[ { "id": 204309, "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-1961", "page_number": 77, "title": "RAS-1961", "content_text": "Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society Hong Kong Branch\n\nORASHKB and author\n\nVol. 1 (1961)\n\nISSN 1991-7295\n\n73\n\ncalled \"Umbrella of Noumenon and Unity\" (hun-yüan san A) which is decorated with emeralds and precious pearls of divine power which are threaded together to form the words: \"to pack up the universe.\" When this umbrella is opened, heaven and earth, the sun and the moon, will be covered up by darkness, and when it is rolled the world will be shaken. Mo Li-hai carries a spear and on his back there is a four-stringed guitar (p'i-p'a) which will produce the same effect as the \"Blue Cloud Sword\" when played on and the four strings correspond to earth, water, fire and wind. Mo Li-shou carries two whips and a bag in which is concealed a peculiar creature resembling a rat, hua hu-tiao (the striped marten). When hurled into the air this creature will assume the shape of an elephant with wings from its ribs and will devour every one.\n\nThe combat between these four brothers and the heroes from the camp of King Wu can be found in Chs.39-41 of the novel. They are engaged in mortal combat with the Li brothers, Chin-cha, Mu-cha and No-cha in Ch.40. If the reader knows that Li Ching, the fabulous father of these three Li brothers is in fact derived from one of these four heavenly kings, Vaisravana, the ingenuity of the author of this novel can be appreciated, because before the publication of this novel, in many other works Vaisravana and the Chinese god Li Ching, based on the historical hero so named of the Tang dynasty, had long been amalgamated and formed a single name, P'i-sha-mên t'ien-wang Li Ching (Vaisravana or Li Ching, the Heavenly King of Vaisravana). The Chinese transliteration from the Sanskrit \"Vaisravana\" since the T'ang dynasty has been Pi-sha-mên (R), the last character of which, mên, though senseless in this connection, normally means \"gate\". Thus, in popular literature, the term P'i-sha-mên lost its original meaning and became the name of the P'i-sha Gate, and it was therefore natural enough to have a heavenly general, like Li Ching, to take charge of it, though in English this may appear peculiar.\n\n* In Yang Ching-hsien's (MRK) play T'ang San-tsang Hsi-t'ien Ch’ü-ching (EXRE), Scene 9, we read \"P'i-sha-mên hsia Li Tien-wang\" (TX) which means the Heavenly King Li under the P'i-sha Gate. In the prompt-book Ch'i-kuo Ch'un-ch'iu P'ing-hua ta (TH), chüan 3, we have \"P'i-sha-mên To-t'a Li T'ien-wang\" (*XE) or P'i-sha-mên, the Heavenly King Li who holds in his hand a pagoda. Sometimes the story-tellers thought since there was a P'i-sha mên (gate), it was wise to create a palace, called P'i-sha Kung (CE W D). In the Nan-yüeh-chi, Ch. 11, we have \"P'i-sha Kung Li Ching Tien-wang\" (K*XE). In a long eulogistic poem in Ch. 12 of the Feng-shen, there is a palace in heaven called K'un-sha Kung (R V E) which is obviously an erratum.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1961.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/vd6724704", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 204460, "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-1962", "page_number": 92, "title": "RAS-1962", "content_text": "LIFE IN THE NEW TERRITORIES \n\n81\n\nweddings and funerals, repairs to the ancestral temple, and so on. In \n\nAnother and less formal method of securing these aims is the setting aside of joss and oil fields, sometimes known by the obscure title of ching sheung 1, whose proceeds, again, are used for the proper observance of ancestral rites and other family needs.1 One need hardly emphasise the integrating effect of these land measures,\n\nTo understand the people and their outlook and background it is necessary to see to what sort of government they were accustomed.1 The government of the San On district was essentially Confucian, like that of every other administrative division; by which I mean that Confucian principles were ostensibly followed. This was sealed by the state worship of the sage. In every district city there was a temple to Confucius styled a man miu in which the District Magistrate, his senior staff and the local gentry paid the customary respects to the sage and his seventy-two disciples on his birthday (twenty-seventh day of the eighth moon) and at the spring worship or chun chai 1 in the second moon. The same thing happened at the prefectural and provincial capitals. At the head of the San On district was the District Magistrate whose superior was the prefect of the Kwang Chau prefecture which embraced at least five large districts. He was subordinate to the provincial governor and he in turn to the Viceroy of the two Kwang Provinces of Kwangtung and Kwangsi. The nature and duties of the provincial officers had been established since the T'ang dynasty and for well over a millennium the pattern of government had been cast in an identical mould. The District Magistrate was usually a scholar who had taken one of the metropolitan examinations at Peking and he was always a native of another province than his native one, this being a long standing rule. He spent three or six years in one post and was then moved elsewhere, and was promoted in due course to be prefect or to higher office through merit, connections or good fortune. Some persons began and ended their official careers as District Magistrates.