[ { "id": 204251, "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": 19, "title": "RAS-1961", "content_text": "Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society Hong Kong Branch\n\nRASHKB and author\n\n16\n\nVol. 1 (1961)\n\nISSN 1991-7295\n\nChristian centuries of the new states of South-east Asia, formed under Indian influence in Indo-China, Indonesia and the Malay Peninsula.\n\nDuring the Middle Ages the navigation of the Southern Seas was in the hands of the Arabs. But after the rounding of the Cape, direct contact between Europe and the East by sea was restored. It was mainly by the sea-route that India, China, and South-east Asia became known to modern Europe. In this the Portuguese navigators played an all-important part. Passing over the rivalries of the Western nations we come to the days of the East India Company.\n\nIn India the Moghul empire had reached its height, fine examples of its art remaining in the Moghul architecture of Pakistan and North-west India, and Moghul miniature painting. But with the Moghul Moslem law had come to India, and it was soon recognized by the East India Company that the study of Moslem languages was necessary for the government of India. So Islamics now became part of the study of India as of Persia.\n\nIn 1783 Sir William Jones, a brilliant linguist who had mastered Persian and Arabic during his student days in England, was appointed Judge of the Supreme Court of Judicature in Bengal. In 1784 he proposed the forming of the Asiatic Society of Bengal and became its first President. Becoming aware of the importance of Sanskrit, he became the founder of Sanskrit studies in the West. In accordance with Warren Hastings' decision in 1776 that Indians should be ruled by their own laws, he undertook the immense task of compiling a complete digest of Moslem and Hindu law, a task which he left unfinished at his death eleven years later.\n\nIt was from India that the Western study of Tibet commenced, initiated by Catholic missionaries, of whom the most eminent was Desideri who lived for many years in the great Sera monastery at Lhasa, and wrote the first comprehensive account of Tibet.\n\nMeantime the Jesuit missionaries had proceeded eastwards in the wake of the Portuguese to Malacca, Macau and Japan. It was from Macau that Matthew Ricci entered China in 1580 and in course of time reached Peking, where a beginning was made in the study of the Chinese Classics and Histories, which led to the first real knowledge of Chinese civilization in the West. It was now realized that the 'China' at the end of the sea-route was the same as Marco Polo's 'Cathay'.\n\nAt the beginning of the nineteenth century modern Sinology commenced with Robert Morrison at Canton, and continued with a number of able scholars, too numerous to mention here, of whom James Legge with his translation of the Chinese Classics into", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1961.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/vd6724704", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 204253, "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": 21, "title": "RAS-1961", "content_text": "Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society Hong Kong Branch\n\nRASHKB and author\n\nVol. 1 (1961)\n\nISSN 1991-7295\n\n18\n\nBIRDS OF HONG KONG\n\nCAPTAIN A. M. MACFARLANE, R.A.\n\nBased on a lecture delivered on September 22, 1960,\n\nThe birds of Hong Kong are notable for their variety. Over 330 different kinds of birds have been recorded here since 1860, and the list covers a wide range of types, with very few families found in China left unrepresented. I propose to cover the more common species, both residents and visitors, and to touch on a few of the rarities besides.\n\nI would normally hesitate to point out to residents of the Colony the geography of their surroundings, but a few features are worth remembering from a bird-watcher's point of view. First, Hong Kong is just inside the tropics, and therefore lies at the southern breeding limit of some of the typically northern birds such as the Black-capped Kingfisher, and at the northern breeding limit of some of the typically tropical or sub-tropical birds, such as the sunbirds and flowerpeckers. Secondly, the year is divided into quite definite seasons, some much longer than others, and so we get summer visitors who breed here, such as the Black-naped Oriole and Hair-crested Drongo; winter visitors such as certain ducks and many species of hawks and thrushes; and of course, passage migrants that pass through the Colony, sometimes in immense numbers, in spring and autumn to and from their breeding grounds in the far north. Examples of the more noticeable of these migrants are the waders, the swifts and the flycatchers. Thirdly, the Colony has a wide range of bird country within its small limits, from the top of Tai Mo Shan, over three thousand feet high, down through the wooded valleys such as the Lam Tsuen valley and the Tai Po Kau Forestry Reserve, across the open paddy-fields and marshes bordering Deep Bay to the rocky coasts and open sea off Hong Kong Island and Lantau. Therefore a bird-watcher can select different areas and hope to see different birds accordingly. Lastly, to the regret of all but bird-watchers, Hong Kong is subject to occasional fierce storms and even typhoons. If these last occur, then it is worth every effort to go out and brave the storm, for unusual birds are blown in, especially of marsh and coastal species.\n\nDuring the last few years, members of the Hong Kong Bird-Watching Society have found that just over 60 species nest regularly in the Colony. Despite the apparent scarcity of birds in the summer months, this number compares quite favourably with an area of English coastline of the same size. Although", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1961.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/vd6724704", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 204804, "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": 107, "title": "RAS-1964", "content_text": "FENG CHAU\n\n95\n\nfrom his own or adjoining villages worked with him. The Shek Pik people were therefore closely connected with the sea despite the fact that their fields were extensive and well-watered. Elsewhere on Lantau, an old account book of the Hakka CHEUNG Kung Tak Tong at Pui O, which is dated 1897-99 (Kuang Hsu 23rd-24th years), shows that the Tong had a regular income from a fishing sampan.\n\n41 It has been shown that the Peng Chau shopkeepers always contributed to the temple repairs. A more illuminating instance of merchants' concern for the safety of local waters is to be found in the Tin Hau temple at Fan Lau on the south-west tip of Lantau, facing Macau and the mouth of the Delta, a remote area two hours' walk from Tai O Market. Here tablets survive from the Chia Ching and Hsien Feng periods (1796-1820 and 1851-61) and contain the names of many Tai O shops. One imagines that few of the donors would ever visit the temple, but they were obviously intent to ensure Tin Hau's benevolent care.\n\n42 Information received from CHEUNG Kai Chun of Ham Tin, Pui O, Lantau (born 1886). But this was not true everywhere. At Shek Pik several families of Tanka used the anchorage for at least fifty years. There was no remembered animosity during this time and these fishermen were allowed to cut grass and firewood without charge. However, they rarely strayed far from the beach and the two groups did not intermarry or have much to do with each other, except in casual contact at the main festivals and when villagers bought fish from them at the jetty, which was over a mile from the village. The fishermen would not go to the village to sell their catch.\n\n43 Information received from the present leaders of the WONG Wai Chak Tong ✯ of Cheung Chau.\n\n44 This statement is based on close knowledge of the Southern District of the New Territories and of the District land registers.\n\n45 Barbara E. Ward \"A Hong Kong Fishing Village”, Journal of Oriental Studies (University of Hong Kong) volume 1, no. 1 (January 1954) pp. 195-214, especially p. 211. See also note 42.\n\n46 See my Cheung Chau article for the Cheung Chau district associations before the British lease. At Tai O in the same period there appear to have been associations of Tung Kwun and San On origin, each with a club-house.\n\n47 The number is wrongly given as 28 in note 14 to the Cheung Chau article.\n\n48 A tablet in the Pak Tai temple at Cheung Chau dated January, February 1906 (a lucky day of the first month of spring of the thirty-second year of Kuang Hsü) shows that Peng Chau people also contributed to its repair.\n\n49 See the Cheung Chau article for this institution.\n\n50 The Kaifong of the Hong Kong region, and their like, are local institutions with a fairly long history. The Peng Chau Kaifong is quite likely to have an early date in relation to the age of the present settlement.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1964.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/qz20zx09r", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 204871, "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": 174, "title": "RAS-1964", "content_text": "NOTES AND QUERIES\n\n149\n\nAn expert could say what the ranges of such cannons were, but after you have landed at the pier and walked to the fort, you will appreciate that it is 1,200 yards from the coast. It is unlikely that guns in the fort could be really effective at this range, so that one questions the wisdom of its planners in placing it so far from the sea, if it was meant to be a work of coastal defence.\n\nWhat of the garrison? In the later Ching period there were at least three military installations on Lantau at Tung Chung, Tai O and Fan Lau, another on Cheung Chau, and a considerable number of troops in the Kowloon Walled City. These were all sedentary garrisons drawn from the Tai Pang (Mirs Bay) battalion of the Chinese regular forces, which was scattered in forts and guard posts all over the eastern and southern part of the Sun On district, of which the present Crown Colony of Hong Kong formed the major part. The garrison at Tung Chung was commanded by a subordinate officer and probably consisted of a score or two men who were very likely without modern weapons. Writing in 1903 Dyer Ball said of the Chinese military forces that \"matchlocks, gingals, bows and arrows, spears and lances are still the weapons of many\". Their military efficiency was probably very slight. A missionary, who wrote an interesting account of the San On district for the last number of the transactions of the old Hong Kong Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society, 1859, has an amusing description of the guard post at the Shatin Pass. However, they probably had a deterrent value, but owing to the poor state of local communications at that time, they were much too far away to assist if anything happened elsewhere on Lantau, particularly on the south side, though their influence was felt there. When the local leaders of the Pui O community (South Lantau) rebuilt the Hung Shing temple there in 1875, they persuaded the garrison commander at Tung Chung to make a contribution. In the commemorative tablet recording the event he is styled Fu Ye, a respectful form of address for this subordinate officer.\n\nTo bring these rather rambling notes to a close, the fort was used after 1898 as a police station. The District Officer who recovered the cannons for the fort has left a vivid picture of his occasional magisterial visits there about 1920:", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1964.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/qz20zx09r", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 204907, "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-1965", "page_number": 15, "title": "RAS-1965", "content_text": "S. G. DAVIS\n\n1897). Laufer also pointed out that the only reference that he could find in Chinese literature to pottery of the Han Dynasty is by Chow Mi in the Kuei Hsin Tsa Shih, Chow Mi lived under the Southern Sung Dynasty in the thirteenth century.\n\nSuch an observation by Laufer is of importance because he was an established authority on Chinese archaeology. As Curator of Anthropology at the Field Museum of Natural History in Chicago he was in China from 1901 to 1904 collecting specimens and making investigations with the Jacob H. Schiff Chinese expedition. He returned again to China in 1910 with the Mrs. T. B. Blackstone expedition. While he collected most of his Chou and Han pottery mainly in Shensi Province he also travelled widely in China and visited Canton and Hong Kong. Thus he would certainly have reported Han pottery if it had been known in the area.\n\nThis relatively recent discovery of neolithic archaeology in China is certainly paralleled here in Hong Kong. The first reference to it that I can find is by Dr. C. M. Heanley in 1928 when he described Hong Kong celts (8). Dr. Heanley, who fortunately is still active and keenly interested in Hong Kong (I received a letter from him recently), lives in Salisbury, Southern Rhodesia. He was head of the Government Vaccine and Bacteriological Department and in his spare time was a devoted amateur geologist. He knew of Laufer's work and in his article on celts referred to Laufer's statement that prehistory stone implements were scarce in China. Heanley suggested that they were only scarce because prospectors did not know how to look for them. He said, \"To find celts in South China select the crests and spurs of granite hills bared of vegetation by rain erosion. Do not look for celts but look for isolated fragments of pottery and water-worn stones. The eyes should be kept ranging well ahead and on either side and little attention given to the ground near the feet.\" Heanley estimated that on granite outcrops in Hong Kong there was an average of about 30 to 40 celts to the square mile within 600 yards of the sea and land reclaimed from the sea.\n\nDr. Heanley's shrewd advice to prospectors has helped considerably in later searches. It is on raised beaches, terraces and hill-spurs that most of our archaeological remains have been\n\nPage 15\n\nPage 16", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1965.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/s752cj653", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 204965, "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-1965", "page_number": 73, "title": "RAS-1965", "content_text": "66\n\n: JEN YU-WEN : \n\nIn the summer of 1958 a number of Chinese and Western historians, writers, poets, reporters and government officers accompanying the author, who had taken the principal interest in and had organized the research project, made three trips to the place to see and study the historic object. As a result of painstaking research and study, we are now able to decipher and read every character engraved there and to understand the exact meaning of the whole text. The full text is rendered more clearly on the opposite page.\n\nThe inscription and engraving were done by the Administrator of the salt field, Kuan-fu-ch'iang (Kwoon-fu-ch'eung) a place which is identified as present-day Kowloon Peninsula. The text describes the Administrator's full name and position, his visit to the site, the construction of the Stone Pagoda on South Fu-t'ang (the islet south of North Fu-t'ang now officially named Tung-lung Island), the repairing and renewing of these two places successively by several persons, the erection of another stone tablet (now disappeared), and finally, the elaborate repairs carried out by a local celebrity, Lin Tao-yi (Lum To-yi), who caused the text to be engraved on the rock on the aforementioned date.\n\nLin Tao-yi was also responsible for the construction of the Temple of T'ien-hou at North Fu-t'ang. The author, after visiting the place, had the privilege of being invited by some of his descendants in Kowloon to read their Genealogical Record mentioned above. It was found that Tao-yi's great-grandfather originally hailed from P'u-t'ien (P'o-t'in), South Fukien, and was the first ancestor of their clan to migrate to Kwangtung settling down in Kowloon sometime during the Southern Sung period. His own son had had two sons, Sung-chien (Ch'ung-kin) and Po-chien (P'ak-kin). The two brothers engaged in the transportation business with large sailing vessels between sea ports along the coast and Kowloon. Once while returning south they met with a typhoon near the Fu-t'ang gap. The ship was wrecked and sunk, but they held on to the matshed-cover of the ship which kept them floating. On the cover was a tablet of the Goddess Lin Ta-ku whom they had been worshipping aboard the ship. They tied their loosened hair to it and swam to South Fu-t'ang. Landing in safety they firmly believed that the Goddess had saved their lives and immediately made the matshed-cover", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1965.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/s752cj653", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 204968, "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-1965", "page_number": 76, "title": "RAS-1965", "content_text": "STONE ENGRAVING AT FU-T'ANG\n\n67\n\nher temporary temple. Since then other sailors passing by went ashore to worship her, who, they believed, gave them every protection at sea. Later, they collected a sum of money to build a permanent temple there. Sung-chien, the first beneficiary, had become wealthy by then and contributed the principal share of the construction fund. Still later, in the second year of the reign of Hsien-hsun (1266) the local people, because of superstition, thought that another temple should be built on the shore of North Fu-t'ang. Tao-yi, the only son of Sung-chien, responded and constructed a much more elaborate temple there. Besides, he composed a poem commemorating the event and had it inscribed on a stone tablet which was erected by the side of the new temple. This monument has long been lost, but the temple remains there till the present day, of course having been repaired from time to time during the past 700 years.\n\nIts name has also been changed since the Goddess has been bestowed by Emperors of successive dynasties with different honorable titles from the plain Lin Ta-ku to Tien-hou (Heavenly Queen) which was given her by the Emperor K'ang-hsi (Hong Hei) of early Ch'ing. According to the Gazetteer of Kwangtung this is the oldest temple of T'ien-hou along the coast of the Province. Eight years after its construction, Lin Tao-yi, having made another effort to renew the whole vicinity and repair the Temple, requested the Administrator of the Kuan-fu salt field to prepare the inscription which he had engraved on the rock.*\n\nThe stone-engraving has distinct cultural value. In the first place, for students of the history of the Southern Sung Dynasty, the reference to the construction of the Stone Pagoda at South Fu-t'ang in the fifth year of the reign of Emperor Chen Chung of the Northern Sung (A.D. 1012) is particularly of historical interest and significance. This is because when the two young sons of Tu Chung, who would become the last emperors of Sung\n\n* The Goddess was the sixth daughter of Lin Yuan (Lum Yun), an official in Fukien (892-946). It was alleged that she had an innate supernatural power and could perform miracles in saving people from drowning at sea. She died at the age of twenty and henceforth was worshipped by sailors as their patron goddess. See the author's study of her story in Sung Wong Toi, A Commemorative Volume (1960), Chüan 5, p. 279ff (in Chinese).\n\nFor the author's detailed studies of the engraved rock, see the same volume, pp. 151-154, 268-280, 284-290.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1965.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/s752cj653", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 205098, "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-1966", "page_number": 54, "title": "RAS-1966", "content_text": "49\n\nSINO-WESTERN CONTACTS UNDER THE\n\nMONGOL EMPIRE*\n\nHerbert FRANKE\n\nContacts between Chinese civilization and that of the West, whatever we take \"West\" to mean in this context, have a long and tortuous history which, for some periods, is still far from sufficiently studied. All historians, however, even the most Europe-centered ones, do agree that these contacts reached a pre-modern, all-time high under the Mongol empires in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, and even the most superficial or condensed textbooks of world history have a few words to say about East-West relations following the conquests and campaigns of Chingis Khan. In such books, we frequently encounter the statement that this period facilitated intercourse and exchange because of the so-called Pax Mongolica, \"Mongol Peace\", when the Mongol domination of East and Central and even great parts of West Asia crystallized into an empire stretching from the Yellow Sea to Southern Russia. Like so many historical tags, this is, however, a statement that loses much of its seemingly uncontrovertible truth when one considers the historical facts. If it is really the task of the historian to reconsider from time to time historical writings and historical dicta, and to debunk history if necessary, then this notion of Pax Mongolica requires qualification.\n\nA historian of China will therefore perhaps ask if cultural contacts and interchange between China and the non-China West were really more frequent and easy under the Mongols in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries than under the Six Dynasties and the T'ang when no Eurasian universal empire like that of the Mongols existed. We know that a great number of travellers, missionaries, and merchants from the Western Regions came to China between the late second and the ninth centuries A.D., and that many non-Chinese cultural elements penetrated East, among them the world religion of Buddhism that became such an important part of Chinese culture. Most of the early Buddhist\n\nText of the Hume Memorial Lecture delivered at Yale University, February 5th, 1965. The author is Director of the Institute for East Asian Cultural and Linguistics Sciences, University of Munich.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1966.