p.469. A translation of the work is given at pp.469-487.\n\n13 Besides the Buddhist and Taoist works in their collection (Moral Tenets and Customs in China, Ho-kien-fu, Catholic Mission Press, 1913) Fathers Wieger and Davrout also include some Confucian contributions. One of these was yet another very influential work, the Chu Pai Lu Chia Shun or the \"Familiar Instructions of Chu Pai-lu”, a 17th century Confucian scholar. The \"Instructions\" were particularly favoured by generations of teachers. Enshrined in countless vertical scrolls and horizontal exemplars brushed by distinguished calligraphers, their text, in full or in part, served as suitable texts for pupils to copy. In both\n\nPage 240\n\nPage 241", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1999.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/s178b887x", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 215192, "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": 288, "title": "RAS-2000", "content_text": "PHOTOGRAPH OF HONG KONG HARBOUR AND WATERFRONT TAKEN IN 1954\n\nJACK LAO MOU CHI\n\n251\n\nThe photograph is actually five photographs joined together, approximately 30 inches by 6 inches.\n\nStarting at the Central District Vehicular Ferry to Jordan Road, it can be seen that, moving to the right, Connaught Road at the time formed the Praya or Waterfront. Near the right-hand end of the photograph both Blake Pier and Star Ferry Pier can be seen. The Star Ferry moved to its present piers, on reclaimed land, in late 1957 when a number of people complained about the extra distance to walk!\n\nBehind the two piers can be seen the Queen's Building (where the Mandarin Hotel stands today), the old Hong Kong Club building and Mercury House (Cable and Wireless). Behind is the Royal Naval Dockyard, which was where Admiralty is situated today. Beyond, of course, is Wan Chai, where Gloucester Road at that time formed the Waterfront, and still further on is North Point.\n\nOn the other side of the Harbour the skyline is formed by the Kowloon Foothills and one can pick out such landmarks as Kowloon Peak (Fei Ngo Shan), Lion Rock and Beacon Hill. Passes along the Foothills, from west to east include Kowloon Pass, Sha Tin Pass, Grasscutters' Pass, Customs Pass and Tate's Pass. Further to the north are Heather Pass and Buffalo Pass.\n\nRight over to the west of the photograph is Tai Mo Shan, Hong Kong's highest mountain.\n\nIn those days there was a clear view of the Harbour from Government House and Governors were said to use the number of ships in the Harbour as a barometer of the economy. In this photograph there does not appear to be a great deal of activity.\n\n(Question from Dan Waters, who borrowed the photograph and copied it: 'During the 1956 Riots I served as a Special Constable based at the Waterfront Police Station. I was under the impression that this", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2000.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/nk328168n", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 215210, "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": 306, "title": "RAS-2000", "content_text": "270\n\nconnection, as my mother was a Yip from Chan Uk Village, also at Nam Tau. There were over ten families of Ng in Kowloon Tsai, but we had no ancestral hall there. There were two parts to the village, an upper and lower part - Sheung and Ha Wai. We lived in the Ha Wai. There was a Tin Hau temple at the village, and we had puppet shows on the goddess' birthday every year when I was young. We also had a Ta Chiu in the village every ten years.\n\n'I was married to a Li of Sheung Sha Po Village when I was 18. My husband was a revenue officer in the Customs service. We had three houses in the village, but they were all demolished for the airfield extension. We were sent first to a vacant tenement house in Cheung On Street [not identified in a modern street guide, but very likely to have been in nearby suburban Kowloon] whose owner had left. We were there for 4-6 months, before moving to Model Village.\n\n'I am Shing Sung, now 55, a Hakka. I was born at Nam Tau and came to Kowloon when I was 18 to join my uncle who owned a wooden house at Tsat Kan Uk [The Seven Houses], a place north of old Kowloon Tsai Village. I later built a wooden hut there for myself. I came to Model Village after the war. I remember that there were private fields in the general area, as well as government land. People named Fung, Hui and Tsang owned fields there before the war.\n\n'I am Madam Law Mui, aged 57, also Hakka. I was born at Nam Tau, and came to Kowloon when I was 20, to marry Shing Sung's elder brother - also to The Seven Houses. We farmed government land there, for which we had a permit and paid fees, both before and after the war. There were many people at Ap Tsai Wu (Duckling Pond), the name of the general area where we lived and farmed. They were scattered here and there, because we were all vegetable farmers and you built your own house beside your own plot of land. Like Shing Sung, we moved to Model Village after the war.