\n\n1\n\nThe District Magistrate's duties were many and his competence was most extensive. He was, in truth, the father-mother official1 of the people so called by them and also so styled in official documents because of his authority over all their affairs, criminal or civil. He certainly regarded himself as", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1962.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/9s166f47f", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 206843, "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-1973", "page_number": 120, "title": "RAS-1973", "content_text": "114 \n\nSUNG HOK-P’ANG \n\nto Kam T'in he was much taken by it, considering the people were more friendly and honest than those of his own country, and it was said that he came to live there in the 6th year of Hoi Po (HT) A.D. 973 of Sung dynasty. During the 8th year of Shing Fa (APC) A.D. 1472 of Ming dynasty when the Kam T'in people revised their family tree, they added a note which cast doubt on the veracity of this, and instead they were inclined to believe that Tang Foo (#) the great grandson of Tang Hon Fat was really the first to come to Kam Tin, and that he transferred the bones of his father, grandfather and great-grandfather to Kwangtung from Kiangsi. Be that as it may, and although there is no actual proof that one or other was the original Tang to settle in Kwangtung, Tang Hon Fat remains a \"first ancestor\" as his is the oldest Tang grave near Kam T'in. It can be found at Ah Kai Shaan (Y), Waang Chau (H) village.\n\nSix generations after Tang Hon Fat there were two brothers, Kwai (3) and Sui (). Kwai had two sons called Yuen Ying (* ) and Yuen Hei (†), both of whom left Kam T’in and founded branches of the family elsewhere. Sui had three sons, Yuen Ching (元祯), Yuen Leung (元亮) and Yuen Woh (元和). The first and last of these also left for other districts but Yuen Leung remained behind, and the Tangs in Kam T’in to-day are his direct descendants. These five cousins were known as the \"Five Yuens\", and after their death their descendants who by then were scattered in various parts of China built an Ancestral Hall, common to all the Yuens, called To Hing T'ong (*). It is at the South gate of the district city of Tung Koon (✯✯), on the Kowloon-Canton railway not far from Sheklung (). In the hall Tang Hon Fat has been given premier place, but the \"Five Yuens\" are venerated in the same way as he and Tang Yue are, as being \"first ancestors”.\n\nAs mentioned before, Tang Foo, the great grandson of Tang Hon Fat is said to have found the sites for the graves of his father, grandfather and great-grandfather, himself. They were all acknowledged as being lucky places by the \"fung shui\" men, who were, of course, consulted. That of Tang Hon Fat is called Yuk Nui Paai T'ong (£#*) jade girl reverence; and his son's grave which is on Yuen Long Hill (₪), is called Kam Chung Fau Tei () gold bell cover ground. The grave of Tang Foo's father is called Poon Yuet Chiu T'aam (#AM) half moon shine lake,\n\nPage 120\n\nPage 121", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1973.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/8910rj06r", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 207758, "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-1976", "page_number": 146, "title": "RAS-1976", "content_text": "NOTES ON FRIENDS AND RELATIVES OF TAIPING LEADERS 131\n\nCARL SMITH'S ADDITIONAL NOTE\n\nCarl Smith has added to the text of the article appearing in Ching Feng the following note on the family of Li Tsin-kau and their services to the Hakka Church of the Basel Mission in Hong Kong and in Sabah.\n\nLi Tsin-kau, otherwise known as Lee Sik-sam, died 8 April, 1885, aged sixty-two. On the letters of administration issued to his widow Ho Lai-yau, the value of his estate was estimated at $400. His assets consisted principally of a small house beside the Basel Society's Church and Mission House in Sai Ying Poon, which he had purchased in 1878 for $480. He sold a portion of the lot in 1878 for $370.\n\nLi Tsin-kau's wife was baptized in Hong Kong in 1861 and died there 21 September, 1888, leaving four surviving children. The family property after her death was conveyed by Li A-cheung, an interpreter, Li Shin-en, a missionary and Li En-kyau, unmarried to their brother Li A-po, a trader.\n\nThe eldest son of Tsin-kau, A-lim, had died in 1864 “in trouble with the police\". A-po, the second son was betrothed in 1865 to Kong Oi-fuk from Lilong. She was a student in the Basel Society Girl's Boarding School at Hong Kong, and he was a student of their Boy's School at Lilong.