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/bz60k0811", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 205272, "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": 34, "title": "RAS-1967", "content_text": "The Travelling Palace of Southern Sung\n\n27\n\nheight. The character toi was in a variant which has been mistaken by many people for tang (). Later, a further seven characters were added, vertically, on the right side, recording that repairs had been carried out in the ting mau year of the Ch'ing Emperor Chia Ch'ing (A.D. 1807). Of course, this means the re-engravement of the three original characters, for there was otherwise nothing to be repaired. The character wang (£) \"king\" should be huang (§) which stands for \"emperor\". It was first intentionally inscribed in that erroneous form in the history of the Sung Dynasty compiled by the Yuan officials where it was recorded that there were two Sung \"Kings\", implying that they were not recognised as Emperors perpetuating the Sung dynastic throne. This was a grave mistake subsequently pointed out by many Chinese scholars. We should use the character huang for \"Emperor\" instead. The naming of the Sung Huang Tai Garden and Sung Huang Tai Road by the Hong Kong Government is therefore correct.\n\nThe precise meaning of the name Sung Wong Toi is not easily ascertained. It has been alleged that the boy Emperor Tuan Tsung used to rest in the cave beneath the great rock and sometimes played hide and seek there with his small brother. The mound has been likened to a toi, a terrace or high building. One historian has asserted that a watch tower was built on the top of the mound to look out for the advent of the enemy, hence its name. This last theory is not credible since the mound itself was already high enough for watching over the sea to the east without the superstructure. In my own research work, a line has been found in the Hsin-an Gazetteer which gives a very useful hint for the interpretation of the name. It reads: \"There were three characters 'Sung Wong Toi', on the great rock which was beside the Toi\".12 In reverse the last part can be read \"the Toi was beside the great rock\". Therefore, neither the great rock nor the hill itself can be identified as the Toi. The logical conclusion cannot be anything but that a separate toi must have been constructed near the foot by the side of the hill and the big characters were later engraved on the great rock merely as an indication of the historic spot commemorating the visit of two Emperors. It might have been a real watch tower, for the rocky hill was not easy to climb for military purposes. But where exactly was the toi or tower is a problem which remains to be solved.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1967.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/0c488p70g", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 205274, "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": 36, "title": "RAS-1967", "content_text": "The Travelling Palace of Southern Sung\n\n29\n\nSung Wong Toi Garden was finally completed in the winter of 1957. Acting upon the suggestion of the Chiu Clansmen's Association, most of whose members are the descendants of the early emperors and princes of the Sung Dynasty, whose family name was Chiu, the Government, with the valuable assistance of the Association, provided two stone tablets commemorating the Sung Wong Toi, one in Chinese and the other in English, on each side of the entrance to the garden. On the 28th December, 1959, a simple and dignified unveiling ceremony was held in the garden. The design and craftsmanship of the tablets are of the first quality. In particular the two dragons, symbolizing two emperors, were beautifully done. It was said that only a very few craftsmen in Hong Kong could have done them and that they should be ranked as one of the Colony's works of art. I had the honour of being asked to compose the Chinese text and to assist in translating it into English. I was also asked to compile and edit a book entitled Sung Wong Toi, A Commemorative Volume which was published in Chinese in 1960 by the Chiu Clansmen's Association.\n\nV. A FEW LEGENDS\n\nIn the text on the tablets above mentioned I stated that there existed a few historical sites connected with Tuan Tsung's stay in Kowloon. They may be of interest to you, in spite of their legendary character, if you are keen to know more of local history.\n\nNorth of the Sung Wong Toi rock it is said that there was a Chin-fu-jen mu (Lady Chin's Tomb). It is recorded in the Hsin-an Gazetteer that the Princess of Tsin Kuo, younger sister of Tuan Tsung, had been drowned nearby, or en route to Kowloon, and that a golden image of her was buried in that tomb. That was why it was called Lady Chin (Gold)'s Tomb. A large stone tablet was erected there with the name Chin-fu-jen engraved on it. I consider this as sheer legend, unsupported as it is by any substantial proof.\n\nTo the northwest of the hill is the popular Temple of Hou-wang (Hou-wang miao). Ch'en P'ei-t'ao, a famous scholar of Tung-kuan District in late Ch'ing, put out the theory that Yang Liang-chieh, uncle of Tuan Tsung, had died at sea on the way here; was subsequently buried at this spot; that he was posthumously given the title of wang (king); and that the local people built the temple in memory of his loyalty. I have found", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1967.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/0c488p70g", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 205275, "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": 37, "title": "RAS-1967", "content_text": "30 \n\nJEN YU-WEN \n\nthat this legend is also ill-founded, because it has been ascertained that there are at least six other Temples of Hou-wang in Kowloon and the nearby island of Lantau. Moreover, there are other Hou-wang Temples in different districts of Kwangtung, and the images worshipped in them are different deified persons. But the decisive counter-proof of Ch'en's theory is found in a book written by Chou Mi, Kuei-hsin tsa-chi hsü-chi (B), 47a in early Yuan which records that in the last battle between the Sungs and Mongols at Ya-men in 1279, Young Liang-chieh perished at sea with the Emperor Ping (successor of Tuan Tsung) and other generals and ministers.14 \n\nAnother story tells how Emperor Tuan Tsung occasionally established his court at Yu-hsien-yen on Pê-ho-shan (Lé iao), northwest of Kowloon Tsai. There was a stone that looked like an armchair. Tuan Tsung used to sit on it as his temporary throne. From that time, the stone got the name “The Royal Armchair Stone\" (Yu-tso chiao-i shih #PERM ̄ ). This is a more reasonable tradition for a historic event although there is also no proof for it. \n\nVI. THE ERH-HUANG-TIEN VILLAGE \n\nThere was yet another historical site called Erh-huang-tien Village (in Cantonese Yi-wong-tin Two Emperors' Palace Village) which was closely related to the royal visit. Amongst the many old villages listed in the Hsin-an Gazetteer was the name Erh-huang-tien but written in the form, meaning Two Huangs' Store. Ch'en Pê-tao was the first scholar to point out that this was a mistake and should be Two Emperors' Palace. (The Cantonese pronunciations of huang for emperor and huang for yellow are the same, and in Mandarin tien for palace and tien for store are the same. The error in the Gazetteer may be ascribed to intentional alteration of the two characters to avoid political trouble in the Yuan dynasty which exterminated the last two emperors of Southern Sung.) This interpretation is acceptable. \n\nA few other writers in modern times in describing the historical sites in Kowloon have likewise confirmed the existence of such a village. It has been generally taken for granted that it was so named because the last two Sung emperors stayed there for some time, or constructed a palace there. Furthermore, the", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1967.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/0c488p70g", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 205280, "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": 42, "title": "RAS-1967", "content_text": "The Travelling Palace of Southern Sung\n\n35\n\nits followers to a nearby islet, Ku-ta (†) or Ancient Pagoda, Tung-lung Island.19 In the autumn they proceeded to Ch'ien-wan (*) which is now definitely identified as Tsun-wan (now written) along the western coast of Kowloon. Two months later, the Mongol army, which had been pursuing them along the shore, began to attack. The boy Emperor sailed to Hsiu-shan (ƒ), now known as Hu-men or the Bogue. Continuously under pressure from the Mongols, Tuan Tsung passed by Hsiang-shan District (at present Chung-shan) and reached Tseng-o (#4), south of Macao, where his ship was badly damaged by a typhoon. He himself fell into the sea but was rescued. The terrible shock led him to contract a fatal disease. He was sick on board ship until the spring of 1278, when the whole fleet sailed northward back to the harbour at the mouth of the Pearl River. By that time Canton had been recaptured by some royalists and so they felt safe enough to anchor and encamp at Kang-chou which is identified as Ta-yu-shan or Lantau Island20.\n\nTwo months later he died there. His younger brother Ping succeeded him on the throne and became the last emperor of Sung. He named the new reign Hsiang Hsing (#) and the 1st year began in the next month, still 1278. In the 6th month the new emperor had to sail away with the whole fleet southwestward until they arrived at Ya-Shan of the Hsin-hui District. Finally, in the 2nd month of the next year (spring 1279), they fought the last battle against the Mongol forces commanded by the arch-traitor Chang Hung-fan (K). As a result of the defeat the whole army perished. The boy Emperor with his royal seal was tied to the body of his prime minister, Lu Hsiu-fu, who plunged into the sea, to be followed by thousands of court officials in a mass suicide. When the Queen Mother Young heard of the tragic and heroic death of the Emperor she also drowned herself, thus ending the long reign of 315 years of the Northern and Southern Sung Dynasty.\n\nBefore concluding this talk let me point out that besides the above story there is a deep and important meaning to be derived from our study of the Travelling Palace of Southern Sung in Kowloon. Throughout the Sung Dynasty, China was frequently invaded by neighbouring foreign tribes. Almost every year there was war, not only against the Hsi Hsia (the Tangut), but also, in turn, the Liao (Khitan), the Chin (Nuchen) and the Mongols.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1967.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/0c488p70g", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 205281, "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": 43, "title": "RAS-1967", "content_text": "36 \n\nJEN YU-WEN \n\nAt the close of Southern Sung, the last two emperors had to flee and seek refuge by the shores of the sea, from where they led a hundred thousand odd officials and soldiers in the noble endeavour to restore the empire. The Kuan-fu area, with the three big characters Sung Wong Toi still remaining, commemorates one of the last portions of Sung territory on which the two emperors stood. Shortly afterwards they met their ultimate defeat and the whole country was lost to a foreign tribe for the first time in China's history. But what we commemorate is not this unfortunate event in our national history; it is the spirit of nationalism and patriotism displayed in the last struggle of the Sung patriots for the recovery of the mother country.\n\nThe independence and freedom of China had a higher claim to their lives. This unconquerable spirit, expressed in the unceasing revolutionary efforts of the Chinese people to fight against the Mongols ever since the last days of Kuan-fu and Ya-shan, was finally crowned with success in the overthrow of the Yuan Dynasty less than 90 years afterwards. Today, when we pass through the ancient site of the Travelling Palace and look at the Sung Wong Toi monument, we see the symbol of this same spirit, which is the essential quality necessary for the survival of any nation on earth.\n\nNOTES\n\n1 This lecture is a condensation of my Chinese article Sung Kuan-fu Hsing-kung K'ou (†‡3hB) published in the Continent Magazine (†\nA), Taiwan, September, 1966.\n\n2 Such as Ch'en Chung-wei, Erh-Wang Pen-mo (RR#i, =±**), Shu Mou-kuan, Hsin-an Hsien-chih (Chia-ch'ing), Gazetteer of Hsin-an District (**T. **\n**BA), K'o Wei-ch'i, Sung-shih Hsin-pien (MM. ER #), Chang Hsu, Ya-shan Chih (HM, AJA), Nan Sung Shu (ET).\n\n* Mother Yu was never again mentioned in historical records; probably she had died.\n\n4 For references, details and discussions on the royal itinerary from beginning to end, see my treatise Sung-mo erh-ti nan-ch'ien nien-lu k'ou (**=*64***) in Sung Wong Toi, a Commemorative Volume (edited and compiled by myself), Hong Kong, 1960, pp. 122-174 (X£b444).\n\n5 It is alleged that there were eight mountain ranges spreading over the peninsula which look like running dragons (lung), and that when the boy Emperor stayed at the place, people pointed out that he himself represented the ninth, as an emperor was commonly believed to be symbolized by a dragon. But the more rational and reasonable interpretation for the origin of the name would be that there are altogether nine mountain ranges spreading over the peninsula. According to Hsi-nan I Chuan (§§ AM) in Hou-han-shu (**後漢書**), the Ai-lao-i (‡‡✯ aboriginal tribe Lao) in Yunnan Province called back “k'ou\" and seat \"lung\". Hence to them, Kowloon meant", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1967.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/0c488p70g", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 205351, "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": 113, "title": "RAS-1967", "content_text": "106\n\nREV. MR. KRONE\n\nTo the North of Deep Bay is Chik-wan Bay, on the shore of which is situated the renowned temple of Tien-hau. To the South is the Bay of Toon-mun-wan, near Castle-peak. The open sea forms the Southern and Eastern boundary of the district.\n\nMirs Bay, the most remarkable of those which indent the Eastern shore of Sanon, is called by the Chinese \"Ti-po Hoi\" 大步海.\n\nIt is worthy of notice, that when the question of ceding Hong-kong to the British crown was brought before the Emperor Tau-kwang, it was asserted that the island had never really belonged to China; and it appears remarkable that, in an official geographical and statistical account of Sanon, in 8 volumes, published about 40 years ago, no mention of Hongkong is made, although islands much more insignificant are accurately included. However, in the list of villages of the Sanon District, the names of Shek-pai-wan (Aberdeen) and Check-chu (Stanley), are found. Among the numerous Straits between the different islands the most worthy of notice are:--\n\n1. The Cap-sui-mûn between Lantao and the two small Islands of Tsing-yeu and Ma-wan; Kai-check-mûn, between the two last mentioned islands and the mainland itself, and Ly-yue-mûn and East-tong-mûn, which constitute the Eastern passage from Hongkong harbour. According to Chinese authorities, the greater diameter of the district, from North to South, measures 380 le, and the lesser, from East to West, 270 le. But it must be remembered that the measurement from North to South extends to the southermost of the small islands which are reckoned as belonging to the district. The district is generally mountainous, and the mountain ridges extend nearly to the shore, leaving only small plains at their feet, which are occupied by villages and hamlets. These mountains have usually a dreary and barren aspect, and resemble those of Hong-kong and the opposite mainland. The granite rocks are scantily covered with soil, and are overgrown with grass. A luxuriant underwood is found in the ravines, but trees are seldom met with, though groves of them, evidently planted, are generally found in the neighbourhood of villages, Buddhist monasteries, and temples. The Chinese are accustomed to burn down the grass on the tops.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1967.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/0c488p70g", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 205377, "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": 139, "title": "RAS-1967", "content_text": "132\n\nREV. MR. KRONE\n\nTo the left of the temple of Confucius, is the temple of “Kwan-kung”關公—the God of War; and on the right another one dedicated to \"Man-tai\", the God of Literature. Behind the latter is the hall Ning-lun, in which the public examinations are held. The literati and elders meet here on special occasions. In the vicinity of these edifices is the temple of “Sha-nung”神農—the God of Agriculture; and before it extends a piece of ground, on which the chief magistrate has to plough a few furrows at the beginning of spring, in accordance with an ancient custom. Near the sea-shore is a large space of ground, which serves for drilling the military, and on which the military examinations are also held. On it also a hall is erected for the accommodation of the officers.\n\nNot far from this place is a Buddhist temple, which contains images of the three Buddhas, and of the eighteen Lo-hou, which are Buddhist demi-gods. In front of the three Buddhas is a tablet, before which the devotees worship the reigning dynasty. On this tablet is the inscription \"Ten Thousand years!\" Farther above this is another tablet with the characters \"Protect my black-haired people.\" The chief magistrate is obliged to repair here once a month, and to prostrate himself before these tablets.\n\nOther edifices worthy of notice are, a five-storied pagoda, a temple to the well-deserving mandarins Wong and Lau, and an altar to the Gods of Land and Grain. Outside the town is the execution ground, and here, in 1854, many rebels were decapitated, and there might be seen at times the heads hung up in baskets as a warning to the people.\n\nThe fort and city of Kowloong are sufficiently known, and there is but little to say of them. The low walls and miserable forts have often been visited by foreigners. The environs of Kowloong contain some curious mementoes of history, of which the rest of the district is destitute. Ping-tai, the last of the Southern Emperors of the Sung dynasty, fled with the remnant of his faithful adherents to the province of Canton. Near Kowloong he attempted to build himself a palace, which however he was unable to complete, and the situation is now marked by a temple to \"Pak-tai”北帝—the God of the North. One of his high officers died here, and his tomb is situated on a hill, which is called to this day Sung-wang-tai. These three characters are engraved on\n\n+", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1967.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/0c488p70g", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 205401, "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": 163, "title": "RAS-1967", "content_text": "156\n\nNOTES AND QUERIES\n\nADDITIONAL NOTE to the above, kindly supplied by Professor LO Hsiang-lin, Professor of Chinese, University of Hong Kong, at Professor Goodrich's suggestion and the Hon. Editor's request.\n\nProfessor Lo writes:\n\n“I am pleased to provide a note on Tu, Fan and the Superintendent of Inland Seas, Chief military commissioner, installed as Ting-hai General. I regret that I have not been able to identify the other two persons, namely Hsiao Li-jen and Su.\n\nTu, Fan and the Superintendent of Inland Seas also appeared on the inscription of the cannon constructed in June 1650, discovered in 1956, for which I have written a short treatise entitled \"Researches on a Cannon made in the Fourth Year of the Yung-li Period of the Southern Ming (1650 A.D.), in Hong Kong”, (in Chinese) Ta-hsüeh Sheng-huo★ Vol. II, No. 10 (January 1957). For detailed information the reader may refer to my treatise on the cannon discovered earlier.\n\nTU, GOVERNOR-GENERAL OF KWANGTUNG AND KWANGSI ✯t, who re- 1648 and offered\n\nTu can be identified as Tu Yung-ho † †¤, a follower of the Governor of Kwangtung. Li Cheng-tung volted against the Ch'ing dynasty in Canton in his allegiance to the Emperor Yung-li (Chu Yu-lang *. formerly prince of Kuei) of the Southern Ming dynasty. When Li Cheng-tung died in the following year, the Ming emperor appointed Tu as Governor-General of Kwangtung and Kwangsi with his head-office at Canton. Thereupon Tu took up the responsibility of leading his men in their fight against the army and fleet sent by the Ch'ing government to crush the revolt. The Ch'ing general Shang K'o-hsi laid siege to Canton in February of the fourth year of Yung-li (1650). To check the enemy's advance, Tu used the two forts built by Li Ch'eng-tung which stretched out into the sea outside the city of Canton. However an officer under Tu conspired with the Ch'ing army and assisted the latter to land on December 2nd. The forts fell into the hands of the Ch'ing army and the city met the same fate. Tu and his fleet consisting of several hundred vessels made their escape through the sea route and headed for Kiungchow ] (the", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1967.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/0c488p70g", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 205403, "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": 165, "title": "RAS-1967", "content_text": "158 \n\nNOTES AND QUERIES \n\nTHE CHAN FAMILY OF TSEUNG KWAN O \n\nThe village of Tseung Kwan O (4) is situated in the Hang Hau sub-district of the New Territories. It stands at the head of the bay of the same name, which is the northern inlet of Junk Bay. The village is said to derive its name of \"a general's bay\" from its resemblance to a general's armour in a geomantic sense.\n\nThe village is a small one; two rows of houses of the single room type. It is surrounded by padi fields, which in front stretch down to the sea, and behind climb up the stream valley in many terraces to the Clear Water Bay Road and the village of Tseng Lan Shue (##). Although the village is but a short distance from Kowloon as the crow flies, it was, until recently, difficult to reach and thus remained largely unaffected by urban influences. Now, however, the bay has been made the home of the Colony's ship breaking industry and both shores are being reclaimed for steel rolling mills.