\n\n'I am Madam Kwai-fung, aged 64. I am a Hakka, born at Sha Po Tsai, Kowloon, where my family had lived for several generations. My father kept a store in Lower Sha Po, near Blacksmiths' Street in the Kowloon City suburb. When I was 22, I was married to Ng Sam-hong, a Punti, of Old Kak Hang Village, next to Nga Tsin Wai, when we had gone to live in a newly repaired house. We had two houses of our own at the", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2000.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/nk328168n", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 215580, "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-2001", "page_number": 357, "title": "RAS-2001", "content_text": "307\n\nand Monuments Office and the Government Marine Department and to everyone mentioned in the text. Without their help this paper would not have been written. Special thanks are also due to Yip Kin-sang Superintendent of Aids to Navigation of the Marine Department. Thanks are also due to many other helpful people including Master Mariners Roger Parry and Alan Lack, Dr James Hayes, Simon Lord, Paul Brown, Phillip Bruce, Louis Thomas and S J Chan. This paper would not be complete without photographs and those published here are indeed rather special. For these, a very sincere thank you to Charles Slater.\n\nNOTES\n\nPart One\n\n1. T. Roger Banister (1932). The Coastwise Lights of China, Shanghai: Inspectorate General of Customs, Statistical Department.\n\n2. Lee Krystek - http://unmuseum.mus.pa.us/pharos.htm\n\n3. Trinity House - http://www.trinityhouse.co.uk/\n\n4. A day in history - http://www.sis.gov.eg/calendar/html/cl171196.htm\n\n5. It was named after James Horsburgh (1762-1836), an eminent hydrographer for the East India Company, author of the book Sailing Directions, which became the most widely used nautical directory of Eastern waters during the first half of the 19th century. He was also a Corresponding Member of the Russian Academy of Sciences. The lighthouse has a cone-shape tower painted with black and white horizontal bands. http://www.lighthouseclothing.com/database/searchdatabase.cfm.\n\n6. It was rebuilt in 1875 in the form of a white conical cast-iron tower with black trim. The 30-foot high tower with lantern constructed of oyster shells had a light visible for 20.5 nautical miles.\n\n7. T.R. Banister concedes that the claim is good only in its literal sense. '...if we except such primitive lights as the old open beacon at north-east promontory, or the ancient native light on Fisher Island in the Pescadores. The Tungsha Lightship, in the Yangtze Estuary, was established in 1855, and the Taitan Light was apparently first shown by the Chinese priests in 1863. But neither of these were exactly light [houses].'", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2001.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/zg651950g", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 215581, "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-2001", "page_number": 358, "title": "RAS-2001", "content_text": "308\n\nThe Gula Lighthouse, situated at Longitude East 113°35,' Latitude North 21°11.' is 52 1/2 feet (13.3 m) high. Its light, originally lit by paraffin as an unclassed light, was modernised in 1910 by the installation of a group-flashing apparatus of the Third Order which can be seen for 20 miles in clear weather.\n\nOn 20th March 1875.\n\nCape D'Aguilar is at Latitude 22°12' 14\" N. Longitude 114°15' 44\" E.\n\n10 T. Roger Banister (1932). The Coastwise Lights of China, Shanghai: Inspectorate General of Customs, Statistical Department, p. xiii.\n\nAn example provided by the Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1957, Vol.14, p. 88 shows that a lighthouse of 200 ft. in elevation is visible at a distance of 16.22 nautical miles. It can be seen by an observer at an elevation of 30 ft., which by itself has a visible distance of 6.28 nautical miles, within 16.22 + 6.28 = 22.50 nautical miles.\n\n12 CO129/166 pp.351-357 Letter from Earl of Kimberley to Hong Kong Governor Arthur Kennedy, 11 July 1873.\n\n13 The corporation of Trinity House is said to have developed from the Trinity Guild formed by Archbishop S. Langton in the 13th century. The Guild owned a hall and alms-houses at Deptford for the benefit of seamen and their families. It also checked the pillaging of wrecked ships on the English coast. Trinity House, located at a place overlooking Trinity Square in London, has been the headquarters of the Lighthouse Service in U.K. since 1796. At present it owns 72 Lighthouses, 13 Major Floating Aids, 18 Beacons, 429 Buoys, 48 Radar Beacons and 7 DGPS Reference Stations. http://www.trinityhouse.co.uk/\n\n14 CO129/172 pp.17-22. 1974/06/03\n\n15 CO129/172 pp.17-22. 1974/06/03\n\n16 HKGG, 12 June, 1875. P. 242.\n\n17 CO129/167 pp.124-128.