[
    {
        "id": 212328,
        "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": 270,
        "title": "RAS-1990",
        "content_text": "247\n\n―\n\nand Godown Company. 'Monuments' still standing include the Helena May Institute (completed 1916), Saint Andrew's Church (foundation stone laid 1904) and Church Hall, and the Peninsula Hotel (official opening 1928) which — along with the Taj Mahal in Bombay, Raffles in Singapore and a few others was classified, before World War II, as one of the 'great hotels of the East'. Another of Leigh and Orange's edifices is the main, 'Renaissance' style, building at Hong Kong University which was completed in 1912 and extended in 1952. It has been gazetted as an historical monument. The now demolished Sir Paul Chater's 'Marble Hall', generally accepted as the most luxurious residence in Hong Kong before World War II, was another example.\n\nThe Colony's first, full-time, chartered accountant was Arthur Lowe, who came to Hong Kong in 1902. Joseph Bingham became his partner in 1905, and Frederick Mathews (Lowe, Bingham and Mathews) in 1909. There were other accountants in the Territory before 1902, but few had professional qualifications and auditing was usually a subsidiary activity to their main lines of business. For instance, Linstead and Davis were mainly property agents, but they also sold bicycles, and, up to 1926, they had an agency for Manila cigars. The partners audited the accounts of various companies. The senior partner of Gibb Livingston was one of the two Hong Kong Bank auditors, and so on.\n\nLowe Bingham (Lo Bing Ham in Chinese) became part of the international firm of Price Waterhouse in 1974,\n\nHong Kong and China Gas Company\n\nWilliam Glen, who had no knowledge of the gas industry in 1861, obtained from the then Governor, Sir Hercules Robinson (when the population was 123,281), a concession to supply gas to the city of Victoria. The company was incorporated on May 31st 1862: most of the shareholders lived in the United Kingdom, although 500 shares were offered locally.\n\nThen, on December 3rd 1864, Hong Kong was lit with gas for the first time by about 15 miles of mains and 500 lamps, in Queen's Road extending up the hill to Upper Albert Road. Previously, the only street lights had been installed voluntarily by residents, and burned peanut oil. The residents of Caine Road complained that they\n\n---\n\nPage 270\n\nPage 271",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1990.txt",
        "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/d79206299",
        "rank": 0
    },
    {
        "id": 212602,
        "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": 156,
        "title": "RAS-1991",
        "content_text": "136\n\nThe charming English custom of dressing for dinner is ill adapted to the perspiring tropics.\n\nWhen the walla-walla boat took me out to the coaster anchored in the harbour, I found she was even smaller than the ship I had come on from Shanghai, and slower. The run to Singapore, which the larger ships cover in a little over three days, again took a week. It is true we had to make a considerable detour to avoid the extensive belt of mines laid round the Singapore harbour, and we were kept waiting outside pending permission to enter.\n\nWhile anchored there, I was astonished to observe a launch, flying the Japanese flag, and towing a string of fishing craft, steam in over the minefield. On enquiry I was told that Singapore could not do without fish. It later transpired that many of the fishermen were Japanese naval officers in disguise, and that there was little they did not know about the British minefields. Only a few months previously, while undergoing cross-examination in court, a Japanese consular official detained on a charge of espionage had swallowed poison to avoid having to give evidence; but, presumably in the interest of the breakfast table, the Japanese fishermen continued to receive the benefit of the doubt. The big talk of the moment was the scandal of the bribes which had been paid on large contracts for the construction of the new concrete pill-boxes, which were being erected around the island. It was alleged that the quality of the concrete supplied was sometimes little better than plaster, and that some of the leading British firms were implicated. It was all a trifle disturbing.\n\nThe further you got from Shanghai and the nearer to India the worse the plumbing. In Shanghai, American influence had overcome British conservatism with happy results. In the foreign home there was generally a bathroom to each bedroom, and the fixtures were as pleasing to the eye as in use. Stainless steel vied with coloured plastic and the right use of glass to gratify the visitor. In Hongkong the standard lagged a bit. In Singapore it was a long way behind. The bathroom floor might be mere wood, and the walls just homely white tiles. No incentive here to dawdle in delectable contemplation. Even in the famous Raffles Hotel, a barrack descended from earlier times, the bathroom, though no doubt sumptuous enough by English standards, left much to be desired. If I remember rightly it even contained a primeval article of furniture called a \"wash-hand stand”.",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1991.txt",
        "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/k356gt84j",
        "rank": 0
    }
]