[ { "id": 209855, "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": 114, "title": "RAS-1983", "content_text": "92\n\n3.\n\n4.\n\nThese speak a different language from the other three races. They have a history of having migrated ages ago from the Yangtse valley, and economically are pioneers, opening up inferior lands, and doing all quarry work. They occupy the eastern and northern islands, and are often called \"Chinese Scotchmen”. For this reason Scottish regiments here are called “Hakka ping\" (Hakka soldiers). Nearly all regimental servants here, I believe, are Hakkas: formerly the Hakkas were anti-Manchu and often joined Triad Societies. As such, they gave vigorous assistance to the British in 1857-61, and the connection with the Army has been kept up.\n\nHoklos, a Cantonese nickname for the coast peoples of Northeast Kwangtung; it means \"men of Hok1\", meaning Fukien. Most come from the area around Swatow and Swabue. Their language is very widely different from both Cantonese and Hakka: as different as German from English. They are fishermen, grasscutters, limekiln and saltpan workers. Their major settlements are at Tai O, Pingchau, Cheung Chau, Taipo (by the District Officer's island), and probably others. They are migrating here steadily, and many appear in court for offences of all sorts. A major reason behind the migration is probably that the coastal areas from which they come are suffering erosion and losing soil: the collapse of the Hoi Luk Fung Soviet Republic is another factor: finally, piracy is no longer as profitable as it was.\n\nPolitical divisions\n\nThe Ladrones or \"Pirate Islands\" of which Hong Kong and its outlying islands are part were so named by the Portuguese pioneers of sea trade to the East. They are shared unequally between China, Britain and Portugal. In China they are administered by the nearest district magistrates, of Hoifung, Po On, Chungshan, Sanwui, and Toishan districts. Macao has only two or three nearby isles. The British Islands are divided between the District Officer, North, and the District Officer, South, so that the latter is sometimes called \"Lord of the Isles\". I had that job for nearly 3 1/2 years.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1983.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/j9607p61v", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 210332, "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": 303, "title": "RAS-1984", "content_text": "282\n\nCHEUNG AH-LUM, A BIOGRAPHICAL NOTE\n\nCHOI CHI-CHEUNG\n\nOn February 2, 1857, Cheung Ah-lum, proprietor of the Esing Bakery, was charged with administering poison in bread with intent to murder on January 15 that year. The charge, defended by Dr. Bridge, who was Acting Colonial Secretary, was found unproven. However, Ah-lum was \"re-arrested as a suspicious character and detained in gaol until July 31, 1857\". He was released \"on condition of his not resorting to the Colony for five years\".\n\nThis Cheung Ah-lum was a member of the Cheung lineage of Heung Shan County (Hsiang Shan) (= now Chungshan). The Clan Record of this lineage was published in 1934, and contains a lengthy biography written by an old colleague, Chen Chao-ch'ang, in 1904, four years after Ah-lum's death. Since this biography gives a very different view of Ah-lum to that more frequently found, it is felt that a translation of this biography might be of interest, and it is, therefore, given below.\n\n“An Account of Ancestor Wu-sheng of the Chang (Cheung) Clan, granted the Honour of a High Official Title”\n\n\"His death name was Pei-lin, his style was Han-hung, and his assumed name was Wu-sheng. He was a native of Ya-kang of Heung Shan. His great-grandfather was Chiao-chin, his grandfather was Huan-pi, and his father was Wei-kang. He had two younger brothers, the first was Yu-hung, and the second was Tsan-hung. He was the eldest of the three sons of his father. From his youth, he was eager to excel. He could read the books his father gave him, and he had an excellent memory. However, because of poverty, he had to give up studying and followed Yung-yin, a man of the same surname whom he called uncle, to do business in Macao at the age of 13. From there, he learnt the ways of doing business with the foreigners. Knowing that Hong Kong was a newly opened port and that there were chances to develop business there, he decided to go to work in Hong Kong when he was 18. He became chief comprador of", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1984.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/5h73wh572", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 211939, "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": 354, "title": "RAS-1989", "content_text": "329\n\nLoi Tung, among other places, including some to Dongguan and Xiangshan counties. The cousins of Hung-Yi moved away to nearby Ha Tsuen and Xiangshan county, among other places. Hung-Yi's brother Hung-Ji moved to Ha Tsuen. Thereafter, all the remaining Dangs of Kam Tin were descendants of Hung-Yi.\n\nCasually asking the Dang elders about the relationship between lineage segmentation and settlement, one is given both concrete examples that suggest a correspondence as well as general observations that there is no correspondence. For example, one would be told that the descendants of the third branch (Yeui), which are very few in number, all live in Wing Lung Wai, and that all the others of that village were descendants of the first fong. Unless one asks about a particular segment, the answers would be in terms of the four branches of the lineage, and the conclusion will be that no single segment lives in a village of its own except in the case of Tai Hong Wai where all the villagers are descendants of Man-Wai and his brothers.\n\nGoing down the level of segmentation, to the lineage divisions focussed upon ancestors of the 17th to 19th centuries, there is correspondence in the sense that members of these segments all live in the same village. As already mentioned, all the members of the third branch live in Wing Lung Wai. Similarly, all the Ji-Ga Tong people live in Shui Tau, all the descendants of Wan-Yu live in Wing Lung Wai, and all the descendants of Gwong Yu Tong and Lei Ging Tong live in Tai Hong Wai. Another example is the descendants of Wan-Gaan, who, according to one account, had three sons: Fau-Ng, Jan-Ting and Gai-Jau. Gai-Jau's segment live in Kat Hing Wai. Fau-Ng's descendants are divided into three sub-segments. One of the three lived in Ko Po, another in Kat Hing Wai, and the other in Kam Hing Wai.