\n\n18 Sessional Papers of 1901.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2001.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/zg651950g", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 216024, "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-2002", "page_number": 323, "title": "RAS-2002", "content_text": "257\n\nand pleasure-grounds, all of which showed evident signs of great neglect. The suburbs were one dense mass of habitations of two stories in height; the lower portions of which were devoted to the handicraftsmen, who employed themselves in them, or to store rooms, in which merchandise was deposited. There were numerous public buildings, most of them appearing to be of a religious character, either dedicated to Buddha or Confucius.\n\nMainly for safety reasons ships passing up and down the Yangzi tended to use the main channel which ran along the north bank of the Great River opposite Zhenjiang. Down the years spits have formed close to Zhenjiang, mainly off Ganlu Si [Consular Bluff] and Xiang Shan Bluff, whilst the Zhengrenzhou spit steadily advanced downstream from the west blocking off the approaches to the harbour. The flat sandy bottom, so the Admiralty Guide tells us, does not provide good holding ground, especially during autumn gales.\n\nThe channel of the Great River at Zhenjiang is some two miles in breadth and had long been a ferry crossing point over the Yangzi, linking Zhenjiang with the major city of Yangzhou, a short distance upstream of the northern section of the Grand Canal. The long-mooted bridge over the River has still to be built. In the early days of the opening up of China by the West the city was believed to be the furthest point upstream on the Yangzi which seagoing vessels of the heaviest burden could reach with comparative ease. When Hankou, over five hundred miles further upstream, was opened to foreign trade it soon became apparent that trade at Zhenjiang consisted of little more than being an agency for steamers using the port as a stopping point, and for the Customs House for Chinese merchants. So it was that when vessels had access to the fountainhead of trade at Hankou, together with the fact that the harbour at Zhenjiang having silted up, the importance of the port became in great measure superseded. Sadly, the dolphins which not too long ago frolicked in the Great River and were commonly seen off Zhenjiang have been fished into extinction with today's oily pollution preventing any return, though a very occasional porpoise may still be seen.\n\nA Victorian writer described the climate and temperature of Zhenjiang as 'little different from that in Shanghai, whereas the varied scenery and hilly surroundings of Zhenjiang were an advantage which", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2002.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/mp4901278", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 216047, "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-2002", "page_number": 346, "title": "RAS-2002", "content_text": "280\n\nfood and shelter with money he collected from foreigners. He always wore straw sandals, Chinese clothes and cap, and had a strong Chinese complex. The local Chinese adored him, but not so the missionaries; they detested him, even refusing him food and shelter, or any assistance whatsoever - consoling themselves with the reflection that he was a 'disgrace to the cloth'.\n\nDr. James Hayes has reminded me that he produced a note for Volume 23 of this JHKBRAS[1983] in which he provided extracts from A. H. Rasmussen's China Trader21 describing the westerner's community shooting bungalow in about 1905. Rasmussen was barely twenty when he joined the Chinese Maritime Customs at Zhenjiang, a small, lonely British concession. When first posted there he had been assured by others that Zhenjiang was a very nice and clean Concession, with a good club and excellent shooting. He found this to be a good description of the Concession but not of the native town. During his first four years, two of the original thirty-five Europeans died, two went mad, two cut their throats, and he himself was twice nearly murdered by smugglers. After several years with the Imperial Maritime Customs he was offered a job representing a foreign firm still in Zhenjiang and found himself now one of the upper set. No longer could he walk down the crowded streets of the Concession but must ride in state in his sedan chair, borne by his four chair bearers garbed in his firm's colours. Rasmussen's sanity was saved by the presence of a small shooting bungalow in the countryside near by, looked after by a caretaker. It was about eight miles away on a hill called Wu Chow where he would stay during his off-duty hours either reading or hunting wild boar. Though it was relatively expensive in ammunition and tips for the beaters he was able to lessen the latter by sharing expenses with shooting companions. Rasmussen spent many happy hours scanning the visitors' book finding out more about previous hunting successes and failures. He describes how he relieved his boredom by walking up and down the Bund, three hundred yards there and three hundred back, and for a change he walked along the only cross street to the south gate of the Concession, two hundred yards there and two hundred yards back.