\n\nThe third son, A-cheung studied at Hong Kong Central School (Queen's College) and in 1871 was given the prize for best scholar. After leaving school, he entered Government service, beginning as a charge-room interpreter for the Police, but in 1875 was transferred to the Magistracy as a clerk. Three years later he was promoted to Second Interpreter in the Magistracy. In 1882 he was offered the position of Interpreter to the Kingdom of Hawaii. Like his brother he had married one of the students of the Girl's Boarding School in Hong Kong, Tshin Then-tet. She accompanied him to Hawaii.\n\nIn 1883, the Rev. Frank Damon, who was in charge of Chinese Christian work in Hawaii, visited Hong Kong. In a report of his visit published in The Friend (New Series, Vol. 33, No. 2, p. 9) he expresses his pleasure in meeting \"the venerable and interesting father of our Government interpreter in Honolulu, Mr. Lee Cheong. A brother and sister are engaged in teaching here, while another brother is missionary to his countrymen\".", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1976.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/hq382988q", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 208111, "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": 150, "title": "RAS-1977", "content_text": "134 \n\nW. J. HINTON \n\nThe fishing fleet, or what part of it is in harbour, lies outside this floating village, and so do the salt and cargo junks, which occupy the centre of the harbour in lines on either side of the fairway to the pier, and boats ply to them from the beach all day and night. To the West are the boats of the Hoklo tribe, drawn up on the beach or riding to their stone anchors. Wonderful boats these, shaped like a crescent moon and able to ride the great waves in the monsoon, miles from land. They are heavy, yet easily rowed by a few men. These tribes like the Puntis and Hakkas keep their own distinctive customs, languages and crafts though so closely packed in one small island. \n\nBeyond the Hoklo beach lies the greatest temple of the island, the Pak Tai Temple, dedicated to the Guardian of the North, and the scene of an annual Theatrical display in honour of the God. The Guardian it appears was once an official under the Sung Dynasty, canonised later for his services to the Empire, and now worshipped in some parts of China. At the other end of the town, among the Hakka tribe is the Temple of the Queen of Heaven, goddess of sailormen. It is hung with votive offerings from the happy sailors whose ships and lives she has saved. One is reminded of the Church of Notre Dame de la Garde at Marseilles. Still farther to the east is a rock shrine, shared amicably by the genius loci, and the gentle and compassionate Kwan Yin. The streets show small shrines wherever a strangely shaped stone or tree is to be found, and of course the Kitchen god, can be seen in his smoky niche above the fire as one peeps through the open doors. Elsewhere in the island are two small shrines or temples. One is the beloved Kwan Yin, and the other a shrine for fishermen where some fish god gives luck to the devotee and receives his offerings and thanks when success has followed the fishing. At the little temple of Kwan Yin mothers often kneel to ask for favours, above all for children. \n\nThus far the village is purely Chinese but some of the houses in the centre are built in the hideous style of the tenements of Hongkong, like a pile of empty boxes with the mouths gaping blankly at the spectator, but the majority are still Chinese in style and ornament. Most of the houses are of one storey, and they are built of a great variety of material. Some are of granite masonry (looking much more substantial than it really is, since the walls are hollow and the mortar practically mud,) and others of brick, \n\nPage 150\n\nPage 151", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1977.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/np198x23n", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 208117, "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": 156, "title": "RAS-1977", "content_text": "140 \n\nW. J. HINTON \n\nnot so very different in their essence from those of greater cities. \"Aes alienis\" is much the same all the world over. \n\nFarther west a rope walk stretches back across several streets on the landward side, where they are twisting a mighty bamboo cable for the big junk being built in the Yard at the end of the bay. On the seaward side one of the long dark houses frames a picture of the bay and the ships seen through a verandah three rooms distant; within is the rich glow of lacquer chest. It is a picture for a Dutch master. For the most part the well-built doorways are closed by lacquered or painted doors or screens. We are in the West End; the crowd is thinner, but the dogs, pigs, fowls, and cats, if anything, more densely strew the scene. Through little lanes and alleys, we can see the Hoklo boats drawn up on the beach or riding a little from the land. Their owners are busy about them or putting out to fish with net and line in neighbouring bays. \n\nA dry nullah, and we are on a flight of steps leading to the terrace of the Pak Tai Temple. This terrace is a spacious place at times covered with a huge matshed theatre, which will house