\n\nSome segments of the lineage settled elsewhere. The descendants of Hung-Yi's second son Jan had moved to Ying Lung Wai near the Yuen Long Old Market at a very early date. I was told by its head of branch that many more lived in Zhongshan county. Some of the descendants of San-Fung, a son of Wan-Guk, also had settled elsewhere. I was told that most of them live in Kat Hing Wai, but some had moved to Tong Fong near Ping Shan. The ritual handbook for Ching-Lok's ancestral hall had a special provision for the descendants of San-Fung, which said that they had moved to Naam Tau, in a street outside the city wall.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1989.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/8336pm92h", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 212019, "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": 434, "title": "RAS-1989", "content_text": "409\n\nmore evidence and further substantiation are needed for Faure to argue otherwise.\n\nAlso related to cash-cropping is the question of subsistence which Faure addresses. It is well known that Guangdong was a rice-deficit province throughout the period under study, very much dependent on foreign and extra-provincial supplies even in normal years as the records of the Imperial Maritime Customs clearly show. The conventional view that population pressure and the displacement of food crops by industrial cash-crops necessitated grain imports is, however, regarded by Faure as a 'fallacy', (p. 56). He contends, 'Grain was imported, not because food was short, but because income from export crops had raised the standard of living... an income with which to purchase a preferred foodstuff....' (pp. 56, 58). It follows that the increase in grain consumption in Guangdong was, in all likelihood, not a sign of impoverishment, but of rising prosperity', (p. 58). This contention is, I think, questionable. One wonders why Faure, in tabulating ‘paddy yield estimates' and 'food sufficiency' in Guangdong (Tables A.3 and 3.4), chooses to rely on Guoli Zhongshan daxue nongke xueyuan's surveys and does not make good use of the more comprehensive county paddy acreage and production statistics collected in Chen Qihui's Guangdong tudi liyong yu liangshi zhanxiao as well as the county paddy consumption statistics contained in Guangdong jingji nianjian. Since these latter sources serve to shed light on the patterns of paddy production and consumption in practically all the counties of Guangdong, they ought to have been taken account of in order to achieve a better understanding of the reasons behind the continuous need to import rice. Faure does point out that 'the [county] average figures have been subject to manipulation'. (p. 217). But why are Zhongshan daxue's data, whose coverage is more restricted, considered to be more reliable? Faure does not explain. Indeed, the county statistics show that demand generally exceeded supply, and that rice shortage was fundamentally attributed to an adverse man-land ratio. They do not support Faure's contention that 'the areas that suffered from population pressure or land shortage were not the ones that could have afforded to import grain, while the ones that did were not as short of grain', (p. 56). Dependence on outside supply was accordingly a matter of sheer necessity and not simply \"out of choice' (p. 56), as Faure claims.\n\nSpace does not allow me to comment in detail other aspects covered by Faure. I shall be brief. On certain issues, Faure's work certainly", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1989.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/8336pm92h", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 212467, "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": 21, "title": "RAS-1991", "content_text": "BUSINESS NETWORKS AND PATTERNS OF CANTONESE COMPRADORS AND MERCHANTS IN NINETEENTH-CENTURY HONG KONG*\n\nPUI TAK LEE\n\nTo trace and account for the role of Cantonese in modern Chinese economic history is an interesting study topic. Actually, under what specific socio-economic and historical conditions did the Cantonese contribute to the formation of Chinese capitalism? Cantonese are outstanding in business not only in mainland China but also amongst overseas Chinese scattered around the world. The Cantonese were the earliest and largest group of Chinese to go to Southeast Asia. Moreover, in the 1850s, after the Taiping Rebellion, Chinese immigrated to Hong Kong or transited through Hong Kong to the west coast of North America and to Australia. This movement reached its peak in the 1880s. Overseas Chinese are always hardworking, hoping to save enough money to ensure them a good quality of life after they return to China. They usually accumulated capital and modern business know-how when they were in foreign countries and then returned to start their own business in China. An obvious example is the Australian Cantonese who started the first modern department store in Hong Kong, which marked a revolution in modern Chinese retailing business practice. Furthermore, the four biggest department stores in Shanghai were also opened by Cantonese, and all of them came from the Heung Shan (Zhongshan) prefecture, which is strategically located near Macau and Canton, the two centres of early European commerce in China. Simultaneously, in the mid-nineteenth century, Cantonese compradors from Zhongshan prefecture, namely Xu Run, Tang Tingshu, and Zheng Guanying, were pioneers in establishing modern Chinese businesses. This article will assess the mechanism of Cantonese immigration in the nineteenth century and also examine emigrant Cantonese business ethics.