\n\nOne of the most lucrative trades around Shanghai and Zhenjiang used to be that of being shot. Foreign merchants often went up creeks in house-boat parties, or wander about the fields in the outskirts, looking for snipe. There were no hedges or game laws and innumerable", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2002.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/mp4901278", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 216048, "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-2002", "page_number": 347, "title": "RAS-2002", "content_text": "281\n\nsmall boys were always at hand to do the beating, gun-carrying, ditching and picking up. It often occurred, under these circumstances, that a few dust-shot were put into the calf of a man's leg, and occasionally even an eye was injured. A fairly definite tariff gradually established itself; so much so that people used to dodge behind bushes or lurk in the ditches, so as to be ready to raise their hands and yell the instant a gun went off in their direction. Very few Chinese rustic skins were without an assortment of sores and bruises; and nothing was easier than to rub a shot or some powder in and pretend that an ‘internal injury' had occurred. With irate villagers gathering around timid or non-Chinese-speaking sportsmen were often only too glad to compromise on the spot; especially if a few old women with buckets of liquid manure joined in the discussion.\n\nZhenjiang, some twelve to fourteen hours sailing upstream from Shanghai, was yet one more of the points of call on the Yangzi. Ships only stayed a matter of 30 or so minutes and tied up alongside one of the hulks or pontoons. These belonged mostly to foreign shipping or trading companies, though there were one or two hulks owned by Chinese businessmen, moored off the concession, from which it was reached by a bridge as there are pronounced seasonal differences in level. Passengers landed and were quickly cleared by the Customs House. The city, at the back of the foreign concession, was the prefectural capital with a Daotai, a Prefect or Circuit Intendant, and the Dantu, the County Magistrate. A Co-Prefect in charge of coast defences and a Prefect of Police were also located in the city, and in addition to the Manchu [Tartar] garrison stationed in Zhenjiang, under the command of a Lieutenant-General there was the ordinary Chinese garrison under a Lieutenant-Colonel, consisting of several battalions of local militiamen and trainbands [bodies of citizens trained in the use of arms].\n\nLaw and order was maintained in the settlement up to the turn of the 20th century by a body of British-officered Sikh policemen. Tall, imposing and forbidding-looking, they despised the Chinese and were equally heartily feared and disliked by them. The Chinese, amongst other things, complained bitterly about the iniquitous rates of usury charged by the Sikhs!\n\nAt the age of 65, the indomitable traveller and writer Isabella Bird,", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2002.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/mp4901278", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 216050, "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-2002", "page_number": 349, "title": "RAS-2002", "content_text": "283\n\ndoctors in charge, and a Lifesaving institution possessing six well-equipped, well-manned boats always on the river near the port, and ten others dodging about above and below. There was also a free ferry, with thirteen big boats, for crossing the ofttimes stormy and dangerous Yangzi. The city also had a winter 'soup kitchen', a Widows Relief Society and Widows' Home, the latter connected with a Boys' Orphanage.\n\nAnother of the many Western visitors to pass through Zhenjiang was one of the first British Indian Army officers to study Chinese in Peking.\" Colonel Wingate eventually retired from the Indian Army as the Director of Military Intelligence but not before he had accomplished, among other things, a journey back from Peking to India overland between September 1898 and May 1899 to collect information of all kinds'. In the October during his journey up the Yangzi he disembarked from the Butterfield and Swire boat at Zhenjiang and was met by the British Consul, E. L. B. Allen who put him up in the consulate. [One of Allen's claim to fame was his hatred of the maddening noise of cicadas which he disposed of by shooting them with his pistol]. Wingate remarked in passing that Zhenjiang was unique among treaty ports in that it had only a British settlement; consequently most of the trade was divided between British and Chinese.