all the population that can leave home or junk for the show. Just now, it is occupied by children and by two parties of fishermen making fishing lines of some tough fibre on a primitive bamboo contrivance doubling and redoubling the thread. Under the groves, we see the eaves of another and smaller temple, and the tall wooden dyeing vats in which the nets are dyed blue and so made invisible to fishy eyes in the blue water. \n\nThe Pak Tai Temple must await another visit, for dusk has fallen, and bright lights are burning on the junks. There is no moon, but the stars are reflected in the still water. On the stern of every junk, the little cooking stoves glow, and family groups crouch round the rice bowl, half-illuminated by the glow, or brightly lit by a fishing flare where such extravagance can be afforded. Our yacht lies far out, and we hire a sampan, sitting side by side in the middle while the woman plies the \"ulch\" like a Venetian gondolier, crooning meantime to the baby on her back. Now we are among the junks, and the water lanes are full of small craft loaded with miscellaneous wares. A pedlar dips his paddle and cries his wares set out in a tray on his tiny dug-out. Sampans carry happy parties going ashore, or quiet ones coming off to their floating homes. There are no noisy parties of drunken sailors, but plenty of jollity and even a little horseplay here and there. Our boat moves", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1977.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/np198x23n", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 208715, "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": 172, "title": "RAS-1979", "content_text": "The Maryknoll Mission, Hong Kong 1941-46\n\n145\n\ninterest in the Church on the part of the people. At the same time, Father Tom Brack was assigned to Hong Kong with the task of refurnishing the partially vandalized Stanley House. After four years in the hands of the Japanese Army, less than ten rooms could be adequately furnished. He flew to Canton from Chungking, via Shanghai, by U.S. Army planes and by the S.S. Fat Shaan, from Canton to Hong Kong. On his arrival, he reported that the Stanley House looked just the same as it did in pre-war days. There was no structural damage, and the only external signs of war were some chipped bricks caused by sporadic machine gun and rifle fire. The interior, of course, was quite different and needed a great deal of renovating, repairing, repainting, and restoration of the furniture and equipment which had practically all been burned or looted. Father Tennien, when he arrived shortly after the cessation of hostilities, had done a great job of repairing the floors and making some new furniture under no little difficulties, as materials were hard to come by at the time. However, there still was much to be done before the house could be considered as restored to its former self.\n\nThis work comprised the making of all new altars, room furniture, repair of windows, doors, and floors, and, in other words, to restore all that had either been carried off or destroyed by invaders. The hardwood floors had also been badly scarred in many places, as the Japanese soldiers used to cook their food on small stoves placed directly on the wooden floors.\n\nAt this time, there were as yet no transportation facilities in the Colony, except for the tramways in the city proper, and only a few buses in Kowloon. All the other buses had either been shipped away or destroyed. So, in order to get to town, one had perforce to thumb his way along the road. After a while, however, Father Brack got hold of a weapons-carrier which did yeoman service for quite a while.\n\nOne of the earlier visitors to Stanley was Father John Joyce, who arrived from Kong Moon in a small motor launch, but because he had no passport, he had to stay overnight in the launch and talk his way through Immigration officials the next morning. Free to enter Hong Kong at last, he had to thumb his way to Stanley like everyone else. Had he come a bit later, some new jeeps bought by Father Tennien through the good offices of Father Sheridan in", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1979.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/2801w5938", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 211447, "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": 163, "title": "RAS-1988", "content_text": "139\n\nAs reasonable as these amounts seem to us today, Father could not continue without financial help. Highly motivated, he again turned to his brothers for assistance, because he felt that men without an education were like 'dumb cattle driven by others.' First Uncle replied on 6 July 1898 that he felt 'miserable' because he could not help. He compared himself to a well, drawn dry and needing time to be refilled, because his responsibilities had increased with so many relatives dependent upon him. However, he promised to do what he could. Second Uncle, who had gone to Shanghai, wrote on 29 August 1898 that he was in no position to assist and added that he was glad Father was earning money by teaching and that Father should go on to college and study law, medicine or dentistry.