[ { "id": 204354, "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": 122, "title": "RAS-1961", "content_text": "Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society Hong Kong Branch \n\nRASHKB and author \n\n118 \n\nVol. 1 (1961) \n\nISSN 1991-7295 \n\ndaughters, daughters-in-law and grandchildren) are often dressed in the traditional mourning colour of white, usually in a costume provided by the funeral parlour and consisting, for women, of a white skirt and an upper garment resembling half a sack with one corner placed over the head. Men tend to wear white gowns, with a white band tied round the forehead. A thin surcoat of sack-cloth (haaù ma pò) may be worn over the white mourning clothes by a widow, daughter and daughter-in-law of the deceased; a son may wear a smaller square of sack-cloth over his head.\n\nFriends and relatives will pay their respects to the deceased by bowing towards the coffin three times and once towards the chief mourners, who are usually ranged to one side and may be kneeling with their heads towards the ground. For this public lying in state, the deceased is sometimes placed in a special coffin that leaves the upper portion of the body temporarily exposed. Before burial, the missing portion of the coffin lid will be replaced. The farewell room throughout the vigil and lying in state may be lit with candles and incense sticks, often making the atmosphere uncomfortably heavy and oppressive. In the past, it was customary to bang gongs throughout the vigil, to keep away the evil spirits, but this practice is now prohibited to avoid nuisance to neighbours. It is also customary amongst the less well-to-do for the female relatives of the deceased, particularly a widow, to give a public demonstration of grief in the form of wailing, weeping and loud cries. Mute grief would neither satisfy custom nor perhaps offer adequate incentive to the spirit of the deceased to exercise a benevolent influence on his descendants.\n\nIn practice, the last rites at a funeral parlour usually continue till midday, for the practical reason that it may take the whole morning to complete formalities such as registering the death and making arrangements with the relevant authorities for burial or cremation. The body is then taken by motor hearse to the cemetery or crematorium, accompanied by relatives. Friends may also accompany the hearse if they wish, but there is no objection to their departing earlier after the last rites have been performed. For a particularly large funeral, the journey to the cemetery may be preceded by a ceremonial procession in the neighbourhood, with funeral bands, mourners on foot, the hearse with the coffin, and large wicker framework plaques covered in silver and blue paper describing the deceased. The writer once saw a one-quarter mile procession, with no less than sixteen separate bands, complete an entire circuit of the Happy Valley race course before departing for the cemetery. Some of the funeral bands may be hired by the descendants of the deceased; other bands may be hired by friends wishing to offer condolences.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1961.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/vd6724704", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 204539, "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-1963", "page_number": 20, "title": "RAS-1963", "content_text": "PROTESTANT CEMETERY IN MACAO\n\n15\n\ncemetery. Membership of the Board is open to the Consular Authorities in Macao of certain European Protestant nations, plus Protestant residents in Macao. In 1924 the Rev. John Galloway, a Canadian missionary, was appointed a Trustee; he still lives in Macao and it is to him that we are indebted for much of our information concerning the later history of these two cemeteries in Macao, the Old and the New. When the East India Company ceased operating in China in 1834, its property in Macao reverted to His Majesty's Government in England. But in 1870, it was thought wiser that the two cemetery properties in Macao should come under the ownership of one body, and the Old Cemetery property was transferred to the New Cemetery Trustees, under whose control it rests to this day.\n\nEntrance to the Old Cemetery. The door in the wall already mentioned gives entrance to the property which is on three levels; the highest or first level is a courtyard in which a simple chapel stands; the burial plots are on the two lower levels which we refer to as the Upper and Lower Terraces. A wide cement path leads down from the Chapel level to the Lower Terrace and a break in the left-hand wall on the way down gives access to the Upper Terrace. In the chapel are two wall memorials of interest; one is to a British merchant named Margesson who originally came from Surrey, and who was drowned on 17 June 1869 when the ship in which he was travelling struck a rock just a mile or two off the coast of Japan; the disaster occurred on a clear evening and in a perfectly calm sea, but the ship sank almost immediately with a big loss of life.\n\nThe other chapel memorial is to James B. Endicott who died of typhoid in 1870 after living for 35 years in Hong Kong, Macao, and Canton. He is actually buried in the Colonial Cemetery in Happy Valley, Hong Kong, but he has two daughters, an uncle, and many friends in the churchyard in Macao. Endicott was born in Danvers, Massachusetts, U.S.A. in 1814, and is a direct lineal descendant of John Endicott who sailed from the harbour of Weymouth, England, in 1628 in the ship Abigail on an adventurous voyage to the New World where he became the founder and first governor of the State of Massachusetts. James B. Endicott introduces us to the important American section of the foreigners who lived in Macao more than one hundred years ago, over fifty of whom rest in this cemetery.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1963.