\n\nThe village itself is compact and was perhaps originally walled. Because of this, the fact that it is situated at the mouth of the stream, and because it possesses a large area of fields, it is not surprising to find that the village is inhabited by Cantonese (or Punti) in an area where most of the other villages in the highlands are Hakka. It is also not surprising that this village was founded at an earlier date than the Hakka villages in the same district.2\n\nThe village includes a number of surnames, but the main clan is the Chan (陳). Although this clan does not now possess an official genealogy or tsuk po (族譜), having destroyed it during the Japanese occupation, they maintain records of their family for 26 generations, dating back to the Southern Sung dynasty (1127-1279), the first recorded ancestor being reputed, as is usual, to be a successful scholar and official. During the Sung, this branch moved from Kiangsi to Nam Tau, the district capital of the present Po On district. In their travels, they followed the route of many of the old Cantonese families of the New Territories area. The village itself was founded by the 16th generation at the beginning of the Ching dynasty (1644-1911), approximately the same date of foundation as the other large Cantonese villages of the Sai Kung district.4\n\nPage 165\n\nPage 166", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1967.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/0c488p70g", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 205407, "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": 169, "title": "RAS-1967", "content_text": "162\n\nNOTES AND QUERIES\n\nApart from being an old landmark, the main interest of the present stone is that it bears the characters Kwan Tai Lo (# #). Sayer discusses (pages 90-92) the various meanings which have been attributed to this phrase at one time or another. Among them are suggestions that the name Kwan Tai Lo was the original Chinese name for Hong Kong Island (a small fishing village of this name was listed in the first Hong Kong Government Gazette of 15th May 1841; it was located at East Point near the present Daimaru Department Store); that the name was associated with the famous Admiral Kwan who fought the British in 1841; that the character 'Kwan' was an alliteration for the English word 'Queen'; and finally that the name is descriptive for a road which, like a petticoat girdle, encircles the island. As he says, the name \"has evoked endless speculation\". Another suggestion is that it was the personal name of a girl from the boat people who led the British round the island.\n\nII. LITTLE HONG KONG (**)\n\nThe Setting. With the exercise of a little imagination Little Hong Kong is still, in its outward appearance, the world of the Chinese peasant before 1841. Substitute rice fields for vegetable plots and chicken farms, clear away their associated structures and the modern buildings in the surrounding area, concentrate your attention on the groups of old structures that form the nuclei of the two old villages and you are back in one of the most beautiful valleys on old Hong Kong Island. It was up this valley that Sir George Staunton, the eminent sinologue and Third Commissioner in the Amherst Embassy to Peking in 1816, strolled from the Aberdeen anchorage the following year to visit the village — in so doing to give his name to Staunton Creek now, 150 years later, being reclaimed from the sea.4\n\nThe Southern Side of Hong Kong Island in 1841. When the British came in 1841 the population of Little Hong Kong was around 200 persons (the Census of 1856 gives 229). One of the visiting British officers at that time was impressed with the villages and the scenery. \"In general\", he wrote, \"the south side of Hong Kong Island is far more picturesque and less bleak than the north. The villages we saw, unlike the mat-huts in the harbour, are exceedingly neat in appearance with blue-tiled and white-walled houses\". The village inhabitants, too, were given a good charac-", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1967.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/0c488p70g", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 205412, "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": 174, "title": "RAS-1967", "content_text": "NOTES AND QUERIES \n\n167 \n\nlittle farming, as the island has steep and rocky sides and there are only a few places where agriculture may be carried on. \n\nAs in other little towns of this sort whose existence was founded upon the business opportunities created by the presence of a fishing fleet, the population was mixed, consisting of Punti and Hakka people from a number of districts of the Kwangtung province.23 For the most part, it was recruited from among young men from the country districts bearing introductions to fellow clansmen and relatives already working or settled on Ap Lei Chau, or else following them back to Ap Lei Chau when they came on short visits to their native place. For most of its history, men outnumbered women residents. As late as 1911, the relative numbers of males and females, including children, were 1,041 to 396. In 1897, it had been 783 to 340.24 This was because many wives stayed behind in the village and were never taken to Ap Lei Chau. In this respect, Ap Lei Chau was like any other settlement of overseas Chinese living away from their native place and under alien rule. \n\nFollowing a pattern long established elsewhere, the local people established their own \"district associations\" (鄉會) on the island in the 19th century.25 There were three of these organisations, each under a fong or 'ward' name. Membership of the Fongs was automatically extended to all comers, whether temporary or permanent residents, and irrespective of status. The odd-job coolie and the established merchant were equal members, though having adequate means and more leisure, the latter would, of course, play the more important part in the Fong's affairs: it would, in any case, be expected of him. Only women and children were excluded from membership. \n\nAt a time when the Victorian colonial administration of the Colony saw its main function in the rural areas as keeping the peace, the leaders of the three Fongs, in effect, of the Ap Lei Chau community made themselves generally responsible for local affairs. However, the need to perform special duties was apparently intermittent and spasmodic, and their most regular function was to make adequate arrangements for celebrating the birthdays of the principal gods of the two local temples, Hung Shing, the God of the Southern Sea, and Kuan Yin, the Goddess of Mercy, and the occasion of the Yue Lan Festival (盂蘭節) in the 7th moon. Each Fong took its turn to be entirely responsi-", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1967.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/0c488p70g", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 205458, "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": 220, "title": "RAS-1967", "content_text": "宋官富行官遺址全圖\n\nTHE TRAVELLING PALACE OF SOUTHERN SUNG\n\nIN KOWLOON KUAN FU\n\nWITH\n\nL COMELLAN LIMETESTY\n\n(10)\n\nREFERENCES\n\nPERWER SEA\n\nPREDO SIA\n\nDECLAMER LÁNG\n\nFORMER VILLAGE\n\n$ CALE\n\nKECI\n\nPROPET NA JHOM\n\nPLAY GROUND\n\nLUNC\n\nTO KWA WAN VILLAGE\n\nLANDING MACE\n\nSACRED HILL\n\nSUNG WONG TOI ROCK\n\nXIAO Fur\n\nSHEK\n\nTAM KUNG VEH\n\nMA HILL\n\nKAM FOU VAN GRAVE\n\nTAU EHEME VILLAGE\n\nMA TAU KOM VILLAGE\n\nYI WONG TIEN VILLAGE\n\nYE WONG TIEN HILL\n\nKUAN MOUNTAIN\n\nMA TAU WEL VILLAGE\n\nSHANG-TI ANCIENT DEMONS\n\nWONG TEMPLE\n\nKOWLOON TSAL WALL CHT\n\nPAK HER SHANIYU SIN NGANJ\n\nHAU\n\nTI TARDEN\n\nIN COURTEST AN A NEW KING GOVERNMENT\n\n啟德機懾\n\nPLENARI JAD JA TAR\n\nAIKKA\n\nLOW.ALINAN FLARE FICU\n\nPlate 12. Map to illustrate Mr Jen Yu-wen's article \"The Travelling Palace of Southern Sung in Kowloon\" between pp. 21 & 38\n\n\"Romand Road\" to the immediate right of the number 12 above is taken from a Chinese-English map, and should read \"Lomond Road\"", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1967.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/0c488p70g", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 205530, "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": 72, "title": "RAS-1968", "content_text": "67\n\nFURTHER NOTES ON THE SUNG WONG T'OI\n\nW. SCHOFIELD*\n\nThe very interesting paper by Professor Lo Hsiang-lin on the Sung Wong T'oi and the travelling courts of the Sung Dynasty, in Volume III No. 2 of the Journal of Oriental Studies,† and the partial wrecking of the historic site by the Japanese in the war,‡ have prompted the writer to put on record some notes made during the years 1918 and 1937 on the earthworks, inscriptions and relics found by him on and near the site, which may help to supplement Professor Lo's paper. In what follows the hill is described as it was in 1937, as the writer has not seen it since 1938.\n\nIt is a crescent-shaped hill, convex towards the east, where it rises steeply from the beach to a height of nearly 40 metres. It commands a good view of the south slope of the Kowloon hills and the plain beneath, the east half of the harbour, and of Lyemun channel and the west end of the Fat Tau Mun channel beyond, except for a few hundred metres at its north side by Slope Island (see Plate 5). A watch-tower on its summit would provide an observation post well over 40 metres above sea level. The concave side, on which lies the main path to the top, is terraced for cultivation up to 15 or 20 metres.\n\nThe objects investigated on and near the hill can be classed in three categories, earthworks, inscriptions, and pottery and other objects, and will be dealt with in that order.\n\nThe Earthworks (see sketch plan at Plate 3)\n\nThere are signs that the hill was formerly fortified. On its top from the south end above the 20 metre contour as far as the great inscribed rock on the summit, there is a gentle rise from which the ground falls away steeply to the east, and rather less so to the west and south. At the south end of the ridge traces of a bank at the edge appear to form a rough semicircle, presumably as a flank defence, for a clearly defined earth bank about a metre high by three or four wide at the base runs northward from it nearly straight along the centre of the hill crest to a point near the south-\n\n*See biographical note at the end of this article.\n\n† Published by the Hong Kong University Press, May 1958. [See also Mr. Jen Yu-wen's article \"The Travelling Palace of Southern Sung in Kowloon\" in JHKBRAS, Vol. 7, 1967, pp. 21-38. Ed.]\n\nMr. Schofield writes in the present tense, Unfortunately the hill has now disappeared completely, what was left by the Japanese being removed for the airport extension about 1958. Ed.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1968.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/66833948d", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 205546, "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": 88, "title": "RAS-1968", "content_text": "FAN LAU AND ITS FORT\n\n83\n\noverlooking various approaches in connection with the maritime defence of the Chu Kong estuary.2\n\nIn the past vessels proceeding towards Canton from northerly points used two main routes. The first was an inner route through Fat Tong Mun1 into Kowloon Bay by way of Lei Yu Mun, after which a stop was made near the present day Kowloon City. Vessels then proceeded through what is today's Hongkong harbour towards Kap Shui Mun. Continuing northwestwards, they negotiated the inner Tai Yu Shan passage towards Lung Kwu island, using for their landmark Castle Peak (1, Shing Shan) the same landmark that Sung sailors used centuries ago to pinpoint the then bustling emporium of Tuen Mun, located near its base. From then on, ships continued towards their destination, stopping either at Lin Tin or at Nam Tau with a final clearance at Fu Mun.\n\nA second approach used by vessels was to raise their landfall at Pak Tsim, Yung Hai, or at Tam Kong (see page 87 for these places), and thence to proceed through the Sam Chau Mun picking up the twin-peaked heights of Fung Wong Shan, the highest point in the Tai Yu Shan, as a navigational landmark. On this bearing, ships entered the estuary of the Chu Kong at a point below Fan Lau fort. From Fan Lau they set course for Lung Kwu, before continuing up the estuary to Fu Mun and then to Canton.\n\nThe importance of Fan Lau to the Chinese coastal defence system lies in its location athwart the entrance of the Chu Kong estuary. The headland of Fan Lau too, made an excellent navigational landmark for ships approaching the estuary.\n\nFan Lau fort\n\nThe fort is sited on high ground about 235 feet above sea level. The exterior dimensions are 155 feet by 70 feet. The stone walls vary from 3 to 7 feet in width depending on the extent to which the existing walls have crumbled (plate 7). The height of the walls also varies, being higher at the southern end facing the sea than at the northern end. The area inside the fort covers no more than 7,380 square feet (123 feet by 60 feet). The smallness of this area suggests that the structure was a small outpost fitting the description of “guard-station\" rather than \"fort\", although it appears on a map in the Kwong Tung Tung Chi as the Tai Yu Shan pao tai (*: literally \"Tai Yu Shan gun terrace\").", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1968.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/66833948d", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 205625, "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": 167, "title": "RAS-1968", "content_text": "162\n\n!\n\n:\n\nITINERANT HAKKA WEAVERS\n\nIn the course of general historical enquiries among old village persons in Kowloon and the Southern District of the New Territories, it has been established that in their youth it was a regular practice for itinerant Hakka persons, mostly men it seems, to come yearly to villages in this area some time after the second rice harvest (October-November) to weave locally-grown hemp thread into cloth. The finished product was then dyed and used by local people to make clothes, or sold to others for a like purpose.\n\nFor example, one man born in 1885 in Nga Tsin Wai, one of the old-established Cantonese villages of Kowloon, said:\n\nMost families grew hemp when I was young. It was harvested in the 8th or 9th moons. None grew in the winter as the plants needed water. My mother manipulated it into thread and it could be woven at home or sold to weavers in the Kowloon City shops: sometimes these people came to the village to buy it. We villagers usually relied on strangers to weave our hemp. Every year about the 10th to the 12th moons some Hakka people from Mui Yuen and Hing Ning [districts in North-east Kwangtung] came round the village. They would rent an empty house and stay as long as there was work for them. Then they moved elsewhere. They only wove cloth. It was generally known as tai min po (***) and was very hard-wearing, lasting for several tens of years. The villagers made clothes, quilts, mosquito nets etc., with this cloth, and most clothes were home-made at that time. I went to sea at 18 and the Hakkas came regularly up to then. I didn't come back to settle in the village until I was 45 and by that time they no longer came, no doubt because ready-made clothes were available in the shops.\n\nI came across this kind of information by chance, but was pleased to have it corroborated by what Rev. Rudolf Lechler, the celebrated missionary of the Basel Mission [which specialised in evangelical work among the Hakkas from about 1850 onwards], has to say about this subject in an article \"The Hakka Chinese\" which appeared in The Chinese Recorder in October 1878:\n\n15\n\nIn some parts as e.g. in the prefecture of Kia-yin chow, the women spin cotton, and are also able to weave the yarn into", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1968.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/66833948d", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 205862, "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-1969", "page_number": 168, "title": "RAS-1969", "content_text": "162 \n\nNOTES AND QUERIES \n\nand symbolises pledge of Salvation or Nirvana. (Other Buddhist emblems and symbols often used in a similar way on bowls of this type are the sea-shell, the wheel and, above all, the vajra). Both the potting and decoration of these bowls point to the last years of the 15th century or very early 16th century.\n\nThe discovery of these blue and white bowls removes an apparent anomaly in the Ming archaeology of Hong Kong that is, if it can be said to exist at all. Previously, the only type of Ming pottery found in Hong Kong was a high-fired stoneware with an olive green glaze and a greyish body2, whereas the much more common blue and white porcelain had not been found at all.\n\nThe blue and white bowls provide the clue to the dating of the earthenware jars which are of a type not uncommonly found in the New Territories especially in the areas of Yuen Long and Sek Kong. These jars are generally of globular shape with wide shoulders, thin walls and a porous buff-coloured body with a brown slip coating on the outside. There are usually three or more lug-handles on the shoulder. Similar jars, dating from Sung to Ming, have been found near Canton, especially near Fat Shan where these pots were probably made3. Most of them have been found in cremation burial pits as containers for ashes or grave goods. These jars usually have covers of the same material and the covered jar, when used as ash containers, is often in turn placed inside a bigger covered jar or two large basins (one covering the other). It is thus most likely that the present jars and covers were used for similar purposes.\n\nIt is interesting to note that in recent excavations of a burial site in Pila, Laguna (Southern Luzon) in the Philippines, secondary cremation burials, with stoneware jars and covers, were found in the cultural layer which has been dated by C14 to the late 14th century or early 15th century, i.e. late Yuan or early Ming. Another point to observe is the question of whether the Shek Pik pots were broken deliberately at the time of the burial or by accident at a later date. In the excavations in the Philippines, large stoneware jars containing charcoal and charred fragments of human skeleton were often found smashed. The same phenomenon was also recently found in Thailand. According to the report on the Thai excavations, the practice of smashing pots in", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1969.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/9g553n20d", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 206054, "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-1970", "page_number": 134, "title": "RAS-1970", "content_text": "A BRITISH WARTIME CHART SHOWING HONG KONG\n\n129\n\nAs can be seen from the illustration the chart has a somewhat old-fashioned appearance as it has the radiating lines indicating the 32 directions in the same manner as the Mediaeval Portulan Charts. It would appear that these lines indicate true and not compass bearings as one East to West line meets the point indicating 21° 54' N. on both sides of the chart, also a North line to the south of Hong Kong (not shown on the illustration) has a fleur-de-lis emblem on it; this is the usual symbol to indicate true north.\n\nThe scale of the chart is not given, but the sides are graduated at one minute intervals of latitude. These can be taken as Sea Miles in use at that time. The precise length of one degree of latitude was in dispute during the eighteenth century, and lacking other information it is probably safest to assume that the value obtained by Picard in 1669 would have been used. This assumption would give a scale of 1:333,475, with 10 Sea Miles equivalent to 56 mm., 10 kilometres equivalent to 30 mm, and 10 Statute Miles equivalent to 1.9 inches. It should be noted, however, that the Kilometre did not come into use until 1799 and that the Statute Mile was established by an Act of Parliament in 1824.3\n\nThe latitudes of the southern point of Macao on the chart is 22° 12′ N., being 14 minutes too far north. The latitude of Canton, at the position of modern Shameen, is 23° 9′ N., being 3 minutes too far north, while Kowloon City at 22° 21' N. is 1 minute too far north. These latitudes are very accurate for the period, but not surprisingly so, considering the fact that the Portuguese had been in the area for more than 250 years, and that as the positions are within the tropics their latitudes could be deduced from the date of the sun at Zenith with the help of the Solar Declination Tables. The small error for Kowloon City is fortuitous, due to surveying errors.4\n\nRegarding the content of the map it is clear from the title that we are faced with a composite map with at least two and possibly three distinct sources. These are 1. A Portuguese Chart 2. A Chinese Chart 3. Possibly original surveys by Hayter or others. The Portuguese influence can be seen in the names \"Furado\" and \"Porado”. The contents of the \"Chinese Chart of the Macao Pilots\" is not known, but if the maps in the local gazetteer of the Hsin-an Hsien are any indication they are not likely to have been based on accurate surveys.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1970.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/ww72j0241", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 206083, "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-1970", "page_number": 163, "title": "RAS-1970", "content_text": "158 \n\nS. F. BALFOUR \n\nwant to avoid the mandatory officer of the Emperor, to betake their horrid presence to the South within three days. If they do not do so in three days, I shall wait five days. If they do not do so in five days I shall wait a week. If they do not do so in a week it will mean that they definitely refuse to go, and therefore that they do not recognise the prefect nor obey his words. In other words, they are so stupid and bestial that although their prefect speaks to them they neither listen nor understand. Now those who disregard the words of the mandatory officer of the Son of Heaven and who refuse to go away, and those who are too stupid to listen and harm the people deserve to be put to death. Therefore I, the prefect, shall select good archers among the soldiers and people who will use their bows and poisoned arrows to shoot the crocodiles until they are all dead. And let them not complain then, for it will be too late.” \n\nA year after, Han Yü was pardoned and allowed to return to North China. His passage in these parts was remembered by the first educated Chinese immigrants and Mount T'un Mun was provided with an inscription (§4§—)13 signed with his name which still stands on a rock at the summit in commemoration of his visit. \n\nDuring the period between the T'ang and Sung dynasties our region was governed from Canton by local kings who styled themselves emperors of the Southern Han dynasty. During this period one or two facts about this region are recorded. One is that in 969 Mount T'un Mun was named as a sacred mountain. The ceremony may have been conducted by the Emperor himself performing the sacrifice. From then onwards Mount T'un Mun was called Shing Shan or \"sacred hill.