\n\nEmigration and Chinese Ethnic Groups\n\nEmigration from China gave rise to the concept of native place identity. Historically, Chinese have always distinguished their place of\n\n* The first annual lecture on local history, jointly organised by the Hong Kong Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society & South China Research Circle, Hong Kong University of Science & Technology, 10 December, 1994", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1991.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/k356gt84j", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 212477, "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": 31, "title": "RAS-1991", "content_text": "11\n\nthat all men must die and not knowing when I may be called away, I deem it right while still in bodily health and full possession of mental faculties to make my will.\n\nWei A Kwong, the father of Wei Yuk, had a typical story of success. He was a Zhongshan native; he left his hometown and worked in Macau as a teenager. His father was a comprador to two American merchants, Benjamin Chew Wilcocks and Oliver H. Gordon. It was known that Wei was forsaken by his family and had to resort to begging on the streets of Macau. He was later sent to Singapore where he studied under the auspices of the Morrison Education Society in a school of the American Board of Commission for Foreign Missions. This changed his life. He returned to Hong Kong and began his career. He served as comprador in Bowra & Co. and then in the Mercantile Bank of India, London and China until his death. Wei wrote his will in 1866. He prefaced it with a brief account of his life, particularly mentioning that he was the first student of the Morrison Education Society and that he first came to Hong Kong in 1843. He had \"ever since lived under the just and equitable rule of the British Government.\" Though we cannot prove to what extent his exposure to Western culture was related to his Christian education, he succeeded in becoming a leading member of Chinese society in Hong Kong. This contrasts with the will of Sung Chin Tseung, which reads.\n\nSung Chin Tseung, otherwise literary appellation Sung Ching, otherwise Ngok Shan, native of Kat Tai village, of Kong Sheung Division, Heung Shan District. I followed my deceased father, Mr. Shau U, to Hong Kong in 1842 to trade in foreign business as compradore. Further, in 1854, thanks to the kind support of Mr. Ryrie and others of Messrs. Turner and Co., Hongkong, I took over the office of compradore and up to the present thirty odd years.\n\nBoth Wei and Sung were natives of Zhongshan. They came to Hong Kong for business in the early 1840s when Hong Kong was already a British colony. Though they lived in Hong Kong, they maintained connections with their hometown, as Sung's father, Soong Ke, stated in his will written in 1864:\n\nIn the 21st year of Tao Kwong (1841), I came to Hong Kong and employed myself in business all the time with foreigners, always being diligent and making little profit sufficient to", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1991.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/k356gt84j", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 212478, "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": 32, "title": "RAS-1991", "content_text": "12\n\nsupport my wife and family. In 6 year of Hum Foong (1856) being advanced in age, I handed over all my property to my eldest son Cheng Chuen to manage and sign my name Soong Ke in all business transactions, and he has already managed for several years. In consequence of my having to return home to my native place in the present year to build an ancestor's hall out of my own money, and consequently coming and going I took sick and a large carbuncle broke out on my thigh, getting worse day by day, being now about sixty years of age and my constitution is weak.\n\nHong Kong-Shanghai and Shanghai-Canton-Hong Kong Networks\n\nCantonese compradors were predominant in the nineteenth century. They occupied most of the compradorship in foreign mercantile establishments. They were influential in Hong Kong, enjoying a high status in the business community. Cantonese compradors filled the new posts by personal ties, extending their influence from one place to another. For example, Xu Run was introduced by his uncles Xu Yuting and Xu Rongcun who had been working as compradors to Dent & Co. in Shanghai for many years. Xu was first employed as an assistant comprador and later succeeded his family members as compradors: one of his sons to a German firm; one of his cousins as Dent's Kiukiang (Jiujiang) comprador; and another cousin as Shanghai comprador to Carlowitz & Co.\n\nLikewise, Zheng Guanying was also introduced by his relative in Shanghai to serve the compradorship in Butterfield, Swire & Co. Tang Tingshu was introduced by his Zhongshan colleague called Acum (Lin Qin) to James Whittall, the Jardine's Shanghai manager, then he became a comprador to Jardine, Matheson & Co. Tang later guaranteed his elder brother Tang Maozhi as the firm's Tianjin comprador and this brother later succeeded him as chief comprador in Shanghai when Tang Tingshu was relocated to work at the China Merchants' Steam Navigation Co. in 1873. The post was held by the Tang family for several decades. The last was his grandson Tang Jichang. Those three compradors came from the same Zhongshan prefecture and had an inter-relationship. Zheng was a relative to Tang by marriage and also knew the Xu family for generations.\n\nZheng had guaranteed a Zhongshan townman named Yang Guixuan", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1991.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/k356gt84j", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 212479, "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": 33, "title": "RAS-1991", "content_text": "13\n\nto succeed him as chief comprador to Butterfield & Swire. However, Yang went into bankruptcy after a Shanghai financial crisis and left a debt of a hundred thousand taels to Butterfield & Swire. As the guarantor, Zheng was accused by the company and as a result he was imprisoned in Hong Kong for a few months. Zheng's business activities were not only confined to Shanghai, he had also been active in Canton. He had been in charge of the branch of Kaiping Coal Mines in Canton from 1891 and also of the Canton-Hankow Railway Co. Moreover, the first Chamber of Commerce in Canton was organised by him in 1905.