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/4m90m091v", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 204652, "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-1963", "page_number": 133, "title": "RAS-1963", "content_text": "NAVIGATION ON THE YANGTSE \n\n119 \n\nThe restriction about navigation beyond Ichang was abolished after the Sino-Japanese War by the Treaty of Shimonoseki in 1895, and three years later the indefatigable Little had the satisfaction of taking his Leechuan from Ichang up to Chungking, the first steamer to navigate the Upper Yangtse. The Leechuan was a twin screw, wooden, steam launch only fifty-five feet long, and too small to carry any cargo. Little acted as his own captain and chief engineer, and the Leechuan had to be pulled up the strongest of the rapids by trackers. Two years later, however, a larger paddle steamer Pioneer, built by Little and a group of associates, made the first commercial passage to Chungking. The Pioneer was built by Denny of Dumbarton, and was 180 feet long, 60 feet beam over the paddle boxes, and had a draft of 6 feet. She carried 150 tons of cargo and many deck passengers, and took seven days between Ichang and Chungking on her first trip. There is a photograph of her in Gleanings from Fifty Years in China by Archibald Little (Philadelphia, 1908), p. 141. Shortly afterwards the Pioneer was commandeered by the British government to bring British subjects down the Yangtse during the Boxer troubles, and she finished her career as H.M.S. Kinshi, the headquarters ship of the Senior British Naval Officer on the Yangtse.\n\nIn that same year of 1900 the British river gunboat Woodlark, which was 145 feet long, by 23 feet beam, but had a draft of only 3 feet, also reached Chungking, and in the following year Woodlark and her sister ship Woodcock reached Sui Fu, 100 miles beyond Chungking. It was in the December of that year that the first of many serious accidents occurred on the Upper Yangtse, when the German steamer Suichsiang went on the rocks at the Tungling Rapids, 36 miles above Ichang, and was a total loss.\n\nThe Yangtse has its source in Tibet, not far from the headwaters of the Yellow, Mekong, Salween, and Irawaddy Rivers. When this became known to Europeans it became the ambition of many travellers to go up the Yangtse as far as possible, and then to cross over the Himalayas into Burma or India. This journey had a fascination for Europeans very similar to that exercised by the Nile and Niger over their fathers and grandfathers. The naval expedition of 1861, which went up the river as far as Yochow, landed three Englishmen there who intended to follow the river to its source in Tibet, and then cross over the Himalayas into India. Captain Blakiston, Lieutenant Saral, and Doctor Barton of", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1963.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/4m90m091v", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 204654, "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-1963", "page_number": 135, "title": "RAS-1963", "content_text": "NAVIGATION ON THE YANGTSE \n\n121 \n\nA mere recital of the dates on which the different ports and sections of the Yangtse were opened to foreign trade gives little idea of the difficulties encountered in establishing regular steamer services on the river. Some of these difficulties were political, some economic, and some technical. Physical factors inclined to divide the river into three sections - Lower, Middle, and Upper. The Lower River was the 600 miles from the mouth to Hankow, navigable for ships of up to 10,000 tons in the high water season, and for ships of about half that size all year round. The Middle River was the 340 miles from Hankow to Ichang, and this was navigable for 3,000 ton ships in the high water season, and for slightly smaller ships all year round. The third section was the Upper River, the 400 miles from Ichang to Chungking, which included the famous Yangtse Gorges. At Chungking the bed of the river is 600 feet above sea level, as compared with 130 feet at Ichang, and it is this fall of 470 feet in 400 miles, 1.17 feet per mile, which is the cause of the strong currents and rapids in this section of the river. Only small, very powerful, and specially designed ships could navigate the Upper River. There are some seventy gorges and rapids on the Upper Yangtse, and at some places the river is only 150 yards wide. It is probably the most dangerous stretch of water in the world, and the Chinese estimated that one in ten of junks going through were seriously damaged, and one in twenty lost, while a thousand lives were lost each year. Judging by the many accidents and near accidents, and the callous disregard of life shown by junk men, this is probably an under-estimate. There is some justification, therefore, for an old Chinese saying that \"it is more difficult to ascend to Szechuen than to heaven\". \n\nDuring the high water season ships of up to 1,400 tons could navigate the Upper Yangtse between Ichang and Chungking, but in the low water season ships of less than half that size could do so. Companies operating on the Upper Yangtse, therefore, had two types of ship, one for the high water and one for the low water season. \n\nThere was a bewildering variety of native craft operating on the different sections of the Yangtse, ranging from the large ocean-going junks which sailed on the Lower River and to coast ports, to the smallest junks on the highest reaches of the river above \n\nPage 135\n\nPage 136", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1963.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/4m90m091v", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 205446, "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": 208, "title": "RAS-1967", "content_text": "201\n\nPRESCOTT, J. A. RAINBIRD, S. W. O'C. REDFERN, O'Donnell S. REES, William RIDE, Sir L. T.* RIDE, Lady L. T.* RIGBY, Lady\n\nWest Penthouse, 11 Conduit Road, H.K. Training Unit, H.K.R.N.R. Building, Gloucester Road, H.K. 101 Holland Road, Hove 2, Sussex, England. Chung Chi College, Ma Liu Shui, N.T. 101 Tregunter Mansions, Old Peak Road, H.K. 67 Mount Nicholson Gap, H.K. New Haven, Taipo Kau, N.T. As above. 50 Magazine Gap Road, H.K.\n\nROBERTSON, Prof. Jean M. ROBERTSON, Dr. M. J. ROBERTSON, Mrs. W. G. ROBINSON, F. C. ROBINSON, Prof. Kenneth E.* ROE, Capt. J. S. ROGERS, Rev. D. L. ROSEMANN, Mrs. F. I. ROTHE, U.* ROY, Dr. A. RUMJAHN, S. M. RUST, H. A.\n\nDept. of Social Studies, The University, Pokfulum, H.K. Flat I, 4 Caldecott Road, Taipo Road, Kowloon, Park Mansions, 4 Mile Taipo Road, 1st fl., Kowloon, - - University of Hong Kong, Pokfulum, H.K. c/o Caldbeck Macgregor & Co., Ltd., Union House, Hong Kong. Union Church, Kennedy Road, H.K. 204, Ridley House, 2 Upper Albert Road, H.K. Ernst-Albers-Str. 2, 2 Hamburg-Wandsbek, Germany. Chung Chi College, Ma Liu Shui, New Territories. P. O. Box 448, H.K. -Palmer & Turner, Prince's Building, 19th Floor, H.K.\n\nRUTTONJEE, The Hon. D. RYAN, The Rev. Father T. F. RYDINGS, H. A. SAUNDERS, J. A. H. SCHALLER, Miss K. SCHOYER, B. P.\n\n2 Conduit Road, H.K. Wah Yan College, 281, Queen's Road, East, H.K. H.K. University Library, M.K. c/o H.K. & Shanghai Banking Corpn., H.K. Diocesan Girls' School, Jordan Road, Kowloon. 37, Northbridge Road, Greenwich, Connecticut, 06870, U.S.A.