\" Its modern name of Ts'ing Shan or Green Hill dates from much later. Its Buddhist name is Pu Tu Shan. \n\nFrom another source we learn for the first time that pearl fishing was carried on in this region during the Southern Han dynasty. The text is a petition from a local Chinese of the Yüan dynasty to the Government saying that pearl fishing and the enslavement of the fishers was reviving in the Taipo Sea where it had not been practised since the Southern Han dynasty, and that a repetition of \n\n13 It was written by the ancestor of the Tang clan. See the next section.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1970.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/ww72j0241", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 206084, "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-1970", "page_number": 164, "title": "RAS-1970", "content_text": "HONG KONG BEFORE THE BRITISH \n\n159 \n\nthe conditions which reigned during that time were most undesirable. The text reads as follows;\n\nMemorandum presented to the High Commissioner on the harmful practice of pearl fishing:- \n\n\"Wei Ying having seen that officials are being appointed to conduct the harmful practice of pearl fishing humbly presents his views on the subject for consideration.\n\n\"In Kwangtung province, Tung Kun District, there is a place called Mei Chu Ch'i which is not recorded in any text except by the Cabinet Secretary Ch'an Chün in the Annals of the Sung dynasty, who stated that in the 5th year 5th moon of T'ai Tsu of Sung (A.D. 965) the military post at Mei Chuan was abolished. A footnote states that Liu Chang (Emperor of the Southern Han dynasty) recruited 3,000 persons from the coastal region to gather pearls under the military post named Mei Chuan and that every year a great number were drowned. On account of this it was abolished.\n\n\"I note that when the false Emperor of the Southern Han dynasty, Liu Chen, usurped Kwangchow, the Sung Emperor in the 2nd moon of the 4th year of Hai Pao sent a general called Pan Mei and recaptured Kwangchow forcing Liu Chen to surrender, he then abolished the military post of Mei Chuan in the 5th moon of the 5th year. It was not that the Sung Emperor did not prize pearls but simply because of the harm to the country and people which made it imperative to stop the practice of fishing for them. If only expert divers could gather the pearls, why then was it necessary to organise a military post of 3,000? Because martial law was used to drive them to their death. Pearls are produced from oysters several fathoms beneath the sea and wherever there are oysters many water creatures and dangerous fish protect them. The method of gathering them is to tie stones onto a man and lower him into the sea so that he will sink quickly. Sometimes he gets pearls and sometimes not. When he suffocates he pulls the rope and a man in the boat hauls him up. If this is done a fraction too late the man dies. If he happens to meet dangerous sea creatures he cannot avoid their attacks. Besides out of one hundred oysters opened there are hardly one or two pearls", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1970.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/ww72j0241", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 206085, "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-1970", "page_number": 165, "title": "RAS-1970", "content_text": "S. F. BALFOUR\n\nto be found. In the pearl sea the local Tan and Man14 live near the oyster beds but they are more wretched and starved than the poorest people and are not allowed to get pearls for themselves.\n\nIt is not possible to locate the parts of the Taipo Sea where this fishing was done. No doubt the appellation Taipo Sea was used, just as T'un Mun, to denote a large indefinite area possibly including most of Mirs Bay. There are, nowadays, oysters on the Canton estuary side only, and these do not give pearls. This text, which can be found in the Topography, gives a picture of the conditions existing when the population of our region was composed mainly of soldiers and aborigines.\n\nNo doubt cultivation was practised in the neighbourhood of these garrisons by the soldiers themselves or by a few families of Chinese peasants, but rice cultivation on a large scale, such as exists now on all the plains, cannot have existed a thousand years ago. Much of the country must have been jungle. The presence of elephants is shewn by an inscription dated A.D. 962 at a Buddhist temple not far from the present frontier. The inscription describes the erection of a pagoda on a site where elephant bones were collected and buried in order to pacify herds of elephants which were doing great damage in the neighbourhood. A description15 of the event runs as follows:\n\nIn Ts'ư Fu Shih, a Buddhist temple in Tung Kun district, a stone pagoda was built in the 5th year of the reign of Ta Pao of the Southern Han dynasty with the intention of pacifying the elephants which at that time were doing much damage to the crops. Elephant bones were collected in a heap, and the pagoda raised over them so as to keep the elephants in control.\n\nWe have already seen that crocodiles were common in South China during the T'ang dynasty, but the presence of elephants as late as the tenth century is a remarkable testimony of the change that the region underwent during less than a thousand years. It seems likely that the nature of the region changed after a process of deforestation.\n\n14 i.e. Tanka and Hoklo.\n\n15 BRÂES, Volume I, page 12.\n\nPage 165\n\nPage 166", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1970.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/ww72j0241", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 206090, "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-1970", "page_number": 170, "title": "RAS-1970", "content_text": "HONG KONG BEFORE THE BRITISH\n\n165\n\nsaved by their uncle, a man called Yang Liang-chieh, and made their way with their mother to Foochow which they reached at the beginning of 1276. Their position was by no means hopeless. Most of Southern China was still loyal to them and they had hopes of reaching Canton before the Mongol armies and forming a line of resistance along the whole coast. With them was a famous statesman and writer Wen T'ien-chiang whose influence was very great. They had a considerable army; according to some accounts, it consisted of 170,000 regulars and was increased by 300,000 volunteers, and their court and retinue included a chief minister, Ch'en I-chung, and the general Chang Shih-chieh who recognized the eldest son as Emperor and were prepared to fight for him.\n\nAt Foochow they left behind a force under Wen T'ien-chiang and went first by sea to Chuan Chow, the port which had been a centre of foreign trade during the Sung dynasty. But here they found the local authorities hostile to them and carried on to Chao Chow. There a Mongol force appeared and tried to cut them off but they escaped in their boats and reached K'ap Tze Mun where they landed and marched inland with the idea of getting to Canton, but again they found the local authorities lukewarm and not to be trusted. They took ship and reached a place called Mui Wai in Kwangtung province.\n\nMui Wai or Lam Wai, as it is sometimes called, was undoubtedly in our region. The Topography says that the ruins of the travelling court were still to be seen there. But it has been impossible to identify it. On a map contained in the Topography it is set in the sea just opposite the Kowloon peninsula and from descriptions in texts it appears to be very near Kowloon.* It was densely wooded at that time. From what evidence there is one might suppose it was a part of Hong Kong island, or else one of the peaks to the north of Fat Tong Mun which was mistaken for an island or possibly in the neighbourhood of Mui Wo on Lantau, since the two names are euphonious. Wherever it was, the Emperors and their court appear to have settled there for one or two months, crossing several times by boat to a place on the mainland where they settled in the fourth moon of the year 1277.\n\n18 梅蔚 or 监蔚\n\n* See plate 19.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1970.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/ww72j0241", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 206332, "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-1971", "page_number": 149, "title": "RAS-1971", "content_text": "SUNG-TYPE POTTERY FINDS IN HONG KONG\n\n143\n\nwares in the shape of Chekiang celadons but with a soft red body, black glazed stonewares and white soft wares (probably from Fukien) and various ying-ching and greenish glazed porcellaneous wares. A large number of Southern Han (905-971 A.D.) and Sung coins were found with the pottery.\n\nThe Nim Shu Wan site extends over a beach and the slopes of the low hills behind the beach rising to a height of 60 metres. The site was considered by geomancers to be extremely lucky, being flanked at both ends by promontories; the one at the south end, being long and narrow, representing the \"green dragon\", and that at the north-east end, being wider and broader representing the \"white tiger\". A more basic factor favouring settlement was that both the beach and bay were well sheltered from the prevailing easterly winds. However, the long southern promontory which used to extend to a distance of about 200 metres into the sea has over the years been partially washed away by wave action leaving a few stacks to mark its former extent. By local tradition, this was one of the market places, hsü, for the villages along the coast of the mainland extending from Castle Peak to Tsuen Wan as well as for those on the islands of Peng Chau, Hong Kong, Cheung Chau and Lantau itself. Its location and geographical features made it an ideal market place for people who relied mainly on boats for transport. However, as the southern promontory began to disappear leaving the bay more exposed to the winds, the \"luck\" also left the place and by the beginning of this century only a few families lived there. In the last twenty years, as a result of population pressure, people from Peng Chau have begun to move into this area again, using the stones and bricks of the many ruins of old houses for building new ones and for retaining the terraced fields for cultivation.\n\nThe finds on this site include glazed earthenware funerary urns of a type that was prevalent in the Pearl delta during late T'ang and early Sung times (Plate 1). Apart from these, a large number of stoneware and porcelain sherds have been picked up on the beach from time to time. The fact that the quantity of sherds to be found on the beach remains fairly constant and that the breaks of the fragments are usually fresh and clean would indicate that the pottery has been washed down from higher ground and the pieces were broken on their way down the slope. There seems to be much greater variation in the colour and", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1971.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/z029vt43g", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 206899, "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": 176, "title": "RAS-1973", "content_text": "170\n\nBOOK REVIEWS\n\nto have visited twenty Asian countries; and while critics of later generations found some of his facts mixed with folk-lore and fable, his descriptions of community existence, family relationships, flora and fauna provided—and still provide exciting reading based on observations which the editor regards as both acute and just.\n\nThese expeditions (in part commercial in part diplomatic) comprising fleets of the largest vessels then afloat, are chiefly significant, however, as unprecedented feats of naval organisation and navigation. In this, 'the Elizabethan age' of Chinese expansion, the Chinese excelled as fighters, traders, diplomats and navigators. Appendix 3 provides informative notes on Chinese ships and seamanship. The European of the time might have had more accurate charts, and such instruments as the quadrant, but the Chinese had long used the lead-and-line, the cross-staff and the compass, and they even made rough calculations of longitude ‘by noting the number of watches which elapsed during the run at a speed estimated from the time taken by the ship to pass a floating object'. But Cheng Ho's last voyage (1431-3) marked the end of the heroic age of maritime expansion. The Ming court lost interest in sea power and its imperial implications, and with this curious and sudden withdrawal from the dawning international order, the doors closed on a unique period of Chinese history.\n\nMr. Mills has not been daunted by the complicated question of texts, and he compares and evaluates the various versions. His own translation is based on the definitive text established by the distinguished Chinese scholar Feng Ch'eng-chun, first published in Shanghai in 1935. Appendices contain a gazetteer of southern Asian place-names known to the Chinese in 1433, as well as an expert and fascinating commentary on 'the Mao K'un Map' which indicates the presumed courses of Cheng Ho's various itineraries. Here, an attempt has been made to identify all the names and legends, five hundred and seventy-seven in number.\n\nFormerly Puisne Judge of the Straits Settlements, the editor belongs to that select band of British administrators and proconsuls who were not simply colonial servants, but who in addition might be explorers or archaeologists or scholars of distinction. Only a scholar of great learning and infinite patience could have made this outstanding contribution to history.\n\nJanuary, 1974.\n\nGERALD S. GRAHAM", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1973.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/8910rj06r", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 207078, "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-1974", "page_number": 149, "title": "RAS-1974", "content_text": "HONG KONG PLACE NAMES\n\nO.S. S.S. Meaning or Remarks\n\n143 15 kau 九 gao4 Occurs very often in place-names when the meaning cannot be 'nine', and even where (e.g. 'Kowloon') there is a legend to explain the use of 'nine', other circumstances lead us to suspect aetiological myth.\n\n16 kei 基 ghey The Man147 glossary gives this word as meaning in the language of the southern tribes, 'behind, lesser, second'; which fits the context wherever it occurs in local place-names.\n\n17 kei-wai 基圍 gheywray A bund between paddy fields. An earth dyke.\n\n18 kek 塈 kreak A large earth dyke used to reclaim salt-marsh from the sea.\n\n19 keng 逕 geang Ruins, especially the foundation left after a building has been removed. (The word seems to have originated in Hakka137 pronounced khak—and to have been adopted by local Punti160 speakers). See (3).\n\n 逕座 geang 烴 A pass with a path over it; also the path leading to the pass. See au (2).\n\nOn maps often found mis-spelt kang (which is the Namtau156 dialect pronunciation). The book pronunciation geng is...", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1974.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/x633mp077", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 207379, "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-1975", "page_number": 147, "title": "RAS-1975", "content_text": "THE PACIFIC OYSTER INDUSTRY IN HONG KONG (的蠔業)\n\nBRIAN MORTON* AND P. S. WONG†\n\nOyster farming is an ancient industry. The Japanese and Romans are the earliest known oyster farmers, and with time the practice has spread to other parts of the globe. Thus different species of oysters are cultivated in Europe (Ostrea edulis and Crassostrea angulata), North America (Ostrea lurida and Crassostrea virginica), Australia (Crassostrea commercialis), and in Japan and China (Crassostrea gigas—the Pacific oyster). The diverse sites of culture have led to different methods of farming and the utilisation of a range of implements. With research and development, however, the Japanese method of hanging strings of oysters from rafts in the surface waters of the sea is slowly becoming universally accepted as one of the more successful techniques—but traditions die hard.\n\nOysters (*) have been cultivated in Hong Kong for some considerable time; Bromhall (1958) estimates 700 years though Mok (1973), more conservatively, estimates 170 years. The method of culture is unusual, involving implements of unique design, not hitherto described. The identity of the local oyster remains a mystery though Bromhall introduced the Pacific oyster Crassostrea gigas (Thunberg 1793) (✯✯) into Hong Kong in 1950. It would seem probable, however, that this is also the endemic species, since Hong Kong is within the natural geographic range of C. gigas (Tschang et al, 1962) and specimens have been recovered from archaeological digs on Lamma Island and, more recently, from the mud excavated from the High Island reservoir site.\n\nOysters only grow in estuaries and the Hong Kong oyster industry is centred around Deep Bay (*) which is situated on the northwestern corner of Hong Kong, forming the boundary between China and Hong Kong (Fig. 1). The bay covers an area of approximately 112 km2 bordered to the landward by a characteristic fringe of dwarf mangroves. Deep Bay opens to the southwest directly into the mouth of the Pearl River (#) which is the major river draining the hinterland of southern China. Numerous rivers and streams\n\n* Department of Zoology, The University of Hong Kong.\n\n† Department of Zoology, The University of Auckland, New Zealand.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1975.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/j0995146d", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 208000, "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": 39, "title": "RAS-1977", "content_text": "BRUNEI: A HISTORICAL RELIC\n\n23\n\nSpaniards. She worried about the presence of France in Indochina on the opposite side of the South China Sea at mid-century; and later on she suspected imperial Germany of coveting northern Borneo and the Philippines.\n\nThe British sphere was initiated by the private efforts of an English adventurer, James Brooke, a former officer in the Bengal Army. In 1840, he helped bring an end to an insurrection in the Sarawak River, in the southern-most area under the nominal rule of the Sultan of Brunei, and was rewarded by being granted the province. In 1845 Brooke was appointed diplomatic agent to Brunei and supervised the transfer of the island of Labuan to Britain as a colony and a naval station. He also, in 1847, negotiated a consular treaty with the Sultan which effectively gave to Britain control over Brunei's foreign relations. The colony of Labuan languished but the quasi-protectorate over Brunei served as the de facto and legal base for Britain's sphere of influence in Borneo. Such a sphere was proclaimed in 1868 as a warning to all European nations to keep out.\n\nThe real carving-up of the carcass of Brunei began in earnest in 1878 with the founding of another private venture, that of a syndicate of City of London businessmen which later became the British North Borneo (Chartered) Company. The syndicate was under the control of Dent Brothers Company. Alfred and Edward Dent were sons of the owner of the former Hong Kong firm of Dent and Company. Raja Brooke had annexed, by treaty with the Sultan, additional chunks of territory before 1878. In 1853 he purchased northward to and including the large district of the Rajang River. And in 1861 he purchased the five so-called “sago rivers” as far north as Kidurong Point. When that point was reached, the Governor of Labuan objected to any further northward encroachment of Sarawak and Labuan's wishes were supported by Britain.\n\nWhen, however, the British North Borneo Company purchased the large area of Sabah, the whole of the island of Borneo to the northward of Brunei Town, with strong support from the Foreign Office, both Raja Brooke and the Colonial Office protested. It is interesting to note that the permanent undersecretary at the Foreign Office who midwifed the company charter through officialdom in Whitehall was Julian Pauncefote, who was a former attorney-general.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1977.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/np198x23n", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 208132, "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": 171, "title": "RAS-1977", "content_text": "MEMORIES OF THE DISTRICT OFFICE SOUTH \n\n155 \n\ncrews, who had no permit for that beach, were driven off without their sand. One of my duties was to discover and report beaches that could be dug without injury to cultivated land. Some of these have since then been completely worked out, notably on Sha Chau, as I found in 1938 during archaeological researches. Eventually the P.W.D.* started a scheme for dredging and working sand from the sea bottom off Tai Lam Chung about 1929, which enabled the builders to get what they wanted. The beaches at Tai Long in Lantau and Tai Wan in Lamma were specially reserved for the waterworks filter beds because of the cleanness and high quality of the sand there. \n\nOne of the interesting communities on Lantau was the group of Buddhist temples and chai tong or fasting halls on the well-known high plateau between Tung Chung and Tai O figuring as 'Ngong Ping' on the maps. It lay at about 800 ft. above sea level and its members maintained a good pathway from Tai O across a stream and up the hill to their settlement and ran their buildings, somewhat in the manner of vegetarian youth hostels. They occasionally harboured strange characters, as might be expected in unsettled and revolutionary times. One such, I believe, was a big-scale opium smuggler and den-keeper who had operated in London, and was nicknamed ‘Brilliant Cheung'; I think he got banished from the Colony. The track from Tai O to Tung Chung was a favourite walk for many people: I unfortunately never did it. \n\nAs I notice that Hong Kong seems to have become more and more a tourist attraction of late years, I may perhaps conclude these reminiscences with a few notes on the sites of historical or archaeological interest which can be found in the Southern District, and which may be thought worth preserving. Our chief site, Sung Wong Toi, was I know wrecked by the Japanese as an anti-Kuomintang measure, though the inscription has been preserved. Kowloon City was full of interesting things when I visited it, such as old yamens, drill grounds for Chinese troops, ancient cannon with inscriptions, and above all the old walls and gates; I once sat in the gate to conduct an enquiry, after the manner of King David, with the people assembled round. Close by was a walled and moated village, shown on maps but hard to find, named Nga Tsin Wai, which I hope will not be ‘improved' out of existence by planners! On the low hill west of Kowloon City a loopholed wall and gateway with a ruined guard-house barred the path crossing a gap \n\n* Public Works Department.