\n\nXu Run, Tang Tingshu and Zheng Guanying, all came from the same place, Zhongshan prefecture, and shared the same experience in compradorial life and took part in the guandu shangban enterprises under the patronage of Li Hongzhang. Needless to say, they had all chosen Shanghai as the place to develop their careers. They could be regarded as leaders of the Cantonese community in Shanghai. Amongst the three persons, Xu Run was the earliest and youngest in arriving in Shanghai, Tang was regarded as the oldest, he arrived in Shanghai in 1858 aged 27, he had probably been educated and started his career earlier in Hong Kong for a long period. However, though Tang started his compradorial life later, it did not hamper his contribution to modern economic development of China. Tang joined the Kaiping Coal Mines from its beginning and remained with it until the end of his life. After Tang had been engaged in guandu shangban enterprises, particularly in the Kaiping Coal Mines, he confined his business activities mainly to Tianjin, while Xu and Zheng were still active in Shanghai, Canton and Hong Kong.\n\nAn obvious example was the nationalization project of China Merchants' Steam Navigation Co. advocated by Sheng's political rival Yuan Shikai in 1909. Considering Xu was from Yuan's clique and able to use his strong influence in Hong Kong and Macau, Zheng was sent by Sheng to compete with Xu in soliciting the support of Cantonese shareholders in Canton, Hong Kong and Macau in opposition to the nationalization project. Xu and Zheng at that time were backing their own patrons. Xu was pro-Yuan whereas Zheng was pro-Sheng. As a result, Zheng defeated Xu in gaining the support of Cantonese shareholders and successfully kept the company private. It was incorporated as a limited company in 1909.\n\n15\n\nConnection of Cantonese Merchants\n\nMerchants were among the first Cantonese to emigrate to Macau and", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1991.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/k356gt84j", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 212480, "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": 34, "title": "RAS-1991", "content_text": "14\n\nHong Kong. First, they had enough money to pay their own passage and start new businesses. Second, they had the inclination to engage in trade at a time when business was shifting from Canton to other places. The life stories of Cantonese merchants tell the origin of their emigration, how they struggled against the difficult environment and hardship in acquiring wealth. They gave details of their business careers in the wills to encourage their descendants to follow their examples in creating a successful life.\n\nCanton-Hong Kong-Macau Network\n\nO Kee Cheung, a Cantonese merchant who first came from Canton to Macau, accumulated business know-how and went to Madagascar for trade. Later he returned to Macau but took residence at Canton. He mentioned he was poor and suffered a lot of sorrow in the past and reminded his sons there was hardship and extreme difficulties in making a fortune. His business was the Yee Fung Hong in Annam and there was a family trust fund named the O Chin Sin Tong:\n\nI came to Macao at the age of 18 to learn business, and at the age of 20, I began visiting foreign countries for the purpose of trade. During the first few years, I neither gained nor lost much. Afterwards through the help of Mr. Lee Mang, I went to trade in Madacassar and other islands and was a little more successful. Then I returned to Macao, and afterwards lived at Canton, at which time I was successful in all trade transactions, and my family was considered wealthy. But learning in mind the dangers of the winds and seas and the troubles encountered during the adventures of my youth, my former poverty and sorrow still appear to be within my sight. Therefore with tasteless rice and coarse dress, and always striving to renounce worldly vices, I have passed several decades, as if they were but one day. I have thus set you an example, so that you may know the hardships attending upon the making of a fortune, and being afraid that I would not be able to hold fast to the same, I have always striven to be diligent and economical, and even then, I was afraid of losing it.\n\n16\n\nLeung Kau was a Zhongshan native. It had been said he went to California when mining for gold was the chief attraction for most people.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1991.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/k356gt84j", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 212483, "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": 37, "title": "RAS-1991", "content_text": "17\n\nthe 550 specified wills, 67 of the testators were at the time absent from Hong Kong, being only 12.2%. Mostly they were in Canton and Macau and nearly all of them were in retirement or were there for medical reasons. 19 Table 2 shows Hong Kong merchants held properties, mainly landed properties, not only in Hong Kong, but also in Canton, Macau and Shanghai as well as other parts of China.\n\nTable 2\n\nProperties Held by Hong Kong Merchants in China, 1850-1906\n\n \n \n 1850-70\n 1871-80\n 1881-90\n 1891-1900\n 1901-1906\n \n \n Canton\n 3(4)\n 9(11)\n 7(8)\n 14(14)\n \n \n \n Macau\n 1\n 1(1)\n \n 5(?)\n \n \n \n Shanghai\n \n 1(1)\n \n \n \n \n \n Rest of China\n 1(2)\n \n \n [(?)\n \n \n \n Total\n 1\n في\n 3\n 9\n 10\n 20\n \n\nnote:( ) number of places where landed properties located Source: HKRS#144\n\nHong Kong-Canton-Shanghai Network\n\nAfter 1842, British commercial interests on the Chinese coast were dually extended from Canton to Hong Kong and Shanghai. The newly opened port in Shanghai was flocked to by Cantonese merchants, compradors and foreign employees with Western merchants.20 Though Shanghai was opened for trade in 1843, the real development of Shanghai began during the 1850s. Cantonese emigrants came to Shanghai with the hope of making a fortune from foreign trade, particularly in the 1850s when the Taiping Rebellion disrupted trade in South China. Cantonese merchants had early established a presence in Shanghai. The Cantonese guild was established as early as 1710. As a scholar said, Cantonese merchants were a more national rather than a regional type. After 1843, they mostly came from Zhongshan prefecture and the Hong Kong Macau area, a region within the Pearl River estuary. Shanghai and Hong Kong were cities of immigrants, the number of outsiders surpassed the natives. Statistics confirm this impression. In 1885 immigrants represented some 85 percent of Shanghai's population.