\n\n* Life Member\n\nPlease notify the Hon. Secretary of any inaccuracy", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1967.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/0c488p70g", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 205610, "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": 152, "title": "RAS-1968", "content_text": "NOTES AND QUERIES\n\n147\n\nIt is in connexion with worship of “Mother” that the lay-out of the shrine rooms in vegetarian halls of the sect is important. Mother must be placed higher than any other deity and should occupy a room to herself (or occasionally shared with Kuan-yin with whom, as we have said, she is sometimes identified). This means that halls of the sect should whenever possible be built on two storeys, with \"Mother's\" room on the upper storey. This was so in the case of all the halls visited. Usually, one of the popular triads is housed in the main downstairs shrine-room (occasionally one finds an image downstairs of the many-armed Chun-t'i: “Goddess of Dawn\" supposedly of Buddhist origin, but she was not present in the halls visited).\n\nUpstairs besides the room dedicated to “Mother\" there is often a shrine also for the soul-tablets of past members.\n\nMembers of the Society were fortunately permitted to visit all shrine rooms (some halls do not permit outsiders to enter the \"Mother\" room).\n\nRelations between the Halls and the Ngau Chi Wan Village\n\nThere is a certain amount of inter-action between the halls at Ngau Chi Wan and the village of this name which, though on the fringe of urban Kowloon and augmented by neighbouring squatter huts and factions, is still largely inhabited by the descendants of founding Hakka families who came to this spot in the mid-eighteenth century and after. The annual festival of the god of the main village temple (said to be a Ch'iu Ch'au deity whose image was brought up from the sea off Ngau Chi Wan by village fishermen a long time ago) occurs on the 25th of the 2nd lunar month. At this time the inmates of the halls visit the opera performance that is held in a matshed on open ground in front of the KAM HA CHING SHE and worship at the portable shrine that is brought on these occasions from the temple half a mile away. Our visit took place just before this festival and already the bamboo structure on which the matshed for the opera was to be built, was being erected. A large temporary cooking stove had also been constructed for the occasion for serving vegetarian food (which Marjorie Topley gathered in conversation with some of the inmates was contracted for by the village temple association from the vegetarian halls).\n\nAgain, at the Festival of Hungry Ghosts on the 7th of the 7th moon, it is “traditional” practice for about 100 students from the", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1968.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/66833948d", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 205775, "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": 81, "title": "RAS-1969", "content_text": "TUNG KWU ISLAND\n\n75\n\nnon-liquid food such as grain, nuts or fruit, or for holding food of some sort for the use of the dead, who would not be likely to find their food jars dissolving in their graves. The use of the net pattern with what were probably magic signs in each mesh may indicate that such jars were funerary vessels, covered with watching eyes or other patterns to repel demons from seizing and carrying off the food. (See R. Maglioni “Some Aspects of South China Archaeological Finds\" in Proceedings, Third Congress of Far East Pre-historians). The variety of patterns is illustrated in Plate 8.\n\nThe distribution of ornamented sherds in depth and locality presents some interesting points. In my collection, there are 33 such pieces. 16 were picked off the beach at unrecorded spots; the others were found in known stretches of beach, indicated on the sketch-map, or in situ at measured depths in the sand. It was not always easy to decide either the nature or the purpose of the designs inside the meshes, but round raised studs were probably ‘eyes', and most other designs were perhaps 'life-giving' or occasionally 'phallic'. A few were indeterminable: these were raised ridges in meshes of rhombic shape, or so shapeless that no conclusion could be drawn.\n\nFour designs of each type came from known depths, and four were found in the I, J, L, and M sectors. One, as well as four loose pieces with ‘eye' patterns, came from C sector. No real conclusion can be drawn from the recorded depths with so few specimens, except that the patterns seem to have been equally fashionable throughout the occupation of the site. From other sites, however, notably Sha Chau, a mile or two south of Tung Kwu, I got the impression that the raised stud in a single-line, square-net pattern was more popular when the upper layers of the sandbank formation were deposited.\n\nThe lines of the netting on the sherds differ in number from one to four, and the angles of the meshes are either right angles, enclosing squares, or obtuse and acute angles, enclosing rhombs. Of the square-meshed nets, only four are from known depths, none lower than 122 cm., and there are three with one line round the meshes and one with three. The rhombic net impressions are much commoner than the square in the pottery found at measured levels: 16 as against 4. Nets of one and three lines show average depths of 111 cm., those of two lines—much commoner—average 170 cm.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1969.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/9g553n20d", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 205884, "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": 190, "title": "RAS-1969", "content_text": "184\n\nBELL, G. J.\n\nBENANZIO, Dr. Mario\n\nBERKOWITZ, Dr. M. I,\n\nBERTUCCIOLI, Dr. G.*\n\nBEVERIDGE, R. J.\n\nBEYENS, Baron F.\n\nBIRCH, Dr. A.\n\nBIRNBAUM, Mrs. S. D.\n\nBLACK, D.\n\nBLACKMORE, M.\n\nBLAKER, D. J. R.\n\nBLUE, A. D.\n\nBLUNDELL, G. S.\n\nBOARD, D. B. M.*\n\nBONSALL, G. W.\n\nBORDWELL, H. H.\n\nBORGEEST, G.\n\nBOXER, Prof. B.\n\nBRAGA, J. M.\n\nBRAUN, F.\n\nBRIDGES, G. A.\n\nBRIGGS, G. G.\n\nBRIM, J. A.\n\nBROMHALL, J. D.\n\nBROOKS, D. E.\n\nRoyal Observatory, H.K.\n\n189 Ampang Road, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.\n\nc/o Dept. of Sociology, University of Pittsburg, Pa., USA.\n\nLungotevere delle navi 30, Roma, Italy.\n\nc/o 4A, Horsburgh Grove, Armadale, Melbourne, S.E. 3, Victoria, Australia.\n\nRoom 145, Alexandra House, H.K.\n\nDept. of History, University of Hong Kong, H.K.\n\n7, Braga Circuit, Kowloon,\n\nLong Acre, Gullane, East Lothian, Scotland.\n\nDept. of History, University of Hong Kong, H.K.