\n\nConsulates were set up in Zhenjiang not only by Britain but also by France, Germany, Austro-Hungary and, for a short while, by America.\n\nBritish Consuls and the Consulate\n\nIn 1858 the ruins of Zhenjiang were declared a treaty port open to foreign trade, and in 1861 a site was leased and laid out for a British concession. The British Consul first lived in the temple on Jiao Shan before renting a house on the slope near Guan Yin's Cave, the site which some sixty years later became the premises of the Chinese Life Saving Association which professed to be part-owner of most of the river foreshore.\n\nLater, a purpose-built Consulate was built on land acquired on the side of Yin Tai Shan [Consular Bluff] together with offices for the foreign employees of the Chinese Maritime Customs erected at the", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2002.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/mp4901278", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 216059, "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-2002", "page_number": 358, "title": "RAS-2002", "content_text": "292\n\nwas buried there beside his first wife in the Zhenjiang cemetery when he died in Changsha a mere two months later. By the late forties, the cemetery had disappeared beneath industrial buildings.\n\nThere was quite a scandal about the Methodist chapel in about 1907 when, during an evening service, the whole congregation started to wriggle and scratch themselves. Many left hurriedly, and the preacher was almost alone when the service ended. It was then discovered that the Chinese caretaker had turned the place into a paying doss-house for coolies and beggars, and every pew was crawling with bedbugs and lice.\n\nMesny's Involvement with Zhenjiang 1863/5\n\nNow to an entirely different slant on activities within Zhenjiang. William Mesny was a Jerseyman who ran away from home in 1854 at the age of 12 and arrived in China in 1860. His autobiographical writings describe scenes from his diverse and exciting career in China from his earliest days as a lowly gaoler in Hong Kong, through his sailing days as a master on a small Yangzi trader, his time as an Imperial Customs Tide-waiter in Hankou, to the peak of his career serving with the Chinese Sichuan Provincial Green Standard army, ending up as a brevet Lieutenant-General. From there on, he was a self-appointed adviser to senior Chinese officials, travelling far and wide throughout China, and ending his days as an impoverished 'poor white' first in Shanghai and towards the end in Hankou, where he died in 1919. Although he had little to do with Zhenjiang itself during his time on the Yangzi, he was involved with others who had.29\n\nMesny, writing about his time on the Yangzi, first as a youth commanding a lorcha and then as a Customs Officer with the Chinese Imperial Customs, explained that on his first trip up the River, the comparatively short journey on from Zhenjiang to Nanjing took five hours with a call at Shi'er Wei, an important salt town on the northern bank of the river. An hour and a half before reaching Nanjing, ships would pass the Third Fort guarding the narrow defile under Guanyin Shan. It was there that in April 1862, Mesny was wounded and captured by a fleet of Imperial gunboats whose role it was to stop supplies of all kinds reaching the Taiping rebels. Mesny was sailing for Hankou from Shanghai with a full legal cargo, but to the Imperial gunboats, the 'Imps' as they were referred to by westerners, all vessels were fair game. Mesny", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2002.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/mp4901278", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 216067, "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-2002", "page_number": 366, "title": "RAS-2002", "content_text": "300\n\nSilver Island forts. I did not answer his letter, but noted the date thereon and the date on which I received it. I was requested to send an answer to someone in Zhenjiang. I gave the letter to Consul Mowat.35\n\nAs I did not answer Mason's letter he called early one morning and I asked who he was and what he wanted. He replied that he was the United States consular marshal at Hankou and had come down to see the machine gun I had offered to sell to the Municipal Council at Hankou and wished to know if my machine was a single action or double action gun. I showed him the gun and how to work it, and he decided to buy it. He then wished me to send it somewhere on the Yangzi, I said I could not let it go out of my house until it was paid for, and would not deliver anywhere outside the limits of a treaty port unless provided with a special passport or huzhao. Mason then said that he was going to Ningbo and would call for the gun on his return. He did not do so. He went to Hongkong engaged a lot of foreigners, instructed them to come and report themselves to me for duty, etc., etc.