\n\nThe first Shanghai taotai after the Opium War, Wu Jianzhang, was a Zhongshan native who came from the merchant family of Samqua of", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1991.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/k356gt84j", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 212489, "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": 43, "title": "RAS-1991", "content_text": "23\n\nCloth Mill in 1879. They were regarded as merchants willing to take risks in adventurous undertakings, however, some of them lost money from pouring capital in modern enterprises and some even went bankrupt by speculating.\n\nXu Run (1838-1911)\n\nXu was the earliest, before Tang and Zheng, to come to Shanghai for business and trade as a comprador. In 1852, at the age of 15 Xu left his hometown Zhongshan, trade as a comprador. In 1852, at the age of 15 Xu left his hometown Zhongshan, transited through Macau and Hong Kong to Shanghai where he lived with his uncle Xu Yuting who was working at the Dent & Company in Shanghai (the first Western firm to open a branch in Shanghai) as a comprador. Xu entered Dent & Co. through his uncle's connection. Four years later Xu was promoted from a trainee (as Xu himself stated, he first learnt the tea and silk trade when entering the Company) to an assistant comprador and finally in 1861, he succeeded his uncle as the comprador. His diligent performance was greatly admired by the manager of Dent & Co., E. Webb. From Xu's autobiography, we are able to assess the wealth of a Cantonese comprador in Shanghai accumulated during his compradorial years and also as an independent merchant in which his business investment included various modern enterprises. Furthermore, his autobiography also tells of his complicated relations with Sheng Xuanhuai and Yuan Shikai as well as a part of his personal family history.\n\n30\n\nIn 1868, Xu Run left Dent & Co. and started his own business. He opened the Baoyuanxiang Tea House. The name itself manifested a tea trade business. By 1883, Xu had accumulated a personal wealth of 3,409,423.3 taels.\n\nItem\n\nTable 4\n\nAssets Owned by Xu Run in 1883\n\n \n Item\n Amount (taels)\n %\n \n \n Landed property in Shanghai\n 2,236,940.0\n 65.61\n \n \n Miscellaneous stocks\n 426,912.0\n 12.52\n \n \n Capital in pawnshops\n 348,571.3\n 10.22\n \n \n Shares in custody\n 397,000.0\n 11.64\n \n \n Total\n 3,409,423.3\n 99.90\n \n\nSource: Ku Run, Qing Xu Yuzhi Kiansheng Run Zixu Nianpu, pp 67-8", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1991.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/k356gt84j", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 212490, "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": 44, "title": "RAS-1991", "content_text": "24\n\nAs Table 4 shows, the largest amount of Xu's investment was real property. Xu was said to have started the business in real property when his boss E. Webb advised him to do so before Xu retired from Dent & Co. in 1868. He told Xu that a boom in landed properties in Shanghai would come within a few years as Shanghai was developing and its population was expanding. Xu did more than Webb said; he bought a lot of land and built a number of houses from which he could derive a rental income of about 122,980 taels per year. Xu was quite confident he could derive a large amount of profit even though he had to borrow money at a high rate of interest. Though Xu did plan to share his business with other persons by setting up a new firm named the Baoyuanxiang Real Property Co. with a subscribed capital of four million taels, his plan was unfortunately interrupted when he recognized it was not easy to raise sufficient capital in Shanghai. Even worse, his only partner, Boyd & Co. in England, failed to solicit the capital and suddenly withdrew from partnership. Therefore, he became the sole proprietor liable to all the debts of this company. In 1883, he had accumulated a loan of 2,522,237 taels from twenty-two native banks. Unfortunately, in 1883, Shanghai experienced a financial crisis and foreign banks and the Shenxi bankers withdrew financial credits from the native banks in Shanghai. At a time when real properties were declining in price, Xu was forced to repay debts. He finally became bankrupt. As Xu estimated, due to the recovery from depression in Shanghai after the crisis, the total value of his property in 1883 was now valued at about eighteen million taels. He complained he had lost a million taels.\n\nConcerning Xu's investment in modern enterprises, it is to be noted that he had been active only after his failure in the speculation of landed property in 1883. Table 5 shows Xu's business interests were not only confined to Shanghai but also other parts of China, including Hong Kong. The amount shown in this table is mainly based on Xu's autobiography. It is interesting that in stating his total investment, he had omitted the amount of investment in foreign enterprises and also partnership in the native banks. Perhaps he thought they were not in the category of modern Chinese enterprises. Of his investment in modern Chinese enterprises, the biggest amount was in steam navigation, mines, industrial manufactories, insurance, and land reclamation.43\n\nTang Tingshu (1832-1892)\n\nAs has been described before, Tang Tingshu was born in Zhongshan", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1991.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/k356gt84j", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 212491, "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": 45, "title": "RAS-1991", "content_text": "25\n\nItem\n\nTable 5\n\nXu Run's Investment in Modern Enterprises\n\n \n Company\n Amount (T)\n %\n Place\n \n \n China Merchants' Steam Navigation Co\n 480,000\n 33.44\n Shanghai\n \n \n Yun Wo Insurance Co.