\n\nc/o Gilman & Co., Ltd., P. O. Box 56, H.K.\n\n\"Upper Woodburn\", 19 Millig Street, Helensburgh, Scotland.\n\nD-4 Silverstrand, 94 Mile Clearwater Bay Road, Kowloon.\n\nc/o Education Dept., Lee Gardens, Hysan Avenue, H.K.\n\nc/o The University Library, University of Hong Kong, HK.\n\nP. O. Box 25, H.K.\n\nP. O. Box 1058, H.K.\n\nDept. of Geography, Michigan State Univ. East Lansing, Michigan 48823, U.S.A.\n\nP. O. Box 951, H.K.\n\n8 Kotewall Road, 4th floor, H.K.\n\nc/o The British Council, Gloucester Building, H.K.\n\nThe Supreme Court, H.K.\n\nc/o Universities Service Centre, 155 Argyle Street, Kowloon.\n\nc/o Fisheries Research Station, The Fish Market, Island Road, Aberdeen, H.K.\n\nRadio Hong Kong, Broadcasting House, Broadcast Drive, Kowloon.\n\n* Life Member\n\nPlease notify the Hon. Secretary of any inaccuracy", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1969.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/9g553n20d", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 206982, "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": 53, "title": "RAS-1974", "content_text": "ADVENTURERS IN HONG KONG\n\n47\n\nthe Chicago meat trade. Morès soon joined forces with Drumont,49 the brilliant anti-semitic editor of La Libre Parole, served as the paper's official duellist, and created a body of street fighters called 'Morès and His Friends'. These street fighters, the first 'storm-troopers', were recruited from among the butcher boys of the district of La Villette in northeastern Paris. Morès outfitted his 'friends' in cowboy hats, purple shirts and other Wild West accoutrements.\n\n51\n\nIn June 1890 Morès was sentenced to three months imprisonment50 for the publication of inflammatory writings; but this experience did not dampen his ardour as a fervent nationalist, socialist and anti-semite. He fought four duels, in one of which he killed Captain Armand Mayer, a Jewish officer in the French Army; but in 1893 his political position was compromised when Clemenceau revealed that the anti-semitic Morès had borrowed money from Cornelius Herz, a Jew associated with the notorious Panama scandal. In 1894 the impetuous Morès landed in Algeria and immediately embarked on a violent campaign to arouse the Moslems in North Africa.\n\nIn 1895, after a short visit to France, Morès returned to Algeria. His purpose was to create an alliance between Catholic France and Moslem Africa so as to block British expansion in the African continent. His scheme was visionary and it is not clear how he expected to unify Frenchmen and Arabs in a crusade against British imperialism; but we do know he planned an expedition from Tunis through Ghadames and Ghat across the Sahara Desert to Bahr el Ghazal, where the French would be in a strong position on the Upper Nile to throttle British power in Egypt and prevent complete British control of the route from Cape to Cairo.\n\nIn Tunis on 29 April 1896, Morès signed an agreement with a certain El Hadj Ali to guide a caravan from Gabes, Tunisia, to Ghat, a distance of some thousand miles. He left Gabes on the morning of 14 May with a small escort. On the journey south a party of Touaregs attached themselves to the caravan, claiming they would guide the party through the desert. In fact, they were the henchmen of the Touareg Bechaoui, who was waiting to plunder the caravan and kill Morès at a place on the Libyan frontier called Mechiguig.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1974.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/x633mp077", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 207793, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1976", "page_number": 181, "title": "RAS-1976", "content_text": "166 \n\nA. D. BLUE \n\nIn 1868 T. T. Cooper, a British merchant in Burma, came to Shanghai and attempted to improve on Blakiston's feat. His venture was partly financed by the Shanghai Chamber of Commerce. Cooper went up the Yangtze to Chungking, and then overland to Chengtu, the capital of Szechwan. Here he received permission from the Governor General to travel on through Szechwan and Tibet to India; but he met such determined opposition and hostility from the lamas on the Tibetan border, where he was imprisoned for five weeks, that he was forced to turn back. \n\nIn the following year, Sir Rutherford Alcock, British Minister at Peking, sent Robert Swinhoe of the China Consular Service to investigate trade prospects on the Upper Yangtze. Vice-Admiral Keppel, R.N. was making a survey of the river, and Swinhoe's party, which included Alexander Michie and Robert Francis of the Shanghai Chamber of Commerce and two naval surveyors, travelled to Ichang on H.M.S. Opussum. This was the first time a steamship had reached Ichang, and the Chinese pilot refused to go any further. A junk was hired for the passage through the Gorges to Chungking, and soundings and surveys taken en route. The surveyors, however, gave an unfavourable report on the feasibility of steam navigation on the Upper Yangtze. They particularly commented on the force of the current, lack of suitable anchorages, intricacy of navigation because of the changeable channel, and so on. They also thought descent would be even more difficult than ascent. The chief engineer of Opossum described a sample of coal obtained half way between Ichang and Chungking as resembling good anthracite in appearance, but requiring large furnaces and a long time for combustion. \n\nThis was the most thorough navigational survey of the Upper Yangtze, and many of the factors militating against steam navigation between Ichang and Chungking were investigated and made known. The bed of the river falls 470 feet in the 360 miles between the two places, and this fall of one and a third feet per mile is the cause of the strong currents and rapids in this section of the river. The most difficult stretch is the first half of the Upper River between Ichang and Wanhsien, where the most difficult rapids and gorges are encountered. The Ichang Gorge begins five miles above Ichang, and then come the Ox Liver and Horse's Lung Gorges, and the Hsintan Rapid immediately after the latter. The most spectacular", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1976.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/hq382988q", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 208680, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1979", "page_number": 137, "title": "RAS-1979", "content_text": "110\n\nREVS. J. SMITH AND WM. DOWNS\n\n27-Medical inspection of repatriates at 2:00 p.m. and preliminary inspection of baggage in rooms at 11:00 a.m., so it is beginning to look as if the good ship Asama Maru does mean business, after all!