\n\nOn Mason's return to Shanghai he brought a lot of firearms he had bought in Hongkong. They were seized, and the men he had engaged were looked after. He himself was introduced by Mr R.E. Bredon, Shanghai Commissioner of the Chinese Imperial Maritime Customs, to the Daotai of Shanghai who invited him to dinner and to witness a theatrical performance as if he, Mason, had been a popular hero.\n\nHe lived in the Central Hotel and was a frequent visitor at the Shanghai Club where he had been introduced by Mr Bredon.\n\nMeanwhile all sorts of tricks were being practised to inveigle me into a trap. Conch shells were blown at all hours of the night about my house under the direction of Mason. A host of extra police officers and detectives were placed on special duty on my property, at the switch-back railway. I suddenly remembered the letter that had been sent me. I thereupon called on Mr acting-consul Mowat and insisted on his reporting the matter to H.M.'s Minister at Beijing. Mowat pooh-poohed the whole thing as a farce and so it proved in reality though very costly and dangerous to me.\n\nInstructions were soon received from H.M.'s Minister at Beijing and Mason was removed from the Central Hotel on the Bund to H.M.'s", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2002.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/mp4901278", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 216069, "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-2002", "page_number": 368, "title": "RAS-2002", "content_text": "302\n\nso that I may die childless, as I am now old and not likely to have any more children. I had never met or seen Mason before he presented himself to me as being the United States Consular Marshal at Hankou, which was a lie, he being actually a Custom House Officer at Zhenjiang.'\n\nLet us try to unravel the sorry story of Mason and Mesny. It is involved and still has aspects which are difficult to fathom. We have a number of versions or parts of it available to us but will confine ourselves to three: Mason's own story, briefly described below, written some 30 odd years later after he had roamed the world as a vagrant worker; the letters from the Inspector General of the Imperial Customs, Sir Robert Hart; and Mesny's bitter accusation. Mason, according to Mesny, practically ruined him and certainly caused Mesny great personal problems as he explained in great detail in his Miscellany. It is difficult to fit these three pieces of jigsaw together as there are few elements in common; however, the basic story is there. Mason bought a large quantity of foreign arms, ammunition, and explosives with which to arm a rising against the Imperial government, and having been arrested in Shanghai, was tried, sentenced, gaoled, and finally deported. Mesny was called as a witness but was accused to his face by the Chinese Premier, Li Hongzhang, of being the chief or very senior in the anti-Imperialist bandit body, the Elder Brother Society. This led to Mesny being ostracised by Chinese officialdom and, as his be-all and end-all as a business go-between was his contacts with Chinese officials, his life quietly slipped downhill thereafter.\n\nAccording to records — ‘Charles Welsh Mason, a young Englishman, had joined the Imperial Maritime Customs in December 1887 and was sent to Zhenjiang, an important post but a minor port on the Yangzi, as 4th assistant B, where he joined the Gelao Hui and became involved in a conspiracy to overthrow the Chinese government. In July of 1891, he took two months' leave and went to Hong Kong, where he purchased a quantity of arms and ammunition for the Society and arranged for it to be shipped to Shanghai and from there on to Zhenjiang. He also recruited men for the Society and bought a quantity of dynamite, which he carried with him to Shanghai, where he requested Commissioner Bredon of the Imperial Maritime Customs to allow it to be shipped on to Zhenjiang so that he, Mason, could uncover more of the Chinese rebels' plans. Bredon refused the \"sting\" and instructed Mason to report to Hart in Beijing. Instead, Mason took a river steamer", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2002.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/mp4901278", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 216328, "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": 87, "title": "RAS-2003", "content_text": "36\n\npeople and goods over and along the river. They also helped to load ships in the river and carry goods to the European merchantmen at Whampoa. Their presence was useful to the occupants of the Foreign Factories during periodic conflagrations. For instance, a painting of the Great Fire of 1822 shows residents viewing the fire from these boats, their main refuge in time of such emergencies.28\n\nInterestingly enough, people of this type - perhaps even from the Canton group accustomed to foreigners - were of immense help to the British when they first established themselves in Hong Kong as providers of many essential services.29\n\nOther groups of Tanka constituted the sea fishermen whose craft, large and small, were to be found all over the Delta and the islands outside it; and as we shall see further on in this talk, they provided the 'outside pilots' who assisted foreign merchant vessels to get safely into the Macau Roads.