[ { "id": 208663, "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-1979", "page_number": 120, "title": "RAS-1979", "content_text": "THE MARYKNOLL MISSION, HONG KONG 1941-46 \n\n93 \n\narticles is opened. The display was most interesting, and American skill and ingenuity were much in evidence. Articles included various forms of clothing, shoes, slippers, clogs, chairs, stools, baby cribs, thermos bottles, a fireless cooker, clothes pins, knitting needles, scales, a vise, etc., etc. A small wood turning lathe was also shown, and hats woven of grass. The repatriates' departure has been postponed until the end of the month. \n\n11—It is reported that the recent escapees have been captured, they not having succeeded in getting out of the Colony. A large scale having been found somewhere, the Americans weigh in, with Dr. Hackett and the Maryknoll Sisters, nurses, Sisters Camillus and Dominic, assisting, the latter, by the way, having long since returned to Camp from the Civil Hospital. The following statistics will give a graphic idea of our present status: Father Toomey lost 18 lbs; Troesch, 28; Meyer, 38; Downs, 13; Keelan,?; Bauer, 50; Allie, 18; Reardon, 27; Callan, 11; O'Connor, 16; Hessler, 0; Walter, 12; Knotek, 12; Quinn, 23; Walsh, 22; Madison 36; Moore, 9; Tackney, 23; Norris, 15; Brother Anthony, 50; Brother Cornelius, 6; Father O'Connell, 0; Siebert, ?; Gaiero, 19; McKeirnan, 14; Brother William, 23. A Mr. Hill, in the Camp, lost 65 lbs. \n\n12—Masses now at 8:30 and 9:30 a.m. Today, Confirmation at the Mass, when Bishop O'Gara confirmed four children and two adults. Today, the Britishers follow suit and are weighed in. Perhaps this presages better food. Report has it that two Britishers were caught stealing sweet potatoes in Stanley village, which is out of bounds. When warned that they were in danger of being shot, they said they were so hungry that they took the chance. Then they were assured of better rations, so says the rumor. Let's hope it is more than a rumor. Speaking of rumors, they still flood the Camp, and they range from the abdication of Mussolini, to the landing of the Allies in Europe, and to the proximity of the Chinese troops ready to retake Hong Kong. According to the Japanese paper, the American Navy has been sunk several times, and they are going to crush the United States. \n\n13—Bungalow No. 7 vacated by its British occupants to give way to the segregated American repatriates, who move in after the British got out, only to find that the British had pretty well despoiled the whole building, thinking that the Japanese were moving in. It is also reported today that the American Consular officials' bag—\n\nPage 120\n\nPage 121", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1979.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/2801w5938", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 210724, "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": 75, "title": "RAS-1986", "content_text": "58 \n\nD.A. GRIFFITHS AND S.P. LAU \n\nLordship that the house in which he resided, (situated within the grounds alluded to), has been tendered to me for a Government House; I did not trouble your Lordship with this matter, being of opinion that the house in question, considering its locality and other circumstances connected with it, is totally unsuitable for the purpose.\" \n\nFollowing continued discussions with the Hong Kong Government, the Governor, Dr. Sir John Bowring, F.R.S., F.L.S. a botanist in his own right, wrote on August 14th 1855 to Lord John Russell asking for money from the Colonial Funds to establish “a Public Botanic Garden”. In addition, Bowring suggested that a house would be built for such a person (to be recommended by Sir William Hooker, Superintendent of Kew Gardens). Bowring stressed the commercial importance of the venture in the following passage: \n\n\"The access we are now obtaining to the Chinese Empire itself, and to circumjacent countries, would enable me, with such an auxiliary, to render valuable services, not to science alone, but to the commercial interests. As associated with science, inquiries are constantly addressed to me on the subject of dyes, oleaginous matters, fibres for textile purposes, materials for paper-making, and other topics; which the presence of a Botanist would enable me more satisfactorily to answer. \n\n++ \n\nThe Governor continued; \n\n\"Independently of which I might be able to render services to the Botanic Gardens in India, — to send useful plants and fruits to the mother Country and the Colonies, and generally to promote objects to which I cannot now personally attend,. . . \n\nDespite these overtures to London not much was done in Hong Kong to get the Botanical Gardens established, though various despatches in the form of Answers to Queries from Downing \n\nPage 75\n\nPage 76", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1986.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/jq08c7063", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 210725, "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": 76, "title": "RAS-1986", "content_text": "59\n\nStreet on the Natural History of Hongkong contained numerous references to the flora of the region and these notices would undoubtedly have had the effect of keeping the idea of a Botanical Garden in the minds of the relevant authorities, both in Hongkong and in London. For example, in Despatch no. 130 of 1860 it is stated that:\n\n\"Botanical notices have appeared in Hooker's Journal of Botany 1842. Collections made by Mr. R.B. Hinds, Surgeon, H.M. Ship “Sulphur”. Also in Journal of Horticultural Society 1844 and subsequent numbers by Lindley, of plants collected by Mr. Fortune on his first visit to China.\n\nIn Walpers Annales, descriptions by Dr. Hance of Hong Kong Plants. Some plants were described by the Botanist Mr. Wright attached to the American exploring expedition published by that government.\n\nA review of the Flora of the Colony, derived chiefly from the collections of the late Major Champion, 95th Regiment, was undertaken by Mr. Bentham, V.P.L.S. in Sir W. Hooker's \"Journal of Botany”, 1851 and succeeding years. This version was entitled 'Florula Hongkongensis'. The concluding section of the Botany of the voyage of H.M. Ship “Herald\" (London 1852-7, -4 to 100 plates) edited by Dr. Seemann, under the authority of the Lords Commissions of the Admiralty, is entirely devoted to Hong Kong, and includes, (in addition to the materials at the disposal of Mr. Bentham), the collections of Dr. Seemann himself, (not extensive, however). Since the date of these publications however, the knowledge of the vegetation of the island has been much extended and many novelties added by the constant explorations of the late Dr. Harland, Mr. Wilford (a collector sent out from Kew) and Dr. Hance now Vice Consul in Whampoa.