\n\n28-Sunday. There were no public Masses this morning in the Club Chapel, as that public room was reserved by the authorities for inspection of the baggage of the repatriates. Some baggage was also inspected at the same time just in front of our American Blocks. All bags and suitcases and bundles had to be put in a line and opened for the inspecting gendarmes as they passed along the line. After all, the inspection was not very strict. The baggage was then taken away in trucks to the small pier jutting out into Stanley Bay where, evidently, embarkation will take place. Since we could not have our regular public Masses in the main chapel, we had to be content with three Masses said in the Maryknoll Sisters, Canadian Sisters and in the Dutch apartments. In the afternoon as well we had to have Benediction in another garage just behind the American Club. At Stanley pier, we notice three small launches and some lighters, which are no doubt awaiting the arrival of the Asama Maru. All the Americans on the qui vive these days, and wondering when and if the good repatriation ship will put in an appearance.\n\n29—Maryknoll Foundation Day for all and Departure Day for some. As we arose, we scanned the horizon for signs of the Asama Maru, but there was no sign of her. However, along towards noon, she hove in sight and proceeded to Stanley Bay, where she anchored off shore about a mile distant. It was a thrilling sight, especially for the departants, and they were all wondering what kind of accommodations they were going to get, and what kind of food. After the ship dropped anchor no time was lost, and early in the afternoon the repatriates, about three hundred from the Stanley Camp, and some sixty direct from the city, went aboard the ship by launch. These sixty Americans from the city were bankers and banks' other officials who were allowed to remain at their posts, but who were practically interned in their own quarters. Some forty Americans are remaining in Camp, some of whom, including us, hope to get out to Hong Kong one of these days. Of this number, half are Maryknollers, including 15 priests, one Brother and 4 Maryknoll Sisters. Since we again lose our cooking squad, Father Meyer jumps into the breach and takes over, preparing our supper, which", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1979.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/2801w5938", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 210319, "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": 290, "title": "RAS-1984", "content_text": "269\n\nMy notebook says “We had tea at all these villages all locally grown\". The list includes Tai Hang Hau, Sheung Sze Wan and Ha Yeung, but I visited others in the group without making special mention of tea. At Ha Yeung I was told that they had 100 trees of what they called shan cha (山茶) (“hill tea”), not wild but planted by themselves. Tai Po Tsai, one of the larger villages of the area, claimed to have 50 trees, but the largest village settlement, Mang Kung Uk, reported \"only a few tea bushes not many.\" However, the little island settlement of Fu Tau Chau in Junk Bay gave me hill tea to drink, from its own trees.\n\nFurther towards Sai Kung Market, I was given hill tea to drink at Nam Wai, and also at Pak Kong Au, though the village reported \"only 8 to 10 trees\". East of Sai Kung, people in the hamlet of Shan Liu said that “tea was formerly grown (i.e. cultivated) but only wild bushes are now harvested”. But it was at Nam A, east of Sha Kok Mei, that I learned most. \"A really nice, almost English village\", I wrote enthusiastically. \"We drank hill tea (excellent) from trees planted twenty years ago in the hills behind the village, but not many. It is best brewed in porcelain, they said. Their supply lasts six months in all, but is harvested four times a year - once in the winter months, once at Easter and twice in the summer. The best is the Easter crop.” Nothing was said, or asked, about preparation but each crop was kept in a drawer for two months. My note ends \"The cows like to eat it!”.\n\nOn Lantau, the villagers of Pa Mei, otherwise known as Shan Ha, said they collected hill tea from Tai Tung Shan Keuk (大東山腳), that is the north western slopes of Sunset Peak. On South Lantau the people of the Pui villages also went up to Tai Tung Shan to collect leaves from wild bushes there in the second to fourth moons. Previously there had been many trees, but hill fires had reduced their number. It was used as leung cha (涼茶) for cooling the system. At Tong Fuk my notes state, \"they gather tea leaves from bushes on the hill and use it a lot. The tea comes from the Fung Wong Shan peak behind the village, and the leaves used are plucked in the second and third moons.” Rather surprisingly, the villagers of Upper and Lower Keung Shan, though located on the mountain slopes of a sheltered valley with good tree cover, had never cultivated tea bushes, or at least not within living memory.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1984.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/5h73wh572", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 211938, "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": 353, "title": "RAS-1989", "content_text": "328 \n\nwinter. Once in a year they practised shooting at a police shooting range near Man Kam To. In earlier times the guards had used gwan sticks.\n\nC. The village market\n\nAt present there are a few shops, mostly food stalls, in Kam Tin Shi. Some Dangs also live there. They are descendants of the senior branch, including descendants of Wan-Guk and Wan-Gaan. The place used to be the local market. It was active before the Japanese occupation. It had a sign in the form of an arch, which was removed by the Japanese. Some documentary information about the market has survived in a rent record.29 One of the shops entered into the rental contract in 1851. The rent book included entries for five shops in Kam Tin Shi. Among them one was run by a tailor. It also mentioned the names of three streets. These were Upper Main Street (Sheung Taai Gaai) and Lower Main Street (Ha Taai Gaai) as well as Middle Street (Jung Gaai). The elders remembered that the market had two or three butchers and two or three fishmongers. Besides these there were a few other shops. Two sold jaap-fo (“sundry goods”). Kam Tin Shi is remembered to have mainly catered for the needs of the Kam Tin people. Very few outsiders came.\n\nSome informants added that there was even one pawn shop inside Kat Hing Wai. The owner was a descendant of Wan-Gaan jou. I have no idea when the pawnshop was started. There was also a peanut oil factory which was started more than 100 years ago. It was owned by a Wan-Yu jou person.