\n\nThe next year, on 3 May 1899, First Uncle again wrote, urging Father not to discontinue his schooling until the end of the year unless he had the consent of Grandfather, even though the job offer he received from a local newspaper might be tempting. Father must have finished the school year, for on 7 July 1899, First Uncle wrote to congratulate him on his graduation, noting that he had accepted a position with the Honolulu Chinese Times Bar as translator and reporter, and regretted that he was unable to advise him about going into business because conditions were not the same in different places. Second Uncle also wrote on 19 July 1899, commending Father for choosing a 'good' subject to deliver at the graduation exercises and encouraging him to continue to study while working.\n\nFather probably was looking for a job and business opportunities at the same time. He corresponded with friends in Kauai, in Hilo, and as far as Australia. A friend, Au Goon Bick, who had gone to Kapaa, Kauai, wrote in July that he was working for Lum Keed and that Yim Goon Siu of Honolulu was visiting him then. (Yim was the uncle of Cousin George Yim and was also working for the Honolulu Chinese Times. He later went to Shanghai where he ran a printing business.) Yim also wrote several times to Father about this Kauai trip - how he became seasick as soon as the boat passed Waianae and how he forgot his discomfort as soon as he met a number of young ladies with whom he had much fun singing. He expressed surprise that one of them, a sister of Wong Fat and a student at Kamehameha School, could speak English as well as both the Heong Shan and Nam Long dialects. (I suspect that", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1988.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/ft84gb83q", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 211456, "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": 172, "title": "RAS-1988", "content_text": "148\n\nhave been had he been alive when Ruth graduated from McKinley High School first in her class, with honours and a gold medal, or when she received a degree in medicine.\n\nAlthough our dresses were home-made, our shoes and hats were from fancy shops on Fort Street, then the main shopping centre of Honolulu. Whenever Father took us out, he would tell us to 'dress up like a duchess'. Sometimes he would take us to a cinema, or to a stage show, or to a musical at the Y.M.C.A. A visit to the Bishop Museum was always followed by a pause at the site of the mental hospital then located on School Street, where we would peep through the knot holes of the fence to observe the bizarre behaviour of the inmates. When Queen Liliuokalani died and her body was on view in Kawaiahao Church, he took Ruth, Helen and me to this sad and historical event. I remember him carrying me out onto our porch in Iwilei to point out a comet with a wide spray of bright light. I believe it was Halley's Comet. These may not be unusual experiences for children of today, but in the early 1900s, they were not common for Chinese children.\n\nFather's interests extended beyond our home. There were always illiterate women friends asking him to write letters. He did volunteer work at the Berentania Street Mission under the direction of Mrs. Elijah J. Mackenzie, a missionary who spoke fluent Chinese. There he taught English to young men newly arrived from China, gathered with them in worship, and interpreted for the Sunday and evening services when a sermon was given in English. When the Rev. Schenck came to Hawaii to administer the missions for the Hawaiian Board, he dispensed with Father's help so abruptly that it hurt Father deeply. Father had other community interests. He was one of the early members of the Chinese Y.M.C.A. which was located behind the Fort Street Chinese Church. Among its members were En Sue Kong, Luke Chan, Yim Quan and Tom Joon Yai. Father also served as English secretary for the See Dai Doo Society for many years, until his death. He would often drop by Wing On Tai for a chat or to do business; he would visit with friends from his village or nearby areas at the Pui Gun Horse Stable, located off Pauahi Street near River Street. There he enjoyed their fellowship and the news from 'home'. He would always buy a bag of roasted peanuts from a well-known shop on Pauahi Street to enjoy on his way home.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1988.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/ft84gb83q", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 211881, "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": 296, "title": "RAS-1989", "content_text": "271 \n\nand fine ones they are too. I do not know how many we have now. We talk about getting some monkeys at Anjer when we get there. I wish we were to be there tomorrow. They reckon above 40 days now before we make it. We yesterday crossed the meridian of Greenwich and are now in East Longitude.