\n 100,000\n \n Shanghai\n \n \n Chi Wo Insurance Co.\n 50,000\n 10 45\n Shanghai\n \n \n Kaiping Coal Mines\n 150,000\n \n Tianjin\n \n \n Guichi Coal Mines\n 100,000\n \n Anhui\n \n \n Sanshan Silver Mines\n 60,000\n \n Rehe\n \n \n Pingchuan Copper Mines\n 60,000\n \n \n \n \n Jinzhou Mines\n 50,000\n \n \n \n \n Other Mines\n 10,000\n 29 96\n \n \n \n Shanghai Cotton Mill\n 50,000\n \n Shanghai\n \n \n Shang Jinglun Cotton Mill\n 170,000\n \n Shanghai\n \n \n Craseman & Hagen's Filanda (Yantai Saosi Ju)\n 10,200\n \n Yantai\n \n \n Paper Manufactury\n 20,000\n \n Shanghai\n \n \n Chinese Glass Works Co.\n 30,000\n \n Shanghai\n \n \n Shanghai Dairy Farm Co.\n 30,000\n \n Shanghai\n \n \n Hong Kong Liyuan Sugar Refinery\n 30,000\n \n Hong Kong\n \n \n Tianyi Land Reclamation Co\n 5,000\n \n Jinzhou\n \n \n Taggu Cultivation Co.\n 30,000\n 2.44\n Tianjin\n \n \n Zhongshan Tongyi Ranyuan Cultivation Co\n 1,000($)\n \n Guangdong\n \n \n Total\n 1,435,200\n 99.99\n \n \n\n(+$1,000)*\n\n* Mexican dollars have not been added in the total or calculated in the percentage\n\nSource: Xu Run, Qing Xu Yuzhi Xiansheng Run Zixu Nianpu.\n\nbut educated in Hong Kong. He first came to Shanghai as an interpreter in the Chinese Maritime Customs in 1859. It is believed that he was introduced by an officer named Horatio Nelson Lay whom Tang had met in Hong Kong. Tang was recruited as a comprador by the Jardine, Matheson & Co. in 1863 but he left in 1872. During the decade of his compradorial career, he invested, planned, organized and assisted in the sale of stocks of a number of enterprises. These enterprises were called modern because they had adopted a new form of ownership, organization and management. Moreover, some of them such as steam navigation and insurance companies were the first to take place in China. Unlike Xu\n\nPage 45\n\nPage 46", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1991.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/k356gt84j", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 212493, "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": 47, "title": "RAS-1991", "content_text": "27\n\nShanghai, named the Guang Zhao Gongsuo,\n\nNeedless to say, Tang was famous amongst Cantonese merchants. In 1876, when Tang was organizing the telegraph office in Fuzhou, he was invited by Ding Richang to set up a Chinese bank with branches in Tokyo and London. The venture was supported by a group of Cantonese merchants to set up a modern bank with a paid-up capital of three hundred thousand taels to meet the increasing need of a financial institution to accelerate Chinese trade in foreign countries. Tang was also active in business circles in Hong Kong. He joined in partnership with his brother Tang Maozhi in the first sugar refinery in Hong Kong. Tang contributed three thousand taels while William McGregor Smith contributed the largest share of sixteen thousand taels. They planned to export sugar to Jiujiang, but probably due to Tang's transfer to Shanghai, export of refined sugar was changed to connect with Shanghai where they operated successfully until 1864. Afterwards Tang sold his share to his brother Tang Maozhi. The refinery was set up at East Point, Hong Kong, under the name of Smith, Wahee & Co. However, it eventually went bankrupt and was taken over by Jardine, Matheson & Co.\n\nTang left his work at China Merchants' Steam Navigation Co. in 1884 to manage the Kaiping Mines in Tianjin in which he had a personal investment of three hundred thousand taels. It has to be mentioned that with the appointment of Tang as the Kaiping's general manager, a large number of Cantonese workers were recruited for Tianjin. By 1891, the number of Cantonese workers had grown to five hundred of which some had returned from California and Australia. Though these Cantonese miners were more skilled and experienced than local workers, they did not get along with the local people and refused to teach their skills to the northerners, as they were called. In 1883 a group of a hundred men from Swatow had to be discharged because of conflicts between them and their headmen.\n\nZhang Guanying (1842-1922)\n\nZheng was born in Zhongshan. It is unclear when he moved from Zhongshan to Macau but it was certain that he had received his traditional education in Canton. After Zheng had failed in the public examination, he decided to become a merchant. In 1858, he was sent to his uncle Zheng Tingjiang in Shanghai, who had been a comprador to Overweg & Co. Zheng soon entered into the Anglo-Chinese School organized by a", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1991.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/k356gt84j", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 212496, "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": 50, "title": "RAS-1991", "content_text": "30\n\nenterprises,\" but also challenged their foreign counterparts by planning, organising, and managing most of the modern Chinese enterprises. As Thomas Rawski has pointed out, Western firms in Chinese treaty-ports such as Shanghai were ineffectual on their own; they had to rely on Chinese compradors to conduct business with their Chinese associates. Cantonese compradors were in such a position that they could dominate the main business in Shanghai during the nineteenth century where they had fully shown their special entrepreneur genius.