\n\nIV. SETTLEMENTS AND LINEAGE SEGMENTS\n\n4\n\nAccording to Sung (1973:111) Hon-Faat, the first Dang ancestor to come to the province, built the first house at the bottom of a hill called [Gwai Gok Saan] about three-quarters of a mile away from the present Kam Tin\". His grandson Fu-Hip lived there on retirement and founded a school called Lik Ying Jai (ibid.: 116). The descendants of Fu-Hip's grandson Seui, lived in the Naam Wai and Bak Wai villages around the beginning of Ming dynasty (1368). The division of the Kam Tin settlement into Naam-Bin and Pak-Bin remain today. Yun-leung, father of the gwan-ma and one of the sons of Seui, remained in Kam Tin. The other four descendants of Fu-Hip moved to nearby Ping Shan and places in Dongguan county, among other places. The descendants of many of the sons of the gwan-ma moved away to Lung Yeuk Tau, Tai Po Tau,\n\n30", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1989.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/8336pm92h", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 212607, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1991", "page_number": 161, "title": "RAS-1991", "content_text": "141\n\nThe Mongols conquered Burma in 1287, but the conquest did not last long; and a later invasion was repulsed in 1769. The British came in the nineteenth century to occupy Lower Burma. The French established themselves in Indo-China, whence they intrigued into Upper Burma, producing a situation not unlike that which, ten years later, led to the Fashoda incident on the Nile. The British, who had been having trouble with King Thibaw, decided to forestall French projects, and march on Mandalay. Upper Burma was annexed and the Court of Ava sent into exile. The British are not Burma's real problem: they have, as usual, provided stability and security. The danger lies to the West and to the East, where 400 millions in India and 450 millions in China, hem in a small country. It is not as if Burma is densely populated; the density is only 64 to the square mile, as against 295 in India and 145 in China.\n\nBurmese intercourse, facilitated by easy sea communications, has been greater with India than with China. In 1936 the overland trade with China amounted barely to a paltry 1,000,000 rupees. The subsequent increase brought about by the opening of the Burma road was quite artificial, the result of the blockade of the China coast by the Japanese. When the artificial conditions cease, the trade will revert to its normal channels, round by sea, and over the Indo-China railway or up the Yangtze.\n\nOwing to the relative short range of Indian pressure, overwhelming Indian penetration was what the Burmese had to fear most in the past, but signs are not lacking that the psychological effect of the building of the Burma road, and subsequently the behaviour of the Chinese troops, who retreated through Burma in 1942, may have changed the emphasis. Time will show.\n\nAlready in 1941 the most virulent whispering campaigns flourished, aimed at the Chinese, and directed more especially at the alleged graft and incompetence on the Burma road. That the Japanese were behind these campaigns is as probable as the plausibility which these rumours derived from the actual state of affairs on the road. Later, there were mixed feelings, when the Chinese troops entered Burma to take part in the defence; it would not be too strong to say that in many native quarters their entry was viewed with suspicion.\n\nAs is known, part of the Chinese troops retreated in 1942 into India, where they were reorganised and trained by American officers, but paid and equipped by the British taxpayer, under reverse lease-lend. It may be news, even to General Stilwell, that the idea of training and equipping\n\n!", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1991.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/k356gt84j", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 212629, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1991", "page_number": 183, "title": "RAS-1991", "content_text": "163\n\nJapanese planes were reported to be patrolling the road. We rolled back the hood from the rear half of the lorry and posted two sentries, one looking forward and the other aft, to sound the alarm should any planes be seen. The stores made such a rattle that in the cab you could not hear a shout from the rear, and so a string was led forward and tied to my wrist where I sat next to the driver. Three sharp tugs meant: \"Plane in sight, stop and get out quick\". Our lorry was always full of odd people, besides our own party, as in those days of transportation shortage there would be a crowd of passengers, civilian and military, male and female, at all stopping places, hoping for a lift. The trouble was that their idea of when the lorry was fully loaded and ours seldom agreed, and they would continue to pile in with their bundles long after, in our opinion, the safety margin had been passed.\n\nThe thought of our cargo made my hair stand on end. We had broken every safety rule inscribed in the manuals of the Royal Ordnance Corps. In addition to four large drums of petrol, we had a ton of ammonal, several boxes each of primers and detonators, some Mills and 69 grenades, rolls of instantaneous and detonating fuse, and a number of odd boxes of other types of explosive, such as gelignite and 808; each of these materials should have been segregated, and here they were all higgledy-piggledy with a quantity of shovels, picks, axes, and other metal implements jangling in the steel body of our lorry, and only too liable to spark. Our casual passengers liked to smoke and in their delightfully inconsequential way could not understand why we should object. It was a situation that would have pleased the \"Mad Hatter\", and the climax came when after a particularly bad bump over a pot hole one of the petrol drums burst a seam. The alarm signal was given and I pulled up in quick time to learn that the trouble was not a hostile plane but to meet a reek of petrol that spread a mile and to see the whole of our cargo soaked in the precious fluid which poured away to the earth from a corner of the vehicle. It did not take me long to turn off the engine. The members of our party jumped out and seized any handy can or bucket to catch the jetting petrol; others threw out part of the cargo so that we could reach the drum, which we eventually succeeded in turning over with the burst seam on the upper side. Having escaped disaster thus far, I ordered the whole of the party well away from the truck till the cargo had dried out and the spilt petrol had evaporated.