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1977.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/np198x23n", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 208133, "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": 172, "title": "RAS-1977", "content_text": "156 \n\nW. SCHOFIELD \n\non the ridge.* Further afield, on the Hang Hau peninsula, is the paved road referred to above, which runs as far as Ha Yeung: and on Nam Tong, commanding the strait, is the robbers' stronghold with its gun platform. Porcelain near its gate looked fairly modern, from what I remember. Remains of a similar kind can be found on the other islands of the Southern District. Just above the village of Shek Sun at the west end of Lantau stands a Dutch fort built about 1610, rectangular in plan. A few cannon balls and other relics have been found in it, but it is very overgrown and needs clearing if any research is to be done there, or sightseers enabled to visit it. The old fort and cannon protecting the small yamen were repaired when E. W. Hamilton was D.O., I think between 1927 and 1929: I remember that one room in the yamen was inscribed shu shat (library). Another relic of old coast defences, close to Tai O, is the old Chinese guard station already referred to, outside Po Chu Tam creek, and quite ruined. On the south coast, near Shek Pik, a very ancient rock carving on a cliff was found quite recently. In the outlying islands are three interesting structures: one is on the North Soko island, where in a small valley on its south coast are two converging lines of megaliths. The other two are on Sha Chau, one a stone burial chamber on the south isthmus in the form of a 'kistvaen,' the other a ruined guard station on the flat area northwards of the chamber, with an earthwork protecting the landing place to eastward.\n\nNo doubt there are many other places of interest, especially temples and their contents: one of the finest is the Pak Tai temple in Cheung Chau, with its coloured relief showing the local ferry boat nearing the pier in Hong Kong harbour. Lastly, there is one place of much interest with which I had to deal in 1917 or 1918. The Tang grave at Hau Tei, beside Tsun Wan, made in the Sung dynasty, was naturally affected by the new Castle Peak motor road and a projected reclamation of the shallow sea area beyond it. The Tang elders come to the Secretariat for Chinese Affairs, where I was 2nd A.S.C.A.,† and partly I think on my suggestion the hill of the grave was made into a public park, so as to preserve its surroundings and outlook. The grateful elders presented me with a 'fung shui' map of the grave site for my efforts on their behalf; and the good influence of their virtuous ancestor continues to augment the prosperity of their descendants, and of Hong Kong generally, if there is anything in 'fung shui'!\n\n* See Mr. Schofield's note in JHKBRAS 9 (1969): 154-156.\n\n† Assistant Secretary for Chinese Affairs.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1977.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/np198x23n", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 208145, "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": 184, "title": "RAS-1977", "content_text": "168\n\nNOTES AND QUERIES\n\nROYAL ASIATIC SOCIETY VISIT TO TAI MO SHAN,\n\n3RD APRIL 1976\n\nHISTORICAL AND GENERAL NOTE\n\n1. Tai Mo Shan is 3,140 feet (957 metres) in height, the highest mountain in Hong Kong territory.\n\n2. It is a curiously unimpressive mountain at close quarters. Viewed from Tsuen Wan, the former small market town at its foot on the southern side, the visitor could be forgiven for not noticing the mountain at all. It is, from there, only part of a large hilly area that arises quickly from sea level and extends in all directions, with occasional higher points of which the Tai Mo Shan summit is only one, in no way outstanding or separating itself from its neighbours.\n\n3. From a distance, however, the true splendour of its peak and general mass is revealed. A visitor looking north from Magazine Gap or Wong Nei Chong Gap on Hong Kong Island, some 10-12 miles distant, cannot fail to notice, to the north, the bulk and height of the mountain, overtopping all around. The Lion Rock range of hills behind Kowloon Peninsula, closer to the viewer and usually so impressive from low ground, then appears in its true and diminished scale.\n\n4. Mountains figure prominently in Chinese historical geography. There is, in every district, prefectural, provincial or general gazetteer, a section devoted to Shan-chuen - 'Hills and Streams'. As befits its size, Tai Mo Shan always receives a notice in the local works. The earliest mention I can find so far is in the 1688 edition of the Sun On District Gazetteer. This is repeated with much the same text in the 1819 and last edition, and in the 1822 and 1879 editions of the provincial and prefectural gazetteers respectively. The 1688 notice may be translated as follows:\n\nTai Mo Shan is 50 Chinese miles east of the District City. It has the shape of a big hat. It extends south and west from Ng Tung Mountain. Its peak measures 2,000 Chinese feet. It is a big mountain in the Fifth Division, with a stone pagoda and many tea plantations.\n\n5. So far as I know, there never has been a separate gazetteer of Tai Mo Shan such as has been provided for the more famous mountains of the Province; e.g. the White Cloud Mountains near Canton or", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1977.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/np198x23n", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 208210, "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": 249, "title": "RAS-1977", "content_text": "NOTES AND QUERIES\n\nNatrix aequifasciata Barbour\n\n233\n\nThe first specimen of this species known from Hong Kong was sent to me by the Police on 8 May 1978 for identification. It is a juvenile, having bitten the boy who caught it in a stream near Shing Mun Reservoir in the New Territories on 7 May 1978.\n\nA second specimen, also immature, was kindly given to me by Dr. Frank F. Reitinger. He had found it inside a tunnel in a catchment channel near Shek Kong Village in the New Territories while collecting at night on 17 June 1978.\n\nAccording to Pope (1935, p.95), Natrix aequifasciata is an inhabitant of mountain brooks and is known from various localities in Kwangsi, Kwangtung, Hainan, and Fukien in China. In a recent publication (Anon., 1977), it is listed also for Yunnan, Kweichow, Kiangsi, and Chekiang provinces in China.\n\nOpisthotropis balteatus (Cope)\n\nOn 25 May 1977 I received a live immature female of this snake from Mr. R. J. Clibborn-Dyer, who had found it early that day on the Ting Kok Road close to Shuen Wan in the New Territories. The place where this specimen was found was beside an abandoned waterlogged paddy-field, through which a stream flowed into the sea.\n\nOpisthotropis balteatus is known to occur in Southern China (including Hainan), Vietnam, and Cambodia. It frequents mountain streams, and Pope (1935, p.168) concludes it to be an inhabitant of low to moderate altitudes.\n\nOpisthotropis kuatunensis Pope\n\nTwo immature specimens of this little-known snake were given to me by Mr. Jerry K. S. Lee, who collected them in the central area of the New Territories mainland. The first was found at about midnight on 16/17 November 1974 in a catchment channel near Shek Kong Village. The second he found on the night of 13/14 July 1978 in a stream at an altitude estimated to be about 823 metres on Tai Mo Shan.\n\nThe type and fifteen paratypes of this species were collected by Pope in Chungan Hsien in north-western Fukien, China. In describing the habits of Opisthotropis kuatunensis, Pope (1935, p.170) remarks that: ‘... it inhabits the highest forest cascades of the", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1977.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/np198x23n", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 208334, "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": 58, "title": "RAS-1978", "content_text": "42\n\nKEITH STEVENS\n\nIn addition there were scraps of cotton, threads, one or two grains of rice, a tiny sac of cotton cloth stuffed with more cotton and several beads and slivers of mica. There were also two dried sea-horses* in the image dedicated in 1871 though there were no signs of any other remains. The strips of paper are not all that usual and are rarely found in Southern Chinese images. Precis translations of the six strips of paper are included later in this note.\n\nThe papers show that five of the seven images were dedicated and placed on altars in the County of Wu Kang (A) in South East Hunan, one hundred miles due north of Kweilin and three hundred and seventy-five miles NNW of Hong Kong, near the Hunanese boundaries with its neighbouring provinces of Kwangsi and Kweichow. The west and south-west of Hunan were not easily accessible until the 1930's due to the dangerous rapids in the upper reaches of the plentiful rivers. Then a system of highways opened up the area. Prior to that, apart from the occasional traveller, traders and, of course, the petty officials sent to such \"punishment\" posts, all that was known of the area came from tales passed on from mouth to mouth. Wu Kang is in rising country, on the edge of an area marked on old maps as the lands of the Thai minority peoples, the Ko Lao (z) and another larger minority people, the Miao (δ). The other two images come from Chi An prefecture () in Kiangsi province, some two hundred and eighty miles due east of Wu Kang. Chi An, an old walled city and a major centre on the north-flowing Kan Chiang, had closer cultural links with central rather than south China.\n\nThe first image (Plate 2), from Wu Kang and dedicated in 1756, is a household deity to protect the home and family and to bring blessings. The slip of paper relates that Worshipper Fu Shih-hsiang, together with his three sons and others from his family, all of Hsin Wu Chang Village, Yen Shan, Lung Chu district of Wu Kang county in Pao Ching prefecture (now Shao Yang), Hunan, on the 4th day of the 7th moon of the 20th year of Ch'ien Lung (1756), offered sacrifices to the gods at the City God temple in Shih Pei.† He also reported to them in writing that he and his whole family\n\n* Seahorses, found as far inland, would have a rarity value, though they are commonly used by Chinese herbalists & pharmacists.\n\n† Chinese characters are to be found on the illustrations of the slips of paper.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1978.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/8g84t8593", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 209867, "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": 126, "title": "RAS-1983", "content_text": "104\n\nBefore moving on to discuss the larger islands to the south-east of Lantau, it is worth just mentioning the small islands off Lantau. There are small islands both to the north and the south of the main island.\n\nThe Islands north of Lantau are six in number.\n\nEast Brother, Reef Island and West Brother; fishermen sometimes live there.\n\nChek Lap Kok (\"Red Sea-perch Point\") is a barren island of low granite hills which lies in front of Tung Chung, sheltering its harbour. Big reefs of quartz run through it. Two formerly prosperous quarries on this island were ruined by the 1925 strike. Now there is only farming and fishing. Kwo Lo Wan is a ruined village on the southern isthmus: it is a common placename.\n\nShau Chau (\"Guard-station Isle\") 18; has three dumb-bell isthmuses, two covered at high water, and a third, on which there is a settlement of early man. There is a deserted temple here.\n\nTongkwu (“Brass Drum\") 19 has the chief early settlement of men in this area. The objects found show very little Chinese influence. Later settlements in Sung and Ming times were at the northern end of the beach. The island is used now for fishing and pasturing cattle, and there is a lighthouse. It is a very good example of a dumb-bell island - a sandy isthmus connecting two hills.\n\nUrmston Roads, as the waters between Tongkwu and the mainland are known, was a frequent anchorage for foreign fleets in the 1839 and 1857 wars, despite a strong tidal flow. It was used by a French squadron in 1857, and one ship left a record of her presence by inscribing a stone at Castle Peak with \"Nemesis 1857\".\n\nWe now pass south of Lantau. All this coast suffers from lack of harbours: only bays facing south-west are any good. There is always some swell; and it can be very violent sometimes.\n\nTaking the small islands to the south of Lantau, we have firstly the Soko Islands. There are eight islands in this group", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1983.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/j9607p61v", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 209870, "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": 129, "title": "RAS-1983", "content_text": "107\n\nfamous for the 8½ tons of Persian opium found there about 1921, guarded by an armed sampan and hidden in a cave. Kau Yi Chau (“Armchair Island\") is larger and higher. The sea all round is polluted with Hong Kong refuse tipped from sanitary barges.\n\nFurther on to the east is Lamma: also rendered \"Nam A” (\"Southern Forked Island”). This is an island of remarkable shape. Its best harbour is in the north-west, Yung Shu Wan (\"Banyan Tree Bay\"): all the others have defects: Luk Chau Wan (\"Deer Island Bay\"), Sokkwu Wan (\"Dragnet Bay\") or Picnic Bay, and Tung O (“East Haven”) are all too exposed in winter, Tai Wan (\"Big Bay\") and the other landing places on the west coast are surf-beaten in summer, and Tung O is more liberally supplied with reefs than any other bay in the islands except Ma Wan. Sham Wan (\"Deep Bay\"), a beautiful, deep, drowned valley, gets the swell nearly all the year round; besides, there is hardly any cultivated land by it. Hence Yung Shu Wan, with well-watered plains, villages, and low hills behind it, is the island's only commercial harbour: it has a sampan ferry to Aberdeen, the island's real commercial centre.\n\nLamma specialises in orchards, chiefly of papaya; water buffaloes, tigers and other evil beasts are unknown there, and the island seems prosperous, though animal diseases and shortage of water often cause losses. An interesting point is that some of the land here was used as endowments for what we would call \"fellowships\" for scholars in Namtau under the old order of things.\n\nSince 1932 Lamma has attained much fame as the leading site of the prehistoric culture of the South China coast, as the result of my finding large quantities of ancient pottery in good condition, and the later researches of Father Finn, who published his results in detail in the \"Hong Kong Naturalist\".25 The earliest glazed pottery in China comes from here. Another site nearby has rougher, more primitive objects than the bronzes and ornaments of Tai Wan; and a hill near Yung Shu Wan forms a third site closely related to the other two. At least four other sites have been found on the island, besides stone axes on the hills. The modern population probably does not exceed 1,000,", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1983.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/j9607p61v", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 209872, "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": 131, "title": "RAS-1983", "content_text": "109\n\nNam Tong Island (“Southern Hall Island\"). This island is large and mountainous. Military defence work is currently going on there. It was formerly cultivated, but in 1929 the cultivated area was abandoned. There is an Aga light on the southern point. The channel to the north of this island is \"Buddha's Head Pass\". The harbour within this channel is well sheltered: there is a big temple on the mainland to the north of the channel. The chief place of interest on this island is the old fort near the north point, with a south wall thickened, apparently for mounting cannon. This fort is probably Chinese, perhaps built by pirates.\n\nHere we leave the islands of the South District, and enter the North District as we pass into Port Shelter. The interest of this place lies in its extraordinary geography and geology, and its wonderful beauty. The surf which beats on the high pillared cliffs of High Island, Bluff Island, and Basalt Island dies away as your launch passes into the long calm channels, and under the hills of the mainland there is perfect shelter, though I do not think the anchorages are good. Grassy hills come down to the waters' edge, and near Saikung the sea is studded with diminutive islets.\n\nThe soil of these islands appears extremely barren, as the population of the islands is very small. Fishing seems the chief occupation. Settlements are few. Yim Tin is named after some abandoned salt fields a little to the south of the (Roman Catholic) mission church: Kau Sai (\"West of the Channel\") explains itself. There is also a group of settlements in the southern part of High Island. These have the remarkable names of \"North Fork\", \"Tribute Rice Junks Bay\", and \"White Insect Wax\",32 This group and Yim Tin are the only places in these islands where cultivation is of any extent. \"North Fork\" is a most remarkable place. Someone has lavished money on it, the houses and the ancestral temple are well built, a high platform held up by a big masonry retaining wall stands in front of them, and a small stream by the village is crossed by a fine three-span bridge all of stone: it is the sort of stream for which the rest of the Territory think six stepping stones are ample. I have no idea how these names originated, except that the bay may have been an anchorage for junks carrying the tribute rice north from Canton to Peking.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1983.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/j9607p61v", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 209879, "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": 138, "title": "RAS-1983", "content_text": "116\n\nIn selecting these organizations for study, I must emphasize that they are representative of many more from Hong Kong Island and Kowloon. These simply happen to have come to my attention in the course of official duties and aroused my interest over the years. Taken as a group, whether situated in street, sub-district or suburban village, and despite being under foreign rule, they demonstrate the same capacity for social organization and self-management as in the much older communities on the mainland New Territories, then still under Chinese rule. They provide further evidence to show that communities of shopkeepers and villagers, of diverse origins and without benefit of kinship ties and long settlement, could manage their own affairs without any necessity for gentry or merchant elite leadership. In short, the instances from Hong Kong Island carry this conclusion one step beyond that reached for areas like Tai O and Cheung Chau, and the individual and linked villages of the Southern district of the New Territories, because, if gentry were lacking in those areas, there was altogether no possibility of their presence in early British Hong Kong, concerning which frequent estimates of the low quality of the population can be found.7\n\nAp Lei Chau and the Hung Shing Festival\n\nAp Lei Chau, the island on the south shore of Aberdeen Harbour, had apparently no more than \"two or three families of Hakka grass-cutters\" when the British occupied Hong Kong in 1841. There was, however, a temple to Hung Shing, the God of the Southern Sea, that had stood on the island for many years; its bell is dated 1773.10 The likelihood is that the temple predated the land population, and that (together with the Tin Hau Temple on the north shore, where Aberdeen town now stands) it originally served the boat population of the Ap Lei Chau-Aberdeen anchorage. By the mid-1860s there were 60 houses there, with a population of perhaps two or three hundred persons.11\n\nBy 1897 the number of residents was 1,123, and by the Colony Census of 1911 it had risen to 1,437.12 This population gained its livelihood from concerns that served the fishing fleet: the local Aberdeen-Ap Lei Chau anchorage had 424 boats and 4,130 persons at the 1866 census.13 There was little farming, as the island has steep", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1983.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/j9607p61v", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 210163, "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": 134, "title": "RAS-1984", "content_text": "113\n\nproduce from the sea near the present Aberdeen Country Club. Some villagers operated stake nets lowered by windlass into the sea from a rocky headland, and others used lines catching fish like nai mang (鯺鏝) to make a sweet congee. The old lady's mother, born about 1860, planted hemp and made it into string used for tying and mending clothes until she was sixty years of age. The village people also grew a kind of rush (cheung po) (菖蒲) when she was young, using it as a charm to hang over their doorways, especially in the fifth moon, in the manner reported in old works on China.2\n\n25\n\n-\n\nThe stake nets were an especially favoured form of fishing in local waters. One can see a few surviving sites round the southern coast of Hong Kong island to this day. In the Tangs' time as sub-soil owners\n\nsee below they may have leased sites to local persons, as they were doing in the New Territories in 1899. It is also of interest that no less than 13 sites on the south side of Hong Kong island were leased out by another absentee landlord family of scholar gentry, the Wongs (王) of Nam Tau (南頭) and Cheung Chau, as shown in maps in their printed genealogy issued in the 1860s. People walked far to secure a livelihood in those days. One of the persons interviewed in the investigations into the murder of two British officers near Stanley in 1849, was a villager of Little Hong Kong who had a hut and operated a stakenet on the point where Stanley Fort now stands.