\"\n\nNotes\n\nAssessment of recent studies of Chinese ethnic groups is mainly quoted from Emily Honig (1992) pp. 6-7\n\n2\n\nAs Yen-p'ing Hao mentioned most of the Cantonese compradors came from the coastal prefectures of Guangdong province as Zhongshan, Nanhai and Panyu See Hao (1970a). p. 13\n\n1\n\nFor sample of letter of recommendation for comprador used in the 1870s, see Appendix\n\n+\n\nHKRS#144-245 Wong Kong (August 1867)\n\n4 Hao has explained why Western firms in Japan employed Chinese instead of Japanese compradors. See Hao (1970a), pp. 51-9\n\n6 The first three British firms opened were Dent & Co. (first established Canton, 1832), and Gibb, Livingston & Co. (1836 in Canton)\n\n7 Wei came from the Zhongshan prefecture, his father was a comprador to two American merchants Benjamin Chew Wilcocks and Oliver H. Gorden. He followed a missionary and moved from Canton to Hong Kong. In 1852 he entered Bowra & Co. as a comprador and five years later when the Chartered Mercantile Bank of India, London and China established a branch in Hong Kong he joined the Bank as its first comprador. See Smith (1985), pp. 62-9 and Wei A Kwong's will, HKRS#144-368: Wei A Kwong (October 1866), Wei Yuk's brother Wei Long Shan went to Shanghai to learn business in 1871. He returned to Hong Kong after twelve years and then became comprador to the Eastern Extension and Great Northern Telegraph Co. from 1882 to 1902. He was also assistant comprador at the Hongkong & Shanghai Bank from 1885 to 1895.\n\nIn the absence of sufficient sources, it is difficult to assess Wei's wealth accumulated during his comprador's years.\n\nThe Ho family, beginning with Ho Tung, was called a comprador family. Ho introduced his two brothers Ho Fuk and Ho Kom Tong as assistant compradors to Jardine who later succeeded him; his adopted son Ho Sai Wing was the Hong Kong Bank's comprador through thirty-four years from 1912 to 1964. Ho Sai Wing's brothers: Ho Sai Iu was comprador of the Mercantile Bank of India, Ho Sai Kwong of David Sassoon & Co.; Ho Sai Leung of Jardine, Matheson & Co., Ho Sai Ki of Arnhold & Co. Ho Sai Wa, son of Ho Kom Tong was an assistant comprador in Mercantile Bank. See Group Archives of the Hong Kong and Shanghai Banking Corporation, Comprador Files. Ho Sai Wing. Ho Fuk (Ho Fook)'s son was said to have assisted him in Jardine's work.\n\n10 This company was said to have close business relations with Shanghai's Ting Tai firm.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1991.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/k356gt84j", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 212517, "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": 71, "title": "RAS-1991", "content_text": "51\n\ndistinguished scholars, Wang Chang (1725-1806) and Sun Xinyen (1753-1818) were invited by Ruan Yuan to serve as senior lecturers at the academy he established in Hangzhou, the Gu jing jing she.\n\nWang Chang, a man-of-letters with expertise in such diverse fields as the Classics, linguistics, Buddhist scripture, border warfare, and copper administration, had attained the jinshi degree in 1754 and had served as a clerk in the Grand Council. After a long career that included serving on the personal staff of Wen-fu (d. 1771), the Manchu President of the Board of Barbarian Affairs during the ten military campaigns of the mid-Qianlong reign, he retired to join Ruan Yuan in Hangzhou. Wang had been one of the three chief compilers of Ping ding liang Jin chuan fang lue [Official history of the Jinchuan war] 136+17 juan, printed 1800, and wrote a dozen or so major works of his own, including Yun nan tung zheng chuan shu [The complete work on copper administration in Yunnan], 50 juan, completed in 1787 (now listed as lost), Qing pu xian zhi [Local gazetteer of Qingpu], 40 juan, 1768, and Tai cang xian zhi [Gazetteer of Tai cang], 65 juan, printed in 1803, Shan sheng lü lie [Statutes and precedents of Shanxi province], 50 juan, c.1786, and many others.\n\nSun Xingen, a leading Classicist, specialist in astronomy, Buddhist scripture, geography and mathematics, never attained the jinshi degree but had passed the provincial examination in 1786. He was a friend of such noted scholars as Yuan Mei (1716-1798), Hong Liangji, Duan Yucai, Sun Zhizu, Gui Fu, Wu Yi and Wang Zhong. He met Ruan Yuan during the latter's tenure as director of studies in Shandong. Before joining the Gu jing jing she, Sun also served as director of the Jishan Academy, Hangzhou (1800) and in 1811 was appointed director of Zhongsan Academy in Nanjing. He participated in the compilation of several local histories but made his reputation as a Classical scholar by meticulously correcting the mistakes made throughout the centuries and publishing new editions of ancient texts. He compiled his own local histories — Lu zhou fu zhi [Gazetteer of Lu zhou in Anhuai], printed in 1803 and Sung jiang fu zhi [Gazetteer of Sungjing, including Shanghai], printed in 1819. His considerable literary works were collected in Sun Yen ru shi wen ji [Poems and essays by Sun Xinyen]. Sun was also a noted calligraphist, specializing in the seal script. His wife, Wang Cai wei (1753-1776), and a daughter, Sun Yi hui (married Xiao), both accomplished in poetry and literature, published poems.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1991.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/k356gt84j", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 214497, "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": 355, "title": "RAS-1998", "content_text": "324\n\nthey danced they conspicuously imbibed large quantities of beer and Chinese spirit wines and were showered with water. Although some of the drink was spat out, the dancers' actions became increasingly drunken, with some entering a short-lived trance-like state. After about thirty minutes the dancing concluded with the eating of lettuce, the presentation of _lassie_ and the lighting of a string of firecrackers. The group then set off by van for other markets and fish trading establishments, with the final dance of the morning outside the \"Red Market\" due to be the most drunken of all.\n\nFor much of our knowledge of the Dance Festival, in particular the history and legend, we are indebted to Mrs. Ana Brito, an anthropologist from the Macau Maritime Museum, who as part of her studies on the Festival had interviewed a number of the dancers the year before. Copies of her notes in English, generously supplied to us by Mrs. Brito, show that the Festival was brought to Macau some decades ago from Sek Kei District in nearby Zhongshan County. According to a version of the legend that gave rise to the Drunken Dragon Dance, a certain village had been plagued by a terrible epidemic. In despair the villagers held a procession in Buddha's honour. As the procession was winding its way through the village a dragon in the guise of an enormous serpent arose out of the river. The serpent was killed, hacked into pieces and thrown back into the river, which turned blood red. The villagers drank the water and were miraculously cured.