\n\nOn the fourth day a van full of American aviators passed us. They were some of General Doolittle's men, who had parachuted into China", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1991.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/k356gt84j", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 214761, "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": 176, "title": "RAS-1999", "content_text": "140\n\neverything off just before dark. The AIS is full of naval personnel all trying to find accommodation and food. After a mad scramble, manage to find a bed and retire early, tired and hungry.\n\nThursday eleventh. Commander Millet OC AIS asks me to form antiaircraft and defence posts for Aberdeen as RAF only people with machine guns. I fix up four posts on the roof with tommy gun posts on the verandahs. The AIS makes a wonderful target being only half a mile from the naval dockyard. A hospital has been set up next door to the armoury. For breakfast we get one slice of bread and a little butter and tiffin is the same. For supper, if we're lucky, we get hot stew. Intensive bombing of Aberdeen harbour causing heavy casualties. How we curse the bombers and wish we had a few Gladiators which would make short work of them. Jap fighters are quite slow.\n\nFriday twelfth. Up early and drive in to HK. Buy food, cash a cheque and have a steak at Jimmies. Send cables to Pam and Mother. HK shelled from Kowloon. All our troops evacuated from Mainland. Hear that Walter Rosa, Dick Stanton, Houston Boswall and Bell who messed with us at Kai Tak have all been killed. Small party of Indians still fighting on Devils Peak. Royal Scots fired on in Nathan Road by Chinese fifth columnists using automatic weapons but Scots wipe the whole lot out. Chinese reported assisting Japs on large scale. Amazed at sinking of Prince of Wales and Repulse, also Jap successes against Americans. No one however doubts the final outcome and we realize that HK is only small fry in a tremendous issue.\n\nSaturday thirteenth. I set up antiaircraft positions on Bennetts Hill and Reservoir Hill with RAF personnel. CO goes to battle HQ, leaving me in charge. Dolly goes to Little Saiwan and the Colonel to Stanley. After much sweated labour get guns etc. in position. Whimpeys is in charge of Reservoir Hill and I of Bennetts Hill. I return to AIS for the night and at midnight there's a hell of a commotion and everyone is roused as the Japs are supposed to have landed on Aberdeen Island. Whole thing a farce and return to bed.\n\nSunday fourteenth. Set up positions on Bennetts and start digging holes in side of hill for billets. Junior and I dig like mad but, owing to rocks, make little progress. Quiet day except for a few air raids. Bed extremely hard and rain comes in.", "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": 215526, "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": 303, "title": "RAS-2001", "content_text": "253\n\n'106\n\nWestern side of Cheung Chau Island and about half a mile to the South-West of the village of Cheung Chau and containing about 5.19 acres, was authorized. This was the first cemetery designated on an outlying island and was later extended in 1921.107\n\n108\n\nIn 1912, two Chinese cemeteries were authorized. The first one was situated at 'New Kowloon Survey District 1 Lot Nos. 582 and 583,' very close to Sai Yu Shek Cemetery. The cemetery appeared in a 1924 map109 and was marked as 'Fukienese Cemetery.' In another 1940 HKGG Notification, the cemetery was also referred to as 'Fukienese Cemetery.' The second cemetery appointed, a Christian cemetery, was 'to be known as the Tsun Wan Christian Cemetery situate and being near Tsun Wan in Demarcation District No. 453 in the New Territories in the Colony of Hongkong, containing an area of 10,000 square feet,'111\n\nIn the following year, a site 'to be known as the Hau Pui Loong Cemetery situate and being near Hau Pui Loong in Kowloon in the Colony of Hongkong containing an area of about 19 acres' was appointed.112\n\nThe Chinese Permanent Cemetery in Aberdeen\n\nAlthough a number of Chinese cemeteries were authorized and appointed since the 1870s, these cemeteries were not intended for the upper and wealthier classes. By the early 20th century, the absence of what were considered proper and decent sites for these Chinese who wished to settle in Hong Kong was apparent. In 1901, the Cemeteries Committee of the Sanitary Board moved to set apart a piece of hillside between the Aberdeen Channel and Deep Water Bay for wealthy Chinese as a burial ground.113 However, for some reason, eventually this site was not appointed. Eight years later, the issue was presented again to the Sanitary Board by Lau Chu-pak, a member of the Board and one of the most prominent members of the Chinese community in the Colony,114 Lau said:\n\nThe better class of Chinese who had made Hong Kong their permanent home had not a decent cemetery in which to bury their dead, and the Chinese had no control on what were called Chinese Cemeteries. These cemeteries were simply tracts of barren land set apart by the", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2001.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/zg651950g", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 215597, "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": 374, "title": "RAS-2001", "content_text": "324\n\nJapanese were able to demand the formal opening of Chongqing to steamers, and a clause to this effect was embodied in the Treaty of Shiminoseki. By this treaty, under the favoured nation clause, the Chongqing and the Upper Yangzi became open to the world and Little immediately applied to the then British Minister, Sir Claude Macdonald [of the later Boxer Siege fame], who encouraged Little to proceed and promised energetic support. Little ordered a twin-screw steamer to be built in Shanghai, fifty-five feet long and ten feet beam. It steamed at nine knots, and though he would have preferred a larger and more powerful vessel he had to cut his coat according to his cloth. This was the Leechuen.