\n\nPersonnel directly connected with the China Trade\n\nWe may now consider seriatim, the various personnel encountered by foreign merchants and ships' officers during their time in China over the trading season of the year.\n\nThe Hoppo30\n\nThe Hoppo was the official at the head of the maritime customs, controlling the revenues accruing from the foreign trade. Representing the ministry of finance in Beijing (hu pu) he was dubbed with this title in error by the foreigners. This lucrative office was often filled by a Manchu. The Guangzhou Custom House is shown in Plate 5.\n\nThere were Hoppo in other maritime provinces of China, but the Canton Hoppo was the most important owing to the foreign trade being confined to Canton. His circuit eventually included five sub-stations and some sixty other collection points, the catchment for the coastal and inter-national trade. International trade was itself divided into Chinese, Asian and European, each taxed at a different rate; the Governor was left with control over internal trade.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2003.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/2v242g390", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 216463, "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": 222, "title": "RAS-2003", "content_text": "172\n\nTom Ken\n\n9. Customs House, Shamien, Canton.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2003.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/2v242g390", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 216464, "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": 223, "title": "RAS-2003", "content_text": "A\n\nA\n\n10. A closer view of the Customs House.\n\n173", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2003.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/2v242g390", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 216486, "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": 245, "title": "RAS-2003", "content_text": "195\n\n-\n\nCornell Plant died at sea shortly before their ship's arrival at Hong Kong. Alice Plant died a day or so later and they were both buried in Happy Valley Cemetery, Hong Kong. This posed the question what happened to the two young Chinese girls? This is partly answered by an extract from a letter written to Cornell's younger brother Charles by J.L. Smith, the British Consul at Ichang, an old friend of Captain and Mrs Plant:\n\nThe reference to the two girls as \"adopted daughters\" is a mistake. The two girls were waifs bought by Mrs Plant a number of years ago and brought up by her as servants in her own house. They were too young to marry and therefore Mrs Plant was taking them home with her, intending to bring them back at the conclusion of her furlough after which she intended to marry them off and give them a small dowry. They are now being sent back from Hong Kong to Miss Moore of the Church of Scotland (Ladies) Mission here: Miss Moore desires to keep them for four or five years in her excellent girls school so that they can get an education after which she will see that they are decently married off or settled down in some occupation in the same way as Mrs Plant would have done. There is a movement on foot amongst friends of Captain and Mrs Plant to raise a sum of money to meet the expenses that will be entailed in connection with the education, etc. of the girls.\n\nIn the event, some $4,000 was raised by the friends and colleagues of Captain and Mrs Plant to educate the two girls and set them up in life. Although the Royal Library of Scotland has some of the letters sent home by Miss Amelia Moore to the Church of Scotland, no mention has yet been found of the two girls and what happened to them.\n\nThe 30 foot granite monument overlooking the gorges put up in memory of Captain Samuel Cornell Plant show the high esteem in which he was held by his friends, his business associates and the Chinese Customs Service. On his death, tributes were received from the representatives of many countries including France, Japan, and the United States of America. More personal were the feelings expressed in \"Plant the Pilot\" a poem written shortly after his death and the inscription on the silver inkwell presented to him by Captain F Scurr, shortly before his final voyage in 1921 as a small memento of many kindnesses while 'dodging the dragon.' It was all summed up in the words of his good friend of over ten years, the British Consul at Ichang.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2003.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/2v242g390", "rank": 0 } ]