\n\nI could not help thinking all day yesterday what was going on at home and among my friends and relations since it is the same time with us here as it is in England. I very often visited them all round, and had a peep at what all were doing during the day. We shall soon be ahead of you now, and very soon when you get up in the morning we shall be at noon, taking our luncheon.\n\nSaturday, May 18th\n\nYesterday we were within 200 miles of the Cape, but had to come to a stop and turn back on account of foul winds, so now we are going back again. If we had gone farther the current would have taken us no one knows where out of the way. We have now to go south for about 300 miles before we get round the Cape; and today the sea is as smooth as glass, and it is the calmest day we have had since leaving England. Still we hope for a wind soon, and I believe the men are \"putting the ship round\" to be ready for it. Tomorrow we shall have been out ten weeks, and with fair winds we ought to have been here in seven weeks. It is very disheartening.\n\n1\n\nI have spent a good deal of time lately in study. In fact I am making it like college work, and thus the time goes very nearly as fast. I should like this very nearly as well as college if there were more society, and if I could hear from home once a week.\n\nYesterday I amused myself by fishing for birds. I manufactured a hook out of a bent pin, but that did not answer, so I tried a bent needle, but that being slender and brittle was soon gone. So I bent a large stocking needle and managed to make it do. I caught a cape pigeon by the wing and hauled him up and put him to death. A second one I dropped into the water before I could seize him. In the evening I caught another, but in killing it I made its feathers so dirty that it was useless. The first I skinned and should preserve it if I had the proper chemicals. I can have plenty of alum, but that I fear would not do, so I shall throw it overboard after the other. They are large birds with very thick plumage,", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1989.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/8336pm92h", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 212574, "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": 128, "title": "RAS-1991", "content_text": "108\n\nAlthough one of the above six destinations is the normal fate of a person's heavenly soul, earthly souls reside in graves or ancestral tablets to be worshipped by descendants. Terrestrial souls can even be divided between tablets on altars in family members' homes and in ancestral halls. Views vary on this 'multiple-soul' principle. As do those from theologians, regarding life after death for a Christian.\n\nFor the Chinese, ancestral spirits, gods, devils and ghosts play important roles. Supernatural intervention and magical powers have to be reckoned with. Malevolent, wandering spirits that have no male descendants to worship them must be appeased or they can bring bad luck, sickness and death. Makeshift altars are sometimes set up in streets, joss sticks are burned and offerings made, especially on the 15th day of the Seventh Moon at the Hungry Ghosts Festival (Yu Lan). With the fundamental dualism of Chinese cosmology, devils and their cohorts are yin, ‘inauspicious and gloomy'. Conversely gods, idols and the like are yang and 'lucky and bright'.\n\nIn this study, father died in 1959. When windows rattled, doors opened mysteriously, or troubles befell the family, his spirit, rightly or wrongly, was at one time suspected. This had to be propitiated by visits to the temple. When death strikes, a family tends to become even more superstitious. Scissors and knives are hidden to avoid children cutting themselves and thereby inadvertently hurting the corpse. This is termed lei hei (##) meaning an edged tool or weapon which can injure.\n\nIn this study, a Buddhist prayer in plastic holders was placed in strategic positions around family members' homes, including on the eldest daughter's bedside table. Although a person is a Christian, there is nothing like hedging protection. One granddaughter who had yam ngaan (dark eyes), namely psychic powers, heard a woman ghost wailing at night. When she placed the prayer on her bedside table, it kept quiet. This prayer could be rendered ineffective if taken into a church. Chinese always seem much closer to the spirit world than the average Westerner. For example, some of the older drivers on late-night buses travelling along the Pok Fu Lam Road stop and open the door whether anyone is waiting there or not. This is said to be to allow wandering spirits to get on and go back to the cemetery for the night.\n\nChinese dislike people dying at home as it is considered 'unclean'. If they do, the body is removed as soon as possible, often in a woven,", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1991.