\n\nHe left Yichang on 15th February 1898 for the 500-mile voyage through the Gorges, ascending some 500 feet during the journey to Chongqing. The story, told by Archibald Little in his Through the Yangtse Gorges,2 describes the most frightening moment when at dusk in the Scissors Gorge, making about six knots they bumped over a sharp rock that cut through the inch planking, broke two hardwood frames and sent water spouting up over the saloon floor. Fortunately they soon spotted a steep patch of sand on to which they ran the boat. Then, overnight, they stuffed cotton, white lead and tallow into the cracks; nailed blankets down with planks all over and by dawn had stopped the leak sufficiently to be able to get under way again. The rock had only newly fallen from the cliff above and had been unknown to the pilot. They reached Chongqing eleven days up from Yichang and the only photograph I have seen of the Leechuen during her epic journey is a very fuzzy snap of high cliffs with the Leechuen amidstream, a not so large speck, her billowing smoke being almost twice her size.3\n\nTwo British gunboats, H.M.S. Woodcock and H.M.S. Woodlark, made the same journey fifteen months later in May 1899, and then, in June, the first merchant steamer, Pioneer, followed them up to Chongqing.\n\nWe now turn to William Mesny. In 1878 and 1879 he travelled across south-west and central China calling on the most powerful and influential officials and gentry, advising them to adopt modern means for developing the riches of the country and bettering their conditions.* Mesny was a Jerseyman who spent most of his life, from first setting foot in China in 1861 until his death in Hankou in 1919 endeavouring to make his fortune. He was never backward in relating how he had the ears of many of the most influential Chinese of the day and although", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2001.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/zg651950g", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 215679, "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": 456, "title": "RAS-2001", "content_text": "408\n\nsee the immense possibilities of trade in Szechuen Province and beyond in Tibet. He became convinced that the only way to develop this was to find a way to bring steamers through the Three Gorges between Ichang and Chunking.\n\nLittle, still of the opinion that the Upper Yangtze could be navigated by steamships, made the passage in a junk from Ichang to Chunking in 1887. En route he carefully surveyed the main areas of risk and, on completion of this 400 mile journey, was even more sure that he was right.\n\nHe raised the money to build \"Kuling,\" a stern-wheeler, built on the Clyde and designed specifically for service on the Upper Yangtze. She was shipped out to Shanghai in pieces and reassembled there. However, when she arrived in Ichang, the Chinese authorities would not let her proceed. Apparently the Chefoo Convention stipulated that Chinese steamers had to be the first to ply this section of the river. (This restriction was abolished after the Sino-Japanese War by the Treaty of Shimonoseki in 1895.)\n\nIn any event, Little had to abandon this attempt to realise his dream. \"Kuling\" was sold to Chinese owners at a vast profit and traded on the Yangtze up to Ichang for many years, but never beyond.\n\nNot in the least deterred, in 1898, Little built a wooden-hulled, twin screw, steam launch named \"Leechuan.\" Once again he made the passage from Ichang to Chunking. Apart from having to be pulled up the stronger rapids by trackers the trip was a brilliant success. (Trackers were Chinese coolies who lived in villages near the rapids on both banks. Several hundred would be employed to haul vessels up the rapids.) Unfortunately, being only 55 feet long and full of engine, \"Leechuan\" carried no cargo.\n\nHeartened by his achievement with \"Leechuan,\" Little returned to London in 1899 to raise money to build a vessel that could navigate the Three Gorges and carry sufficient cargo to make its service financially viable.\n\nHow Samuel Plant came to China\n\nLittle was successful in raising money to build “Pioneer.\" By the", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2001.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/zg651950g", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 216047, "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": 346, "title": "RAS-2002", "content_text": "280\n\nfood and shelter with money he collected from foreigners. He always wore straw sandals, Chinese clothes and cap, and had a strong Chinese complex. The local Chinese adored him, but not so the missionaries; they detested him, even refusing him food and shelter, or any assistance whatsoever - consoling themselves with the reflection that he was a 'disgrace to the cloth'.\n\nDr. James Hayes has reminded me that he produced a note for Volume 23 of this JHKBRAS[1983] in which he provided extracts from A. H. Rasmussen's China Trader21 describing the westerner's community shooting bungalow in about 1905. Rasmussen was barely twenty when he joined the Chinese Maritime Customs at Zhenjiang, a small, lonely British concession. When first posted there he had been assured by others that Zhenjiang was a very nice and clean Concession, with a good club and excellent shooting. He found this to be a good description of the Concession but not of the native town. During his first four years, two of the original thirty-five Europeans died, two went mad, two cut their throats, and he himself was twice nearly murdered by smugglers. After several years with the Imperial Maritime Customs he was offered a job representing a foreign firm still in Zhenjiang and found himself now one of the upper set. No longer could he walk down the crowded streets of the Concession but must ride in state in his sedan chair, borne by his four chair bearers garbed in his firm's colours. Rasmussen's sanity was saved by the presence of a small shooting bungalow in the countryside near by, looked after by a caretaker. It was about eight miles away on a hill called Wu Chow where he would stay during his off-duty hours either reading or hunting wild boar. Though it was relatively expensive in ammunition and tips for the beaters he was able to lessen the latter by sharing expenses with shooting companions. Rasmussen spent many happy hours scanning the visitors' book finding out more about previous hunting successes and failures. He describes how he relieved his boredom by walking up and down the Bund, three hundred yards there and three hundred back, and for a change he walked along the only cross street to the south gate of the Concession, two hundred yards there and two hundred yards back.\n\nOne of the most lucrative trades around Shanghai and Zhenjiang used to be that of being shot. Foreign merchants often went up creeks in house-boat parties, or wander about the fields in the outskirts, looking for snipe. There were no hedges or game laws and innumerable", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2002.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/mp4901278", "rank": 0 } ]