(1)&(2)\n\nLeaving the Dragon to make its way through the Inner Harbour area we left for Coloane Village, where festivities were centred on the Tam Gong Temple on the waterfront. This was heavily decorated and had all the trappings and atmosphere of a well-attended Chinese festival. There were many worshippers, as well as beggars, and clouds of smoke from joss sticks and fireworks. We played our part with Dr Patrick Hase lighting the RAS HK string of firecrackers. Nearby a large matshed had been erected where stars from the Cantonese opera world were soon due to perform.\n\nTowards noon the Tam Gong Festival procession gathered in the Rua da Cordoaria, off the village square, and then made its way through the village to the Temple. This procession was a less spectacular affair than the Tam Gong processions held in Ah Kung Ngam Village, Shaukiwan, Hong Kong, but was equally attractive within its own", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1998.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/1g05n0794", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 214517, "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": 375, "title": "RAS-1998", "content_text": "344\n\nAlthough our Qingdao guide accompanied us throughout the trip, we were met off the ferry in Dalian by another guide - Ying, an expert on the local attractions, although she quickly learned, as had her Qingdao colleague before her, that she was surrounded by a bit more expertise than she found in the average tour group.\n\nYing and Jack, the driver, very quickly learned that her new brood had another difference. She greeted us at the ferry pier by saying: \"I suppose you would all like to go to lunch now?\" This was met by a resounding answer in the negative. Having been jolted about on the boat we were not immediately interested in food.\n\nDalian city tour\n\nInstead we asked for the bus to go round some of the streets in the old Russian quarter. Specifically, we pointed out the photographs in \"Far from Home\" and said that we would like to see those and see them we did.\n\nThe People's Theatre looks a bit more garish these days, and has been turned into a Blackpool-like amusement hall. However, the majority of what we had come to see was there waiting for us, looking as splendid and impressive as we had hoped. Zhongshan Square (the former Great Square of the original Russian plan) still contains all the solid bank buildings from many years ago. All are now Chinese banks, but clearly recognisable are the buildings from all the old photographs. The square also includes one of Dalian's three former Yamato Hotels, now glorying in the name of the Dalian Guest House. Do not be put off by this name, however it is far from being a bed and breakfast in Bognor. The wrought iron canopy leads you into one of the most impressive marble lobbies of any hotel I have seen. Our experience in Yantai leads me to believe that the term \"guest house\" is reserved for the grandest of available accommodation, reserved for the party's great and good.\n\nFor me one of the most distinctly Russian buildings, and one that features prominently in \"Far from Home\", is located just on the far side of the Victory Bridge (rather a practical name - not sure who's victory over whom), on the road leading north-west from Zhongshan Square.\n\nPage 375\n\nPage 376", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1998.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/1g05n0794", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 215610, "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": 387, "title": "RAS-2001", "content_text": "337\n\nThe paper began as a collection of notes squirreled from all sorts of sources, and as other information arose it grew almost on its own. For example, when I was in New Zealand for some months teaching at the University of Canterbury in 2001, a postgraduate student popped a just-published newspaper article on my desk about a shipload of Chinese coffins that had foundered on its way to China in 1902. Maori villagers had buried some beached remains with due respect.\n\nThe house where I'd lived in Dunedin for ten years had been close to a big cemetery, but I'd lived there in ignorance of the fact that there were Chinese graves there. By 2001 I had met Les Wong, a Kiwi Chinese who has made it his business to restore those graves and other Chinese graves in cemeteries close to the old gold-mining centres of Central Otago. Dunedin's Dr James Ng, who came to Otago as a child from Guangdong Province, sent me in late 2001 a copy of an autobiographical article which vividly brought to life the familial links (and breaks in links between 1949 and 1979) between Chinese family members in New Zealand and their home villages in Guangdong. I have appreciated the encouragement of both Les and James.\n\nTeather, E.K. (2001). The case of the disorderly graves: contemporary deathscapes in Guangzhou, Journal of Social and Cultural Geography 2(2): 185-202.\n\nThis paper describes three agendas that are shaping contemporary deathscapes in Guangzhou: the modernist planning agenda, the market economy, and the Chinese Communist Party ideology and resistance to it. It develops the concept of deathscapes into deathspace, \"a symbolic system that represents a stage in the ongoing process of conflict and compromise involving the traditional and the modern, the personal and political, and the sacred and the secular'.\n\nPreparing for this research was quite a challenge and I can't imagine how I ever thought I'd find out what I wanted to know. An introduction from James Hayes led to my meeting Dr. May Bo Chan, from the Department of History at Zhongshan University. This department generously hosted my second week in Guangzhou and invited me to give a seminar. Existing links between Hong Kong Baptist University and Zhongshan University were invaluable.\n\nAn enormous stroke of luck was finding a superb and energetic", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2001.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/zg651950g", "rank": 0 } ]