RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-1983 https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/j9607p61v 218 • There are four in the year, but the principal one falls on the nineteenth day of the second moon. * See my "Secular Non-Gentry Leadership of Temple and Shrine Organisations in Urban Hong Kong" pp 113 to 136 of this Journal. * See my article "The Japanese Occupation and the New Territories", South China Morning Post, 15 December 1967. A COMMUNITY SHOOTING BUNGALOW NEAR CHINKIANG, KIANGSU, AND ITS LIBRARY ABOUT 1905 J. W. HAYES The following extracts are taken from A. H. Rasmussen's China Trader, published by Constable of London in 1954. Mr. Rasmussen was barely twenty when he joined the Chinese Customs Service at Chinkiang, where there was a small, lonely British concession. 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. At this time, as he relates, he was lucky enough to find relaxation and renewal of spirits brought low by the conditions of life and work in shooting wild pig, and in finding a library and visitors' books in a small shooting bungalow in the countryside near the Chinkiang concession. Let him speak for himself. "When the Concession really got me down I 'lifted up mine eyes unto the hills' and got new strength from them. A ride of about eight miles took me to a hill called Wu Chow where for many years there had been a community shooting bungalow for those who were keen on wild boar-shooting. It was rather an expensive sport as it required about fifteen beaters at fifty cents (or one shilling) each a day. Moreover, a rifle had to be bought and fortunately I came across an ancient Lee-Metford single-shot carbine used in the Boer War. I bought it for fifteen dollars. In view of the daily cost it was important to get shooting companions to share in the beating expenses. No serious shooting had been done out there for several years, and no one in the port seemed to know the ropes. I went out one week-end to investigate and to get away from everybody, most of all from my old bored self. Page 240 Page 241 ================================================================================ RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-1994 https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/zk522640g 210 Pollard, Samuel (1864-1915), In Unknown China a Pioneer Missionary Among Tribes in Western China, Philadelphia Lippincott, 1921 Poussielgue, Achille, Voyage en Chine et en Mongolie de M de Bourboulon, Ministre de France, et de Madame de Bourboulon, 1860-1861, Paris L Hachette, 1866 Powell, Lyle Stephenson, A Surgeon in Wartime China, Lawrence (Kansas) University of Kansas Press, 1946 Power, William James Tyrone, Recollections of a Three Years Residence in China, including Peregrinations in Spain, Morocco, Egypt, India, London R Bentley, 1853 Pritchard, Earl H, Anglo-Chinese Relations During the Seventeenth and Eighteenth centuries, 1929 Purcell, Victor, The Boxer Uprising, Cambridge Cambridge University Press, 1963 Rabe, Valentin H, The Home Base of American China Missions, 1880-1920, Cambridge (Mass) Council on East Asian Studies, Harvard University, 1978 Rachewiltz, Igor de, Papal Envoys to the Great Khans, London. 1970 Rasmussen, Albert Henry, China Trader, London Constable, 1954 Reed, James, The Missionary Mind and American East Asia Policy 1911-1915, Cambridge (Mass) Council on East Asian Studies, Harvard University, 1983 Reid, Archibald, From Peking to Petersburg, London E Arnold, 1899 Reinsch, Paul S, An American Diplomat in China, Garden City (New York) Doubleday, 1922 Rennie, David Field, Peking and the Pekingese During the First Year of the British Embassy at Peking, London John Murray, 1865 Ricalton, James, China Through the Stereoscope, a Journey Through the Dragon Empire at the Time of the Boxer Uprising, London Underwood, 1901 Ripa, Matteo, Memoirs of Father Ripa, During Thirteen Years' Residence at the Court of Peking in the Service of the Emperor of China, with an Account of the Foundation of the College for the Education of Young Chinese at Naples, translated by Fortunato Prandi. New York Wiley and Putnam, 1846 Roberts, Frances Markley, Western Travellers to China, Shanghai Kelly and Walsh, 1932 Rockhill, William Woodville, The Land of the Lamas, Notes of a Journey, London Longmans, 1891 ================================================================================ RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-2002 https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/mp4901278 280 food 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'. Dr. 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. One 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 ================================================================================ RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-2002 https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/mp4901278 18 Doré: ibid: Vol.X: Second Part: The Chinese Pantheon 95-96 313 19 Stevens, Keith (1999) Images of Sinicised Vedic Deities on Chinese Altars: Journal of the Hong Kong Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society 38:51-106 "Arlington, LC Through the Dragon's Eyes: 1931: London: Constable and Co Ltd. 21 Rasmussen, A.H. China Trader - My 32 Years in the Orient: 1954: New York: Thomas Y. Crowell Co. "Bird, Isabella (1899) The Yangtze Valley and Beyond, London: John Murray Wingate, A. W. S. (1940) A Cavalier in China London: Grayson and Grayson, Ltd. **Coates, P. D. (1988) The China Consuls - British Consular Officers, 1843-1943 Oxford: OUP 25 Simon Winchester in his book The River at the Centre of the World London: Viking: 1997, expresses grave doubts. He suggests that the anchor on display is too small for a frigate's anchor and could well be a foreign anchor lost from a smaller vessel at some time down the years. 26 The Times: London: 10 March 1869 "Griffith John was a pioneering London Mission Society evangelist. A number of the headstones have been preserved in the Zhenjiang Museum housed in the former British Consulate. "Stevens, Keith (1992) A Jersey Adventurer Journal of the Hong Kong Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society 32: 60 *Lorcha - a vessel of about 100 tons burden, having a hull of European build, and generally commanded by a European captain, but rigged with Chinese masts and sails, and manned by Chinese sailors. "Mesny, writing in his Miscellanies many years later, frequently confused dates and facts. ================================================================================