\n\n26\n\n27\n\nHowever, farming was the principal occupation. The Little Hong Kong fields can be seen on the Hong Kong Government's first survey sheet for the area, whilst the extent of the Wong Nai Chung fields can be gauged by the race course at Happy Valley which was built over them.28 Rice was favoured because there was a plentiful supply of stream water available that only required damming, leading and terracing, albeit by dint of hard labour, to provide fertile land that would support two crops of rice yearly. An account of harvest time in one of the Hong Kong villages appeared in one of the numbers of the Illustrated London News for 1858.\n\n\"On the 1st of November (1857) I took a walk with a friend into the interior of Hong Kong and saw the process of rice-harvesting, beneath a bright, hot sun, the entire village popu-", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1984.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/5h73wh572", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 210250, "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": 221, "title": "RAS-1984", "content_text": "200 Y.H. CHEUNG, K.Y. TAI, S.W. TSAO AND L.B. THROWER\n\nDiscussion\n\nArguably, the traditional kei wai has two attractive economic features. The first is that it provides a method for controlled exploitation of recently-deposited alluvium. Probably, rearing of fish is the most feasible procedure for exploiting such sites and the construction of a kei wai requires much less equipment and labour than digging deep fish ponds. The second feature of the kei wai is that it facilitates exploitation of the nutrient-rich waters of an estuary to produce animal protein in a variety of forms.\n\nAn estuary has been defined as “an area in which sea water is appreciably diluted by fresh water from rivers” (Stewart, 1972). Therefore sources of energy and nutrients produced in terrestrial communities are carried by the rivers to the estuary, where tidal movement assists recycling of nutrients from consumer back to producer. This characteristic structure and function of an estuary has led to it being called a “nutrient trap” (Odum, E.P., 1971). The importance of supplements of energy and nutrients moving to the estuary from terrestrial communities has been shown clearly by Odum W.E. (1971) and Odum & Heald (1975) for a system in southern Florida. There an estuary is receiving material from an extensive mangrove community, and measurements showed that material to be more important as a basis for economic productivity than was photo-synthesis.\n\nIn considering the productivity of the waters of Hau Hoi Wan, it is relevant that Vrijmoed (1975) found that the weight of fouling organisms (invertebrate animals) accumulating on blocks of pine wood submerged for several months in Hau Hoi Wan was the greatest among the five sites she investigated within Hong Kong's coastal waters; this result reflects the high nutrient content of the water.\n\nThe inherently nutrient-rich water of the estuary is then impounded in the kei wai where it is further supplemented with nutrients and energy by the plant material that enters it. Microorganisms play an important part in fragmenting the plant material and converting much of the structural carbohydrates to protein. Consequently, the higher trophic levels have available material", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1984.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/5h73wh572", "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": 210444, "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": 51, "title": "RAS-1985", "content_text": "32\n\nBARBARA E. WARD\n\nThere was also an illicit still for making rice spirits, owned by the last mentioned. Beyond the village on the narrowest part of the strait were three stone sheds known as “fish huts”, and used by three separate fisher families for storing nets, fish baskets and other items of gear. Across the other side of the strait, on the second island, were a couple of concrete pits, used as tanks for dyeing sails and nets, and a wooden steaming vat. These were the property of the \"headman\".\n\nMost of Hong Kong's shoreline is steep and rocky. Kau Sai island is no exception. The village is built on one of the few stretches that offer a small ledge above high water mark. It is about thirty yards in width in most places. In front of the temple, south-eastwards from there, and at another point about half-a-mile beyond the northern end of the village, land has been reclaimed from the sea. The fishermen state that this process was started by their forebears. In 1950 the reclamations consisted of accumulations of large boulders carefully arranged to afford as flat a surface as possible. In front of the temple the reclaimed area formed a large semi-circular platform about fifty yards in diameter, raised about six or seven feet above the natural beach and contained by a sea wall, like a ha-ha. Both wall and platform had been sealed with concrete some time before the Japanese occupation. On the southern edge of the platform, near but just beyond the temple, lay the village well. The water, being somewhat brackish, was used mainly for washing. Sweet water was fetched by boat from a never-failing stream about a mile away to the north.\n\nFrom the temple southwards a little beyond the end of the village the reclamation had been filled in with beaten earth to make a broad path. Beyond that, flanking both sides of the strait, there were simply two wide stretches of carefully gathered boulders. These parts of the reclamation were still being added to. The same was true of the essentially similar boulder reclamation north of the village.\n\nThe existence of flat or flattish areas near the water's edge was a necessity for the fishermen who used them for net and fish drying, sail making, rope twisting and so on. Nets being at that", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1985.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/gt54s866x", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 210781, "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": 132, "title": "RAS-1986", "content_text": "HAINAN ISLAND: \n\nA BRIEF HISTORICAL SKETCH \n\nD.L. MICHALK* \n\n115 \n\nIntroduction \n\nHainan Island forms the extreme southern limit of the People's Republic of China, save for the Paracel Reefs. Sometimes referred to as the Tail of the Dragon, Hainan lies between longitudes 108°30′ and 111° east and latitudes 18° and 20°31' north. It is separated from the mainland by the 25 km Qiongzhou Straits, and is part of Guangdong, accounting for 15 percent of the Province's area. Located in the South China Sea, Hainan is about 300 km east of Vietnam across the Gulf of Tonkin, some 500 km southwest of Hong Kong, and a similar distance from the provincial capital, Guangzhou. \n\nHainan is oval-shaped with the longest NE to SW axis measuring 309 km and the shorter NW to SE axis, 221 km. With an area of 34,077 km2 (Anon., 1982b), Hainan is about half the size of Tasmania and ranks as the world's twenty-sixth largest island. Although it accounts for less than 1 per cent of China's land area, its tropical climate, rich mineral and petroleum resources and strategic location make it an important, yet undeveloped region of China. \n\nHainan has always been regarded as a backwater by successive Chinese dynasties and a mystery to foreigners. Indeed, had it not been for a handful of inquisitive academics and devoted missionaries who \"found Hainan\" around the turn of the century, our knowledge of the island would have amounted to little more than folklore. Using these western sources, the aim of this paper is to provide a brief insight into the history of Hainan, particularly the role played by foreigners in its development. \n\n* Senior research agronomist, Agricultural Research and Veterinary Centre, New South Wales Department of Agriculture.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1986.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/jq08c7063", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 210783, "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": 134, "title": "RAS-1986", "content_text": "117\n\nlowed the discovery of pearls with Chinese immigrants in Early Han times numbering 23,000 taxable households (Wang Hsiang-chih, 1849 edition). As time passed, however, delivery of large quantities of top quality pearls to the Imperial Treasury became routine \"local tribute\" (Schafer, 1952) which usurped the lucrative commercial trade. Nevertheless, Hainan, or the \"Shore of Pearls\" as the island was then known, continued to yield supplies of the precious gems until the end of the fifteenth century by which time the pearl beds were exhausted (Mayers, 1867).\n\nAs the size and wealth of Hainan became more precisely known, successive dynasties attempted to extend their control by using military force to break Li resistance which obstructed Chinese exploitation of the island's rich interior. Costly in lives and money, most campaigns achieved no lasting success, and for the first thousand years of occupation, the Chinese clung precariously to the northern coastal fringe, and at times their influence disappeared completely for periods of ninety years or more (Mayers, 1872).\n\nHainan's reputation as a “treasure island” changed to one of a \"dank, poisonous land unfit for normal men” (Schafer, 1969), and soon became a place of ultimate exile for intellectuals and high-ranking bureaucrats who offended the monarch, as well as a sink for pirates and desperadoes. Amongst the exiled scholars the Three Lords (Li Te-yu, Lu To-sun and Ting Wei) and the poet Su Shih are celebrated for their literary contributions (Mayers, 1872; Schafer, 1969). While the exiled scholars left a rich history of contemporary Hainan in their prose and verse, the only legacy remaining from the successive dynasties is a continuum of changes to the names of towns and counties caused by the monotonous re-organization of the administrative bureaucracy.\n\nAlthough the name Hainan (literally South of the Sea) was used as a rather imprecise collective name for all southern lands which lay beyond the familiar borders of the early dynasties, it was not until the Mongol conquest in the thirteenth century that the name was applied specifically to the island. Under the sovereignty of Kublay Khan, the island was incorporated with the western portion of present-day Guangdong Province under the designation", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1986.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/jq08c7063", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 210786, "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": 137, "title": "RAS-1986", "content_text": "120\n\nD.L. MICHALK\n\nTaxes levied on imports were just as crippling since the rates were fixed according to the size of the vessel that ferried the goods to Hainan, regardless of the value of the wares it carried. This meant that because the greatest profits were obtained from luxury goods such as expensive furniture, fine silks, silver vases and gold-en hairpins for the privileged rich, these imports took precedence over cargoes of livestock, cooking pots and bags of rice which returned negligible profits (Schafer, 1969). The lack of necessities of life led the poet Su Shih to lament in verse that a \"grain of rice was like a pearl”.\n\nEnticed by an abundance of rich cargoes, bands of pirates formed and pillaged, almost unchecked, shipping along the entire southern seaboard of China. The problem reached such epidemic proportions in the seventeenth century as to preclude safe navigation on the open sea between the east coast of Hainan and the mouth of the Pearl River (Mayers, 1872). The only secure trade route between the mainland and Hainan was to cross the narrow straits which separate the island from the Leichow Peninsula with strong military escort and thence, trek overland to the provincial capital, at quickest a journey taking one month. As a consequence, commerce virtually ceased and Hainan was immersed again in the poverty and deprivation for which it was noted in medieval times (Schafer, 1969).\n\nDenied their source of revenue, pirates turned their ravages landward, and repeatedly sacked towns and villages in the north and east of the island, in spite of the presence of Imperial garrisons (Mayers, 1872). Although the destruction in 1684 of the pirate kingdom in Taiwan restored safe navigation to the Guangdong coast, Hainan still remained a haven for buccaneers, and pillage continued almost unabated until the beginning of the nineteenth century. It was the combination of a growth in foreign shipping interests in China, the use of steam power in ships and the opening of a treaty port in Hainan, which led to the demise of piracy as a lucrative pastime in the South China Sea.\n\nAlthough the Chinese had previously established rudimentary navies such as the \"Sea-Patrolling Water Army\" (Hsun-hai shui-chun) to control piracy (K’iungchow fu chih, 1920 ed.), it was the", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1986.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/jq08c7063", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 211876, "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": 291, "title": "RAS-1989", "content_text": "266\n\nthe best of it.\n\nThe weather has now grown intensely hot. In the shade the thermometer is now standing at 84°, which is rather inconveniently warm. Since we have a lady on board, we are obliged to keep ourselves quite dressed, and really sometimes at meals it is very oppressive. At night even lying without clothes at all is very warm work. But in the day time on deck it is a trifle cooler when there is any breeze. In fact I have almost lived on deck for above a fortnight. It is pleasant of a night, especially now the moon shines. The stars however are all strangers to me. There is one fine constellation, the southern cross which is very pretty. The north star is just now going out of sight, and after tomorrow I shall not see it again for a while.\n\nI am getting more and more used to sea, although I shall never be very fond of it. It is all very pleasant to sit on deck and read all day, but soon one gets tired of it. It is the same thing every day, and no variety. Not even a sail has appeared for several days. The other day I saw a herd of grampusses, and the other evening a great fellow about 30 feet long, came blowing around the ship for some time. The flying fish are now very numerous, and sometimes a great shoal of them dart out at once from the water, and skim along above the waves. Today I spent some time in watching the stormy petrels as they skim along. Several of them have followed the ship for some days.\n\nI am now making some progress with Chinese, so that I can get on slowly through the gospel of St. Matthew in Chinese. I should do famously if the Chinese servant on board was only a Cantonese. I can of course make him understand in writing, but his pronunciation is as different as French from English. I also shall try to get some German if possible out of Captain Moate, so that I can discourse with the German missionaries.\n\nWe must now call at Anger [Anjer] for a fresh supply of fowls, and perhaps of water. I shall then hope to get hold of some fruit, which of course cannot be procured on board ship. I am very glad we may stop there, because I shall perhaps be able to send you a line just to say I am all right. I expect there will be a wonder at not hearing from me sooner. I fear however it will be impossible, since there appears no chance of falling in with an homeward bound ship. My health continues good, and if this hot weather does not last, I hope to keep all right.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1989.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/8336pm92h", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 211886, "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": 301, "title": "RAS-1989", "content_text": "276\n\nwas \"scarfed\" together and \"fished\" and \"dowled\", which operation has rendered it nearly as serviceable as a new one. We cannot use more than about a quarter of the sails yet, and it will take a long time to get the new masts up, and new sails made. Yet we are going along quite favourably considering, with a strong favourable wind.\n\nYesterday we were on the look out for St Paul's and Amsterdam, two small islands in the Southern Ocean. Through the chronometer's being out of order on account of the storm, we had made a wrong reckoning, and did not pass between the islands till after ten o'clock at night, when the captain came and told me to look out of my window and see them, as I was gone to bed. It was too dark to see more than the bare form of them. In fact Amsterdam was the only one I could see from my side of the ship. It is simply a rugged rock, about 15 miles long, and quite uninhabited except by sea-birds, of which a great number were soon flying round the ship.\n\nThis morning when I went on deck they were far out of sight. We ought to get to Java in 12 days if we were in good trim, but in our shattered condition we shall perhaps make nearly double the time. There will be a short stay also at Batavia to lay in stock of masts and spars to repair with. As yet we have been wonderfully favoured by the wind, and notwithstanding the storm and the fortnight tossing about in the Channel, we are four days ahead of the last voyage the ship made to Batavia. We shall now soon be going northward into warmer weather.\n\nThe captain was quite knocked up with the storm, and has not yet got over it. He does not take his meals with us yet, and Capt Moate and I are in no hurry for him to do so, for we get on far better by ourselves. In fact I may say we are good friends, and have been so all the voyage. We have never had a misunderstanding between us, and as long as he does not swear or talk improperly I do not much mind him as a companion, especially as he is a far better scholar than I am, and has resided at Hong Kong, so that I know by this time what I must expect when I get there. I have got him to read some good books, and now and then a little serious chat with him, which he submits to just to oblige me. I know all his personal history, and in fact could write an account of his life with tolerable accuracy. He is thoroughly disgusted with Capt Harper, who is quite an uneducated man, and thinks he is a perfect gent. For my own part, I never disliked anyone more than I do him. I can hardly be civil to him at times; for he acts in such a disgusting manner", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1989.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/8336pm92h", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 212362, "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": 304, "title": "RAS-1990", "content_text": "281\n\nSee P.H. Hase “The Cheung Shan Kwu Ts'un: an Ancient Buddhist Nunnery in the New Territories, and its Place in Local Society”, in Journal of the Hong Kong Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society, Vol. 29, 1989, pp. 121-157.\n\nJournal of the Hong Kong Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society, Vol. 7, 1967, pp. 104-137, reprinted from Transactions of the China Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society, Vol. 6, 1859, pp. 71-105.\n\nDer Evangelische Heidenbote, Jan. 1862.\n\nSee also P.H. Hase \"Ta Kwu Ling, Wong Pui Ling, and the Kim Hau Bridges\" elsewhere in this issue.\n\nKrone, loc. cit. says that missionaries were usually treated as neutral and ignored in fighting.\n\nDer Evangelische Heidenbote, Feb. 1906.\n\nSHA TAU KOK IN 1853\n\nThe Rev. Carl Smith drew my attention some time ago to the wealth of material available in the Basel Mission Archive on Sha Tau Kok in the middle of the nineteenth century. Through the courtesy of the Mission Archive, photostats of a number of documents were received and studied. Among them was a most interesting general description of the District and Market at Sha Tau Kok dating from 1853. Given its general interest, a translation of this document is printed below. Comments in square brackets are editorial clarifications.\n\n\"Tungfo.\n\nTungfo* | Tung Wo, 41, the formal name of Sha Tau Kok Market station is situated in the Province of Quang-tung [Kwangtung], in the District of Sinon [San On #1. The southern border of this District is formed by the China Sea, whereas, to the east and west, the borders are formed by inlets of this sea. The western inlet is the larger, although it is too small to be called a gulf. The English call it the \"Canton River\". The city of Canton is situated on this estuary. Because of the Canton River, traffic between Canton and Hong Kong is very easy, and\n\n* All placenames in this document are given in the original Hakka transcription. Placenames in Hong Kong are also given in square brackets according to the Gazetteer of Place Names in Hong Kong, Kowloon and the New Territories; placenames in China are also given in square brackets in Cantonese transcription and characters.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1990.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/d79206299", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 213446, "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-1995", "page_number": 42, "title": "RAS-1995", "content_text": "9\n\nBy their differences in dwellings and occupations, already observed, these four communities can be grouped into land-dwellers and sea-dwellers, the Cantonese and Hakka being the former and the Tanka and Hoklo the latter.