\n\nA flora of Hong Kong to comprise all the plants hitherto discovered is now in preparation by Mr. Bentham", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1986.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/jq08c7063", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 210728, "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": 79, "title": "RAS-1986", "content_text": "62\n\nD.A. GRIFFITHS AND S.P. LAU\n\nThe site referred to is the area of rising ground to the south of the site occupied by the present Government House and on a site formerly occupied by the Record Office on \"Government Hill\" which had served as a temporary Government House from 1841 to 1842.\n\nOn Oct 7th in 1861 Mr. Th. Donaldson was appointed Curator of the Public Gardens and the gardens were thrown open to the public under certain regulations on August 6th 1864. In October of that year the military band began giving promenade concerts in the gardens at stated intervals. The establishment of the public gardens had obviously done much to instill among the European community a sense of both pride and achievement and this sense of well-being was reflected in the wide-scale level of planting in the colony and confirmed by Eitel (1895) who stated that:\n\n\"The increased attention, given to the cultivation of trees along the public roads and around European dwellings on the hill side, had already done very much to displace the pristine barrenness of the site on which the city was built by patches of shrubbery.\"\n\nIn the copious correspondence between Hongkong and London, the gardens were referred to either as a Botanical Garden (as when the Surveyor General ordered seeds for it from a Mr. Veitch of Chelsea in 1861) or as a Public Garden and was under the auspices of the Surveyor General and a Garden Committee.\n\nIn 1871 Charles Ford was appointed as the first Superintendent of Gardens and in his first letter back to Dr. Hooker of Kew after his arrival, he reported:\n\n\"The Public Gardens are in a very fair order and well stocked with plants as regards quantity, but we require greater variety.\n\n\"Very few of the plants are labelled and I believe, no catalogue of them has been drawn up. We have not any Orchids nor Ferns except those indigenous to the Island. The plants which have been introduced are chief-", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1986.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/jq08c7063", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 210730, "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": 81, "title": "RAS-1986", "content_text": "64\n\nly Australian and Japanese, some also from India.”\n\nIn the first annual report (31/12/1872) Mr. Ford reported that:\n\n\"It is to be regretted that, owing to the want of skilled European assistance, a portion of these Gardens could not be reserved for strictly botanical purposes, and for the formation of a collection of plants peculiar to China, and thus make the Gardens of use to those scientific visitors who make HK a place of call, as well as students who reside in the Colony.”\n\nThe importance of the Hongkong Botanic Gardens as a repository of plants with commercial value to the area had already been stressed by Dr. Hooker in his report to the Kew Royal Botanical Garden in 1871 when he referred to them:\n\nas a means of introducing a multitude of valuable vegetable products which are described by travellers in China, but which are totally unknown in Europe.\"\n\nIn the 1871 report Ford also refers to the construction of a \"chunamed basin\" 18 ft in diameter and 3 ft deep for the growth of a specimen of Victoria regia but there is no further mention of this eye-catching plant in any further reports. This might possibly indicate its inability to grow under Hong Kong's rather unique climate conditions. The report continues:\n\n\"The trees planted consisted chiefly of Banyans, India-rubber trees, Bamboos, Whampee, Litchi, Rose Apple (Jambosa vulgaris) and Longan which were obtained from Nurseries at Canton. A quantity of Chinese Fir Trees (Pinus sinensis) have been raised from seeds for the purpose of planting in the higher and more exposed parts of hills where other trees do not thrive. A quantity of the same kind of seeds have again been collected together with a larger quantity of Casuarina seeds, which have been matured on trees originally raised, I believe, from seeds received from the Mel-", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1986.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/jq08c7063", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 210731, "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": 82, "title": "RAS-1986", "content_text": "65\n\nBourne Royal Botanical Gardens. The Casuarinas grow moderately well on this island and are not much damaged by strong winds, which is the most important quality requisite for trees to possess in this part of the world where typhoons are so prevalent and the exposure is so great.\n\nThe problem of typhoon damage to the Botanic Gardens was stressed again by Ford in 1874 when he wrote to Dr. Hooker at Kew:\n\n\"I am afraid we should never be able to make an effective combination and groups of shrubs etc. to form a really attractive garden or landscape scenery on account of the typhoons which break and destroy subjects in such a frightful way as to entirely nullify our efforts in that direction, breaking up the picture, which we try to produce, into fragments only.\"\n\nIn 1876, in his second report to Kew, Mr. Ford outlined how the planting programme had been extended:\n\n\"The cultivation of trees has been extended in a new direction, the rearing and planting of Pinus sinensis on the hills. Before this was done, trees were only planted along the streets and roads for shade; but now we annually plant many thousands on hills above and surrounding the town. This tree is the one which has been found, by experience, to thrive the best of all yet tried on exposed situations; in fact, but few or none of these attempted (and experiments with other species have been made every year) will thrive at all on the higher grounds. Exposure and the hardness of soil prevent trees growing. All the trees experimented with on hills thrive well in made and sheltered ground in the gardens.\"\n\nIn an appendix to the 1876 report, note is made of the introduction of a new species of tree from Australia and the growth characteristics of a common southern Chinese species which was used widely.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1986.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/jq08c7063", "rank": 0 } ]