[
    {
        "id": 205426,
        "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": 188,
        "title": "RAS-1967",
        "content_text": "BOOK REVIEWS\n\n181\n\nappendices. The first, Appendix A, is on the Chinese calendar, with a table of the twenty-four fortnightly periods,\n\nThe only criticism of this is the third column giving the approximate date in the Chinese calendar. This presumes New Year to fall on 20th February, the last possible day, throwing forward everything on an average by a fortnight.\n\nAppendix C, furnishing a list of the names of Fireworks, Pigeons, Popular forms of entertainment, Melons, Crickets, and Chrysanthemums is most intriguing. Valuable varieties of pigeons are the \"Toad-eyed grey,\" \"Square-edged unicorn\", and \"Wild duck of the Great Dipper\". Poets have similarly exercised their ingenuity in finding epithets for the Flower of the Ninth Moon for they include \"Purple Tiger whiskers\", \"Concubine of the Hsiao and Tsiang Rivers,\" and \"Wild Goose settling on level sand.\"\n\nIn short, Tun Li-ch'en has left us a vivid picture of life as it must have been lived in the capital for centuries before the violent impact of the western world. It was to change soon after. Within twelve years the Imperial fishpond, Wang Hai Lou, had filled up and was a snipe marsh, whilst in another decade it was walled-in as an experimental agricultural establishment. Again, the emancipation of women through the abolition of foot binding, and their escape from the purdah of the mud-walled compound killed all those forms of entertainment which could only be enjoyed in the home. The famous Shadow play, which he describes as bringing tears to women's eyes, was virtually extinct thirty years later, smothered by the cinema.\n\nTun's study of the human side of the ancient capital is an admirable supplement to the work of two foreigners who spent the best part of their lives there, namely — Arlington and Lewisohn's In search of old Peking.\n\nHong Kong, 1966,\n\nN DU BREUIL\n\nAs noted in the President's Report earlier in this volume Madame du Breuil, former Peking resident and a member of our Council, died in 1966.\n\nPRELUDE TO HONGKONG, Austin Coates. London, Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1966, pp. xi, 232. 40/-.\n\nIn view of the recent events in Macao and Hong Kong this book has a certain topical relevance. It covers the period from",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1967.txt",
        "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/0c488p70g",
        "rank": 0
    },
    {
        "id": 205467,
        "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-1968",
        "page_number": 9,
        "title": "RAS-1968",
        "content_text": "Colony in not losing more than 53 ordinary and two life members in 1967 and to gain 59 ordinary and three life members. It is hoped that, in the year 1969 which will be the tenth year after the revival of the Hong Kong Branch of the Society, we may achieve a membership of 500.\n\nThe Journal of the Society (which has now reached its seventh issue) covering the year 1966 came out in 1967 under the editorship of Mr. Hayes and has maintained its high standard and interest.\n\nFrom the Hon. Treasurer's report it will be seen that on the working of the year there was a small deficit of $738 due mainly to the doubling of our expenditure this year on the Society's publications, the Journal, the Volume on the 1966 Symposium and the reprinting of Sir Lindsay Ride's article on the Old Protestant Cemetery in Macao, from the sale of which we expect to replenish our finances. Our efforts to build up a library available for the use of members have this year shown some promise of success. We have now a collection of over 300 volumes of standard works on China and the Far East including, in particular, works on South China and Hong Kong and a valuable collection of exchange journals. Our collection has been enriched with the books purchased with the generous grant of $2,850 from the Asia Foundation and with about 100 books from the library of the late Colonel Burkhardt and Madame du Breuil generously presented by Colonel Burkhardt's daughter. Our thanks are due once again to Mr. F. A. Nixon who has enabled us to receive from the Fung Ping Shan Museum of the University five albums containing photographs of his collection of Nestorian Crosses which are housed in the Museum. The British Council have come to our aid by kindly providing space in their library for the greater part of our books, while some of the rarer books and reference works will still be kept for the time being in the University Library. The accommodation given to our library by the British Council is the best temporary solution of our library problem until some kind benefactor appears to give us a room of our own with sufficient funds to provide for a part-time librarian. Before the original branch of the Society was wound up in 1859 it had a substantial and valuable library which was presented to the Morrison Educational Society and it was fortunate then in having good friends in its first President — Sir John Davis — and the Chief Justice who provided a",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1968.txt",
        "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/66833948d",
        "rank": 0
    }
]