\n\n43\n\nThe Cantonese, or Punti as they are sometimes called, had their origins in North China and speak a Chinese dialect of the western section of the Yueh language which evidences their claim to be of pure Chinese stock. There is no record of their arriving in the province of Kwangtung, which they colonised, earlier than the Sung Dynasty (960-1278 A.D.). In the van were a clan surnamed Tang who settled in the Yuen Long district of the New Territories late in the 11th century. This clan became the largest landowners with their main centres at Kam T'in, P'ing Shan, Lung Yeuk Tau and Ha Tsuen. They exercised \"a kind of feudal power, and the tradition they had brought with them was so strong that they not only became the founders of the Cantonese settlement but to this day exert a great influence in affairs. The Cantonese occupy most of the two principal plains in the northwest sector of the New Territories, and own a good deal of the best valley land in various other areas. Villages in the Tung Chung and Shek Pik valleys, on Lantau Island, date back to the early Yuan dynasty in the late thirteenth century. The livelihood of the Cantonese is dependent mainly on the cultivation of rice.\n\nThe Hakka migrated originally also from North China and, moving gradually southwards through Fukien and Kiangsi in the 10th century, reached Kwangtung Province during the latter years of the Southern Sung Dynasty. They speak two dialects or sub-dialects of the eastern section of the same Yueh language that the Cantonese speak. Arriving after the Cantonese, the Hakka settled usually upstream of them, that is, on the poorer ground. They have, however, steadily over the centuries encroached on the land first occupied by the Cantonese. For example, after the Manchus in the 17th century had evacuated the entire population of the China Coast inland to guard against the fleet of the Ming Dynasty based on Formosa, the Hakka apparently took the opportunity of resettling in the abandoned coastal area. Again, Hong Kong island is said to have been originally occupied by the Tang clan but the British in the 19th century found it almost entirely inhabited by Hakka. A third example of Hakka encroachment is said to be Lantau Island which in recent times was depopulated by...", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1995.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/95941j25g", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 213472, "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-1995", "page_number": 68, "title": "RAS-1995", "content_text": "35\n\nTU\n\n=\n\n\"Egg families\" or \"Egg people”— an expression used by the land-dwellers but never used by the Tanka to describe themselves as they regard it as derogatory (vide Barbara E Ward's article “A Hong Kong Fishing Village” Journal of Oriental Studies, Vol 1 No 1 (January 1954) p. 195, and Reports, DCNT, 1955-56, para 8, and 1959-60 para 48) They prefer instead to refer to themselves as \"Nam Hoi Yan” (= “people of the southern sea”) or \"Shui Sheung Yan\" (= \"water-borne people\") (Reports, DCNT, 1955-56 and 1959-60, loc cit)\n\n71 Report, DCNT, 1954-55 para 8\n\nTH\n\nReport, DCNT, 1955-56, para 8\n\nReport, DCNT, 1954-55, para 8\n\n24 Report, DCNT, 1954-55, para 9\n\nTA\n\n&\n\nT\n\nReport, DCNT, 1959-60, para 48\n\nop cit p 332\n\nReport, DCNT, 1955-56, para 8, vide Ward, loc cit\n\nTH Reports 1959-60, DCNT, para 46.\n\nTo Balfour states \"The word Hoklo is a dialect variation of Fukien and the Hoklo are the Fukienese fishing people of our region, but there is another term for them always used in literature, Man. We have already seen that the Tanka are considered a branch of the Man tribe. The word is very ancient and is used synonymously for \"barbarian\" or \"uncouth\". From the name alone you can judge that the Hoklo were once considered by the Chinese as barbarians\" (op cit p. 332)\n\nEXOD\n\nReport, DCNT, 1954-55, para 8\n\n* Report, DCNT, 1959-60, para 47\n\n* Report, DCNT, 1954-55. para 8.\n\nop cit p 336\n\n*For example, I have omitted the subjects of house-building and names, which appear in Wilson's Notes (vide footnote 35 supra)\n\n**That was the view taken by the late Mr. G.E. Strickland, Solicitor General of Hong Kong, and his view was endorsed by the 1948 Committee vide Committee Report, 1953, Appendix IX p 120 and Chap. II para 13. (Section 25 of the New Territories Regulation Ordinance, 1910 has now become Section 17 of the present Ordinance (Cap. 97) vide supra)", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1995.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/95941j25g", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 213685, "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": 38, "title": "RAS-1996", "content_text": "recorded as having 29 males and 10 females resident. The boat people at Kowloon City and Sham Shui Po may have been included in the Victoria Harbour grouping. But it seems likely that the bulk of the Northern boat-people population was omitted from the statistics in 1911.\n\nAt Cheung Chau, 4,442 boat-people are recorded in 1911, 2,601 of them male. This probably includes those boat-people usually anchored at Ping Chau and Mui Wo. At Lantau, 5,413 are recorded, 3,159 of them male.** The Lantau figure probably includes, not only the floating population at Tai O, but also the people living in \"boat-huts\" on stilts there. It also probably covers those boat-people anchored at Tung Chung, and may cover those at Tuen Mun as well. In 1921, 3,552 boat people are enumerated at Cheung Chau, and 3,894 at Tai O (probably not including the “boat-hut” residents). Given the absence of some deep sea fishing boats during the 1921 Census period, it seems that the Southern District floating population statistics are broadly similar in 1911 and 1921.\n\nThe careful notification of New Territories residents as to the purpose of the 1911 Census, and the use of local men as enumerators, led to a lack of practical problems with villagers, who seem to have responded surprisingly well to the process. The police escorts had \"not very much to do,” and “no trouble whatever\" occurred.\n\nOn a more detailed basis, the civilian enumerator teams in the mainland New Territories, and the police on Lamma, in the Sham Shui Po area, and, to a lesser extent, on Lantau, seem to have done a more careful job than the police on Cheung Chau, and in the Tsuen Wan and Kowloon City areas. 598 villages were separately enumerated in the nine mainland civilian enumerator districts,\" 18 on Lamma, 49 on Lantau, and 23 in the Sham Shui Po district.\" Very few of the villages or hamlets on Lamma or in the mainland New Territories outside the Tsuen Wan and Kowloon City areas were not separately enumerated. The few that are not are hamlets closely connected with a nearby village and enumerated with it. On Lantau, however, some villages are not separately enumerated. The villages to the south of Tai O (Fan Kwai Tong, Yi O, Fan Lau), those immediately east of Tung Chung and along the upper edges of the Tung Chung valley (Tai Po, Tung Chung Hang, Wong Lung Hang, Lam Che, etc.), most of those in the Chi Ma Wan peninsula (except Shap Long), and most of the very tiny villages in the", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1996.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/3n209j641", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 213709, "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": 62, "title": "RAS-1996", "content_text": "33\n\nall from this group, as were a good number also of those from the southern, seacoast edge of the Delta, and from Sze Yap (266 males, and 65 females; and 28 males and 6 females respectively).\n\nIn Southern District, the dominance of the land population in 1911 by people born outside the area was not so noticeable among females. Only 773 females were recorded born outside the New Territories (15%), and only 364 of these were born outside San On and Tung Kun (7%). This, however, was still a noticeably higher percentage than in the Northern District.\n\nThis temporarily resident male immigrant component of the Southern District population, as compared with the Northern District, is discernible also in the dialects recorded in the 1911 Census as spoken in the home among the land populations. In the Northern District only 50 male Hoklo speakers were recorded (28 of them were working in the salt-fields at Sha Tau Kok), a mere 0.1% of the recorded male population (25 female Hoklo speakers were recorded). In the Southern District, however, 701 male Hoklo speakers were noted within the land population (11.3%) (365 female Hoklo speakers were recorded).\n\nThus, from all the statistics in the 1911 Census, it is clear that the seasonal movement of the fishing fleets, and the general coastal sea-borne trade, with the coolies and traders required to service these trades, was a sufficiently major social factor in traditional islands life to give the islands land population an “immigrant\" type of social structure with an imbalanced male/female ratio, and heavy dominance of male society by persons born outside the area, and speaking non-local dialects. At the same time, underlying this urban, immigrant society was a small settled agricultural society, especially on Lantau, but also on Lamma to a less extent, probably not dissimilar to that seen more clearly in the Northern District.\n\nThe 1921 figures for the Southern District floating population (Table 12) show a pattern generally similar to the 1911 islands land population. There appears to be very little under-reporting in these figures - perhaps because of the difficulty of hiding children when enumerators visited any sampan homes. Taking into account those children who died shortly after birth, and who would be omitted by the census in any case, it", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1996.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/3n209j641", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 213715, "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": 68, "title": "RAS-1996", "content_text": "39\n\nwith, and had a fuller mental concept of, the world beyond the South Sea than he had of China outside central Kwangtung.\n\nMarriage and Childbirth\n\nThe 1911 census gives some information on marriage in the New Territories. \"It notes the married state of 51,101 persons in Northern District, and 17,739 persons of the land population in Southern District. This probably represents all those aged over 12, plus those married as infants under 12.\" 881 males and 902 females in Northern District had been married as infants of less than 12 (2.6% and 2.6% respectively). In 1921, the details of married state are much fuller than in 1911, and include details of the numbers of married and single males and females at all ages. However, in 1921 no details are given of infant marriages. The recorded details from the two censuses are shown in Table 14. The average age of marriage can be given accurately for 1921, but only approximately for 1911.\n\nTable 14\n\nMarried State. New Territories, 1911, 1921 Censuses\n\n \n \n Males\n \n Females\n \n \n \n Total Population\n \n %age of\nmanage\n Total\nPopulation\n Average Age\nof manage\n \n \n Northern District married, 1911\n 14428\n 42%\n 17433\n 50%\n719\n 24\n \n \n Northern District married, 1921\n 14891\n 43%\n 16124\n 46%\n17\n 23\n \n \n Northern District widow(er)s × 1911\n 2201\n 6%\n 5150\n 15%\n \n \n \n Northern District widow(er)s 1921\n 1767\n 5%\n 5500\n 16%\n \n \n \n N District married as infants, 1911\n 881\n 3%\n 902\n 3%\n \n \n \n S. District: boat Population married 1921\n 1757\n 43%\n 26\n 1411\n 50%\n21\n \n \n S. District: boat Population widow(er)s\n 212\n 5%\n \n 343\n 12%", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1996.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/3n209j641", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 213826, "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": 178, "title": "RAS-1996", "content_text": "151\n\nTHE HOUWANG CULT AND\n\nTUNG CHUNG'S COMMUNAL CULTURE\n\nHON-MING YIP AND WAI-YEE HO'\n\nWhile the ancestral hall often serves as the socio-political centre of a single-surname village, a temple of folk religion always stands out as the focal point of local people's social and cultural life in such a multi-lineage rural community as Tung Chung. For the dozen or so villages in the Tung Chung valley, the Houwang has long been their principal deity and the Houwang Temple, their main local shrine. For years, the popular worship of the Houwang has functioned as a cultural and social binding force to hold this secluded community together. In what follows, the development of Tung Chung's Houwang cult is traced, and details of the area's religious and social activities and their cultural as well as political significance for the locality are expounded.\n\nTung Chung as a Secluded Community of Multi-Surname Villages\n\nSituated on the north shore of Lantau Island, Tung Chung used to be a strategic port for maritime defence and trade during the early Ch'ing period. The area's economic development was also facilitated by its favourable position in sea transportation at a time when the northwestern New Territories were Hong Kong's economic centre of gravity. With the British occupation after the Opium War, however, the north end of Lantau suffered gradual marginalization and isolation as the colony's economic core shifted eastward to Hong Kong Island. The decline of ocean transport to north Lantau and underdeveloped overland communication with the southern part of the Island, in effect, kept Tung Chung in a state of seclusion. Hills to the east, south, and west separated this valley from other parts of Lantau. Between Tung Chung and Bak Mong in the east, Mu Wo and Tong Fuk in the south, and Tai O in the west, there were only muddy paths over the mountain or along the shore. Before transportation improved in the 1960s, travel between Tung Chung and these districts on Lantau required two to three hours by foot, roundtrip. Communication was even more difficult with regions outside of Lantau. Beginning from the 1920s, a few ferries carrying goods sailed on\n\nPl", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1996.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/3n209j641", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 214230, "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": 88, "title": "RAS-1998", "content_text": "IMAGES OF SINICISED VEDIC DEITIES ON CHINESE ALTARS\n\nKEITH STEVENS\n\n51\n\nIntroduction\n\nThe rear halls of two temples in the Western Hills of Peking each contains some twenty-eight images which, though predominantly Chinese in appearance and style, are Vedic deities referred to in English in Chinese temple brochures as the Deva. The main question arising from this unique pantheon asks what led to its arrangement and character?\n\nBuddhism in China numbers among its many deities several score borrowed from Brahmanism and other Indian religions, other words Hindu deities with Chinese appearance and bearing. These tend to be well-known forms, accepted by Chinese devotees as Chinese and with little suggestion that they had an alien Indian origin. The concepts and forms of Buddhist deities on altars in China were almost exclusively brought there from India either by the northern route over the mountains and deserts of North-western China or the Southern route by sea to Kuangtung or Fukien provinces. The transit of South Asian Buddhism and its statuary to China began during the first century AD with the statuary being uniquely Buddhist, taken from Hinduism via Buddhism.\n\nThe Revd. J MacGowan1, during the early days of this century wrote that \"the practical, every-day, common religion of the Chinese is idolatry, pure and simple. Ancestor worship is too profound and too ideal and not quick enough to meet the problems that constantly face the Chinese in their struggle for existence. To provide for this difficulty, idols innumerable have been enshrined in homes and in temples all over the land....and many of these idols are of Indian origin, as can be seen by their faces, as well as by the liturgies that are used, which are certainly adaptations from the ancient Sanskrit.\"\n\nWe are particularly interested here in the specifically Hindu deities referred to in English in Chinese brochures as the Devas, but in Chinese guise, on altars in two temples in the Western Hills, the Ta Pei...", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1998.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/1g05n0794", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 214550, "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": 408, "title": "RAS-1998", "content_text": "377\n\ntranslated into Italian, then into French. It was the undated French version that we saw. It had been written, possibly in Macau, on the instructions of the Pope and described the persecution of priests. There was also a massive hand-written \"Tartare-Mantchou French dictionary” 1st edition, Paris 1789, in 3 volumes. Another interesting book was \"Dr Fryer's Travels: A new account of East India and Persia in eight letters, being nine years travels\" by John Fryer MD (Cantab) and Fellow of the Royal Society, published in 1898.\n\nThe more linguistically accomplished of our members interpreted these works for the benefit of all and there was much erudite discussion. This was the Society at its best and we could have spent many more hours, even days, delving into this fascinating collection. [Illustration Two].\n\nOn Saturday afternoon we drove out to Fa Hai (Sea of Dharma) Temple, in the distant western suburbs at the southern foot of Cuiwei Mountain. The temple was begun in 1439 during the Ming Dynasty (1368-1644) with funds raised by Li Tong, a favourite eunuch of the Emperor. It was completed in 1443 and named by Emperor Ying Zhong. The most outstanding features are the frescoes, which completely fill the walls of the main, Mahavira, hall. These reflect a relatively pure Buddhism without Taoist depiction. They are of Buddhas, Avalokiteshvara (Kuan Yin) and the three other bodhisattvas, devas, wonderful animals, auspicious clouds, flowers and realistic landscapes. There are five Buddhas on either side with the 10 Buddhas together representing the full power of Buddhism, and possibly also the idea of east and west. The colours are subtle and not too faded (although the viewing of a colour-enhanced video prior to touring the Temple helped our appreciation). In the temple grounds are unusual pine trees with silver-white bark; ancient trees, said to resemble dragons, and a bell engraved in Chinese characters expressing Sanskrit teachings. The auspicious clouds inside were matched outside, for misty rain added to the atmosphere of the temple, set in the mountainside woods.\n\nOn Easter Sunday we were up very early to go to the oldest Christian church in Beijing - the Cathedral of Immaculate Conception of Blessed Mary, on Qianmen Avenue. This is also known as Nan t'ang, or South Church. The Emperor bestowed on Matteo Ricci the lands and funds to build the church near the then Calendrical Bureau inside", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1998.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/1g05n0794", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 214682, "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": 97, "title": "RAS-1999", "content_text": "61\n\nSee) Hong Kong 1987, WW#ENS \"明 (*1##AB) (Forts and Batteries Coastal Defence in Quangdong during the Ming and Qing Dynasties), Urban Council, Hong Kong, 1997, A Lui Yuen ching Forts and Pirates A History of Hong Kong, Hong Kong History Society, Hong Kong, 1990, p 29\n\n5 On the foundation of Po Kong, see Jen Yu wen, \"The Southern Sung Stone-Engraving at North Fu Tamg\" Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society, Hong Kong Branch, Vol 5, 1965, pp 65-68 The founder was the great grandfather of a significant local leader in the Kowloon area in 1274, the man responsible for managing the rebuilding of the Tin Hau Temple in Joss House Bay in that year Given his local standing, it is likely that this man was in his 50s or 60s in 1274 This being so, his great-grandfather was probably born in the period 1120-1140, and a foundation date for Po Kong in the 1160s would therefore seem very likely\n\nE\n\n6 On this incident see Jen Yu wen, \"The Travelling Palace of Southern Sung in Kowloon\" Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society, Hong Kong Branch, Vol 7, 1967 pp 21-38, Jen Yu-wen, ed , Hong Kong, 1960, , Hong Kong, 1959, #M, (R), op cit, Chapter 4, 蕭國健,“香港王廟奉[楊大王]”in <香港前代史論集> ed 國健 and 大厅, Taipei, 1985\n\n7 Jen Yu wen, \"The Travelling Palace of Southern Sung\", op cit p 33\n\n8\n\n* The young princess was drowned at sea, and the body was lost the grave had buried in it, to represent the deceased, a golden figurine the grave was known locally as the 'Grave of the Golden Maiden'\n\n፡፡\n\n\"Some scholars doubt this ascription (for instance, in his \"FAI PREFLEX\", op cit) but the identification seems certain to me The identification was first made by the eminent late Ching scholar, Chan Pak-to (B) in a tablet he placed in the Hau Wong Temple, Kowloon City, in 1917 (the text is to be found in 科大,陸鴻基,吳倫霞<香港碑銘彙編> (D Faure, B Luk, A Ng, The Historical Inscriptions of Hong Kong), Hong Kong, Urban Council, 1986, Vol 2, pp 446-449) I find the reasons given by Chan Pak-to and Jen Yu wen (loc cit) on this very compelling\n\n10 In 1846, as shown by the drawing of that date by Lt Collinson, the market comprised just the one main street, and the pier had not yet then been built The", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1999.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/s178b887x", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 214903, "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": 318, "title": "RAS-1999", "content_text": "294\n\nI don't for one moment think they had. The Japanese invasion of Hong Kong was a \"natural extension\" of their campaign in China in the sense that they had already occupied southern China - across the border from Hong Kong - a considerable time before. Also, although there are innumerable examples to show that invasion from the sea can be a costly business if the beaches are in any way defended, in Hong Kong's case they weren't. A number of gun emplacements had been built on Hong Kong Island before the war but these would not have prevented an invasion at Deepwater Bay. And there certainly weren't any Allied troops around. The Japanese knew all this. I rather suspect that they invaded from the New Territories rather than assault Hong Kong Island at the outset because they believed that if and when they overran Hong Kong Island, the Allied forces would cross to Kowloon and thence to the New Territories and continue to wage guerrilla warfare for months, if not years. The Japanese had every reason to think that conquering the New Territories and Kowloon first would result in the Allied forces retreating to Hong Kong Island - which they did - where they could be \"bottled up\" - which they were.