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/k356gt84j", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 213811, "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": 163, "title": "RAS-1996", "content_text": "135 o'clock we had our dinner on the deck. Such fun and such make shifts. Our stock of portable soup was very good however, and what with venison pasties and other items we got a very comfortable dinner, much to the amusement of the Chinese passengers, about 20, and the sailors. My servant came in very handy, as he was the only professional cook of the party. Our food was cooked in the Chinese way, in a little earthenware stove, and a camp canteen kettle. The deck all the while was at a very considerable slope, so that it was necessary to mind one's p's and q's, in order to avoid catastrophies. Then when we were done and cleared away, the Celestials came forward and took the deck and began their meal. Each passenger pays 30 cash (not quite three halfpence) for his meal of rice and fish and little nic nacs: and as they only eat two meals a day, you may imagine that there is not much profit to be got out of it. They did walk into the rice and no mistake.\n\nOne little boy I took a fancy to: he was a friend of the owner of the ship and his father a rich man at Sam-tsun the place we were going to. I had a long talk with him, and we read some of the Pilgrim's Progress. He had been to school 6 years, and literally knew nothing after all. The Chinese system of education is the greatest folly imaginable: No Chinaman, in less than ten years is supposed to be able to know the meanings of the characters. Many learn 5 years and only know the sounds.\n\nHowever this little fellow and I got on very well together. He was much amused with Stringer's dog, and asked dozens of questions about it. Then I offered to sell it for a dollar, but the youngster said it was no good only to eat,\" and therefore was too dear. So I joked him that he had not a dollar belonging to him, whereupon he produced a handful of dollars from his purse, and showed me a bundle of paper which he said had 7 dollars inside. He seemed to have perfect confidence in us that we would not try to rob him. It was hard to talk with him, through his dialect. It was like a Londoner and Yorkshireman. “Tea” he called \"Chay-yup\" and we call it \"Chah-eep.\" About four o'clock we entered the “Kup shui moon\" a channel opening into the \"Bogue” or as English people say \"Bocca Tigris\" or \"tiger's mouth.\"\n\nHere we passed the Canton steamer going to Hong Kong. The people stared to see Europeans on board a Chinese craft. Towards evening the breeze dropped off, and at sunset there was quite a calm.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1996.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/3n209j641", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 215515, "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": 292, "title": "RAS-2001", "content_text": "242\n\nSeveral months later on 2nd April 1842, another piece of land adjacent to the burial ground was allotted for internment of Roman Catholics.7 It was recorded that during the leveling work, because of heavy rain, a landslide obstructed Queen's Road. A letter from the Inspector of the Land Office, dated 20 June 1842, required the building of a retaining wall and the immediate clearing of the road. Burials started as soon as the site formation was over. On the same compound, two brick houses were also built, one at the bottom used as a seminary and the second at the top of the hill as the residence of Father Luke Poon8 who had just arrived from Macao to assist the work in the seminary.9\n\n10\n\nEpidemics of fever, which visited Hong Kong each summer in its early years of development, retarded its development and gave it an evil reputation for insalubrity. 1841 and 1842 had been bad summers, but 1843 was even worse. In 1843 the annual death rate among European troops in Hong Kong was 22 percent and among Indian troops even higher. One regiment alone, at West Point, lost a hundred men between June and the middle of August.11 The Royal Army Medical Corps history records 'Hong Kong proved a costly acquisition, as in spite of good barracks and hospital as the men continued to fall sick and die.”12 Almost all contemporary public, private and regimental records had similar entries in regard to the terrible cost in lives, particularly among the troops, in the early development of Hong Kong.13 The popular Illustrated London News had the following account in 1845:\n\nIts diseases are endemic fever, diarrhoea and dysentery...The British Commander, General D'Aguilar, has declared, that to retain Hong Kong will require the loss of a whole regiment every three years... The grave yard was soon filled and another was required form14 the Surveyor-General, who found it difficult to point out a proper spot.\n\nThe burial ground in Wan Chai had only been in use for a short period's15 as space was running out. It became necessary for a new burial site and the Wong Nai Chung Valley,16 soon to be named as Happy Valley, quickly provided the answer,\n\n17\n\nYet the last graves and monuments in Wan Chai were not removed until 1889. By then it had become surrounded by a dense population of Chinese of the poorer classes, it is difficult to keep it in a condition of decency and cleanliness.18 The ground was sold for development.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2001.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/zg651950g", "rank": 0 } ]