\n\nIn the round, however, this discussion is academic. The hard fact of the matter is that Hong Kong was simply not defendable with the forces available in December 1941. A successful defence would have required a force of enormous size and superbly equipped, supported by comprehensive fortifications. The \"protective buffer\" of the New Territories was never any more than an illusion. These arguments, incidentally, were as valid in 1897 as they were in 1941 and to that extent The Back Door was both disingenuous and unhelpful. September 1897 was evidently what the media refer to as a \"slow news\" month!\n\nHong Kong Invaded! A '97 Nightmare is a 'new, integrated and corrected' edition of The Back Door. Incidentally, although The Back Door was written in 1897, it is hard to avoid the suspicion that Gillian is having a gentle swipe at the momentous event in Hong Kong's history that occurred exactly 100 years later.\n\nThe actual story occupies but 56 pages of Gillian's book, including illustrations by Arthur Hacker. These, incidentally, are a disappointment. They are supposed to be illustrating a serious account of a battle fought to the last, with heroism and heavy loss of life on both sides. One would have thought, therefore, that they would have been", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1999.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/s178b887x", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 215132, "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": 228, "title": "RAS-2000", "content_text": "185\n\nTHE TWO OBELISKS AT TAI TAM\n\nDAN WATERS\n\nOn being driven around Hong Kong Island for the first time, in January 1955, the two large Obelisks on the southeastern side, one north and one south of Tai Tam Harbour, attracted my attention. Although I asked people about them at the time, as well as in succeeding years, I was able to glean little useful information.\n\nDr Solomon Bard, an historian who lived in Hong Kong for over half a century, wrote that the two Obelisks are each nearly ten metres high and that they may be mistakenly taken for commemorating an historical event (Bard, 1988:69). He continues that the Royal Navy erected them at the turn of the century (around 1900) as navigational aids. They are in line. That is they are on the same longitude, running north-south, and they are exactly one nautical mile apart.\n\nSomewhat contradictory to Bard a Hong Kong Government Marine Department manual quotes that the two Obelisks are nine metres high and three-quarters of a mile (presumably sea miles) apart, in line, bearing 358 degrees, and that they lead into the Bay. When one is standing overlooking the Harbour and gauging the distance across the water with one's eyes, Bard's figure of one nautical mile appears more accurate. In fact, if one scales the distance from a chart in my possession it does turn out to be one nautical mile, from obelisk to obelisk (Tai Tam Bay, Chart; 1894). Such obelisks are often called beacons in nautical language.\n\nThe squat, northern Obelisk stands high up on what is sometimes known as 'Obelisk Hill.' See Plate One (Mok, 1995:16). Its counterpart, the southern Obelisk, at the foot of so-called 'Red Hill,' is lower down with its seaward side painted white so it is more conspicuous. Like a sentinel it stands on the rocks with its base about 40 feet above the sea, depending on the tide, to the westward side of the entrance to Tai Tam Harbour. Made of concrete, both Obelisks are of similar size, appearance, and construction as one can see from Plates One and Two. Up until World War Two there was little scrub on the hillsides and the upper Obelisk could be seen more clearly (see Plate One). They both have bases about seven feet square, and the upper parts are each divided into", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2000.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/nk328168n", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 215148, "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": 244, "title": "RAS-2000", "content_text": "202\n\nfrom Sea-level to the several mountain-tops and down the farther side to native hamlets on southern shore. The chairs are comfortable, the springy movement imparted by the bamboo poles, so long and flexible, is delightful, and the almost automatic stride of the men inspires confidence in their ability to bear us safely to the topmost points and down the steepest slopes. Thus, charmed by the novelty of our conveyance and by the sunny splendor of our surroundings, we explore the residential\n\nSedan Chair\n\nSedan Chair", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2000.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/nk328168n", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 215328, "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": 105, "title": "RAS-2001", "content_text": "53\n\nby the Hainanese and especially those from the Hainanese county of Wanning where he is primarily prayed to by the sick. He is claimed to be extremely efficacious and able to cure or heal any sickness or injury. He usually sends his Black or White Horse Generals to help devotees and only leaves the Heavens himself for very important cases. His image has only been seen in Singapore, Kuala Lumpur, Borneo, Bangkok and Phnom Penh where his festival is generally celebrated on the 15th of the fifth lunar month. However, he must never be prayed to for prosperity.\n\nTwo entirely different legends describe the origins of this deity, one more popular in Singapore and southern Malaysia, and the other in Thailand and Cambodia. In neither is the Marquis identified by name and he therefore remains unidentified.\n\nHe is also referred to as:\n\nthe Lord of the Seas, Wenzhou Haizhu Houwang\n\nTongzhu Houwang The Marquis Lord of the Aboriginal People\n\nShanqin Houwang The Imperial Marquis of the Mountains\n\nThe first legend claims that a petty king in China was waved by an individual who, in the city of Wenzhou on the coast of Zhejiang province, north of and nearly opposite the island of Taiwan, was awarded the title of Marquis. This happened a long, long time ago. The ruler of Hainan, as a separate state, so the legend continued, had an image of the Marquis brought to the island of Hainan and placed in a specially built temple where he has been worshipped ever since.\n\nThe second story relates that the Marquis was, variously, a Ming governor of Hainan island or a minister of an ancient dynasty against whom, through jealousy, evil ministers plotted. They killed him and threw his body into the sea where it turned into a log and floated away. A fisherman found it, realised that it had spiritual properties and so carved it into a statue which he revered and quickly became wealthy,\n\nPage 105\n\nPage 106", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2001.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/zg651950g", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 215369, "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": 146, "title": "RAS-2001", "content_text": "95\n\nCHINESE BABY CARRIERS:\n\nA HONG KONG TRADITION NOW GONE\n\nVALERY GARRETT\n\nNine o'clock on a sunny morning in April 1989, and I was standing on the pier that juts out like a finger into Starling Inlet, a stretch of sea separating Hong Kong from China. About fifty fisherwomen were yelling at the top of their voices and pushing scraps of clothing in my face. My goal, apart from the immediate one of not falling into the murky waters below, was to acquire traditional clothing from the people of Sha Tau Kok, the fishing village that straddles the border with China.\n\nI was taking part in a research project for the Hong Kong Museum of History to collect and document material culture, through purchases and donations, from the farming and fishing communities in the New Territories, before urbanization changed the area forever. It was a timely mission, for today the paddy fields have gone, and market towns have been absorbed by high-rise apartment blocks housing the refugees who arrived from China in the 1970s and 80s.\n\nI became aware in the late 1970s, that change would soon affect the rural areas, and had paid numerous visits to the New Territories in search of traditional dress. Then, together with an interpreter to help with unfamiliar dialects, I made forays into the countryside each week, visiting remote villages where life had changed little for the past hundred years. Although I was viewed at first as a crazy gwaipo, before long the villagers were yielding to my requests for old clothing they no longer needed. The loose black pyjamas, shady straw hats, colourful children's dress and brightly decorated wedding outfits were collected, photographed and carefully researched.\n\nBoth periods of collecting produced large numbers of children's clothing, kept for sentimental reasons, as well as good fortune, until the child was grown. Cloth baby carriers were some of the most common items collected. Carrying a baby on the back was long regarded in southern China as a safe and convenient place for a mother or servant to keep a child out of harm's way. Many women had to work and care for children at the same time, either in the fields growing rice or vegetables, or helping with...", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2001.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/zg651950g", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 215522, "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": 299, "title": "RAS-2001", "content_text": "249\n\nThree years later in 1885, five cemeteries were simultaneously set apart for the Chinese. These were described in a government notification as follows:62\n\nKAULUNG.— Situated on the North Side of the Road from Yaumati to the village of Mat'auwai, and near this village and within a short distance of the limits of British Territory. The site is an irregular figure bounded by Government ground, measuring on the North, 520 feet; South, 300 feet; East, 290 feet; West, 520 feet.\n\nSHAUKIWAN. Situated in the valley facing the East, lying between the Lyeemoon Pass, and the road from Shaukiwan to Stanley; is nearly triangular in shape, and bounded on the North, South-East, and West by Government ground, and on the East by the sea-shore, and measures on the North, 1,650 feet; South-East, 1,650 feet; West, 1,800 feet; East, 550 feet.\n\nSHEKO. Situated about 1/4 of a mile to the North-East of the northern portion of the village of Sheko; bordered by the Cliff facing the Sea on the East, and on the three other sides by Government ground, measuring on the North, 550 feet; South, 500 feet; East, 340 feet; West, 300 feet.\n\nSTANLEY. Situated about 1/4 of a mile to the South-East from the Stanley Barracks; bordered on the South-East by Tytam Bay on the North-West, East and West sides by Government ground, and measuring on the North-West, 480 feet; South-East, 520 feet; East, 560 feet; West, 500 feet.\n\nABERDEEN. Situated on the promontory 1/2 mile to the South-East of the village of Aberdeen, and bordered on the Southern side by the Aberdeen Channel, and on the North, East and West by Government ground, measuring on the North, 1,200 feet; East, 300 feet; West, 350 feet.\n\nIn 1891, two more Chinese cemeteries were added to the list:7\n\nMOUNT DAVIS.68 Situated on the West side of the Pokfulam Road and about one mile to the North-West of the village of Pokfulam, bordered on the North by Government ground, the boundary line being marked by granite posts, on the South-West by the Chinese Christian...", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2001.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/zg651950g", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 215562, "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": 339, "title": "RAS-2001", "content_text": "289\n\nIn 1888 the Chinese and Hong Kong Governments reached agreement. Gap Rock Lighthouse would be built by the British and maintained by them. The island remained Chinese territory not to be used for any other purpose. On the Chinese part, the Kowloon Customs was to contribute $7,500 towards the initial cost of the light and $750 annually towards its maintenance.22 The agreement was not put into effect. Towards the close of the nineteenth century, however, the proposal for lighthouses at the two main approaches to Hong Kong, on Gap Rock and Waglan Island, was revived. The previous agreement was then implemented.\n\nIn 1891 a lighthouse was built on Gap Rock, at the south-western extremity of Lema and Kypong Islands. Lighting equipment was constructed in Sweden and the light was first shown in April 1892. Three years later the lantern was smashed by a severe typhoon. According to experts' opinions later the lighthouse should have been built on the northern part instead of the southern part of the rock. But to rebuild it would cost somewhere near $140,000. So, the original light continued to function usefully through forty years of typhoons until the Japanese invasion in 1941.\n\nGap Rock is in the form of two hillocks, about 80 to 100 feet high, and the gap between gave the place its name (in Chinese it is called Man Mei Chau, meaning the last island or Mosquito Tail Island). The lighthouse tower is nearly 50 feet high, and the light is thus about 142 feet above mean sea level. In heavy storms seas broke right over the lighthouse but it stood, as a tribute to its builders and a pointer to the developments which have marked the growth of the port of Hong Kong.23\n\nWaglan Lighthouse\n\nUnlike Gap Rock Lighthouse, Waglan Lighthouse has a different history. It was constructed by a Paris company for the Chinese Customs Light Department of the Imperial Maritime Customs in 1893. It started to operate on 9th May in the same year. It was run by the Chinese Maritime Customs from Shanghai. Following the lease of the New Territories by Britain, in 1898, it was transferred to the administration and control of the Hong Kong Government on 1st January 1901.\n\nWaglan was a First Order light of 45,000 candle-power burning", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2001.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/zg651950g", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 216031, "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": 330, "title": "RAS-2002", "content_text": "264\n\nAbout two miles west of Zhenjiang railway station, on rising land, there was a temple called Xiu Wang Miao, the Temple of the Xiu Kings, dedicated to the memory of the Xiu dynasty of Nantang.\n\nLu Xiufu [AD 1238 - 1279] was a native of Zhenjiang, and a statesman and military commander during the latter years of the Southern Song. He had been appointed to the Court of Imperial Family Affairs, a form of Minister of Protocol, during the reign of Song Gong Zong [ca 1276]. He is remembered as a man of integrity and a devoted Minister who, when the Mongols were on the point of capturing Hangzhou, was sent in an attempt to reach an accommodation with them. This ended in failure. The Court was persuaded by Wen Tianxiang [one of the Three Loyal Generals of the Song] that the imperial heirs should be sent to the coast of south China, to Fuzhou and later to Quanzhou to ensure their safety. The emperor and his mother were captured by the Mongols and taken to Beijing, whilst Lu followed the Court in its retreat to the south. Lu met up with Zhang Shijie [the third of the Three Loyal Generals of the Song] in Wenzhou to rally support for the imperial cause, but had to flee on south to Fuzhou where they joined the forces of Wen Tianxiang. The senior heir was enthroned in Fuzhou as the Song Jing Yan emperor. At this point, following a reorganisation, Zhang and Lu became deputies to Chen Yizhong, the Commissioner of Military Affairs and Grand Counsellor. The new emperor was forced to flee further and further south pursued by the Mongol forces until he reached the area of present day Kowloon where Lu Xiufu rejoined the force from Chaozhou. The Mongol fleet having captured Guangzhou destroyed the forces of Zhang Shijie thus driving the Song Court out to sea. A typhoon struck the fleeing Song fleet and even though the ship carrying the young emperor was sunk he was rescued but died from shock and exposure near the Leizhou peninsula in mid-1278. Lu and Zhang stood firmly against any talk of surrender and ensured that the younger heir, a boy of six, was made emperor. Zhang became the Junior Guardian whilst Lu was Grand Counsellor. The next year the Mongol forces having been reinforced compelled the last of the Song forces to attempt to escape. Lu is said to have committed suicide but the official records do not reveal how the last of the Song, the boy of seven, died. The popular version claims that Lu, the hero from Zhenjiang, leapt into the sea with the boy in his arms.\n\nAn imperial hostelry, the Danyang Guan, was founded in Zhenjiang\n\nPage 330\n\nPage 331", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2002.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/mp4901278", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 216092, "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": 391, "title": "RAS-2002", "content_text": "325\n\nPeninsula and Oriental Line had four passenger ships: the Chusan, the Carthage and the Corfu. I sailed on the Royal Mail Ship Canton. As a newly joined Hong Kong government servant I went on half pay as soon as I stepped on the boat. It took 31 days from Southampton to Hong Kong.\n\nIn first class one dressed every night for dinner, except the first night and nights in port. With a long voyage some passengers were like bears with sore ears. For others there were games like deck quoits, dancing, the ceremony of \"crossing the line\" and shipboard romances. Others were seasick. Regarding romance the pretext for \"Romeo\" at night was to take a girl up to the boat deck to show her the Southern Cross. One lady boasted: 'I was taken up twice on one night and both men pointed to the wrong constellation!'\n\nThere were sea birds and flying fish to watch out for, and some wonderful sunsets in the Indian Ocean. Just as the brilliant sun dipped below the horizon you could occasionally see a green flash. Looking over the ship's rail at night one could frequently see phosphorescent, microbial animal and plant life in the tropical waters. Sometimes one could see this when one flushed the toilet in the darkness of one's cabin.\n\nAt Port Said gilly gilly men (Egyptian magicians) were allowed on board to entertain passengers. Or you could go ashore, visit the Pyramids and elsewhere, and catch the ship at the other end of the Suez Canal (that was the way people travelled on the so-called overland route, before the Suez Canal was completed in 1869.)\n\nAden, with low taxes, was a good place for shopping. Or one could visit the museum there to look at a stuffed Manatee with its broad, flattened tail. Fond of sitting on rocks, these sea creatures were said to have provided the substance for seamen's tales about mermaids. Other customary ports of call for British passenger ships were Bombay, Colombo, Penang and Singapore. P. & O. ships were manned partly by lascar seamen with stewards from the Portuguese Goa. There was a splendid array of cuisine with China, Indian and Ceylon teas. The Indian curry cook could serve a different curry for every lunch of the 31-day voyage.\n\nSome Britons preferred to travel on foreign ships which were not", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2002.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/mp4901278", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 216178, "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": 477, "title": "RAS-2002", "content_text": "411\n\nYET MORE ON THE CHINESE LABOUR CORPS IN FRANCE, 1917-1921\n\nDAVID MAHONEY\n\nKeith Stevens writes that Brian Fawcett in his article on \"THE CHINESE LABOUR CORPS IN FRANCE\" quoted a figure of 30,000 Chinese who returned to and remained in France, from China, after World War I. He added that the figure appears excessive. In fact, the total of all the Chinese labourers recruited by the French for the French Chinese Labour Corps during World War I did not exceed 50,000.\n\nThe French began their recruitment of Chinese in 1916, some six months before the British did. The scheme was initiated following preliminary discussions on the practicalities of recruiting Chinese labourers to be shipped to France to work in munitions factories to release Frenchmen to serve in the trenches, with the initial idea being to recruit Chinese from the area around the French treaty port of Guangzhouwan in Guangdong in southern China. This, however, was rejected and Jiangsu province - a northern province where the Chinese were hardier and used to northern climes - was selected, particularly in view of the wide French missionary influence in that province. A French Army major was despatched from French Indo-China (now Vietnam) to Shanghai where he was based in the French Concession ostensibly as a French civil servant, to avoid embarrassing the Chinese, to report on the practicality of the proposal. His report was favourable and accepted, and recruitment of Chinese volunteer labourers was started in Jiangsu province, in the vicinity of Shanghai in July 1916.\n\nThe labourers were transported by sea from Shanghai to Marseilles, where the main French CLC was situated, and Le Havre, and trained and worked in munitions factories across France such as Bergerac in the Dordogne, or in private concerns such as the Schneider factory at Le Creusot. Such employment was not possible in Britain due to the objections raised by British trade unions. French Chinese labourers were often billeted in French homes, and an unknown but comparatively large number married French women, some of whom accompanied their husbands back to China. The few labourers who died in France were buried at French civil cemeteries. Their records were maintained at the Headquarters in Lyons.\n\n'JHKBRAS: Vol. 40, 2000, pp. 33-111.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2002.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/mp4901278", "rank": 0 } ]