RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-1961 https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/vd6724704 Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society Hong Kong Branch ORASHKB and author Vol. 1 (1961) ISSN 1991-7295 Besides the Governor and Shortrede, the first office-bearers included Major-General D'Aguilar, Peter Young the Colonial Surgeon, Mercer the Colonial Treasurer, John Bowring the Younger (of Jardines); and also Thomas Wade, the celebrated interpreter and Envoy to China, who later became famous as inventor of the Wade System of romanization of Chinese still in general use today, and, as Sir Thomas, was to become President of the Society in London in 1887. In his Inaugural Address as President, Sir John Davis stressed the importance of directing the Society's attention to practical projects and to natural history, geology and botany, as well as to literary pursuits, and suggested that he could get the sanction of the Colonial Office to the grant of a moderate piece of ground for a Botanical Garden. Sir John left the Colony in 1848; but, as the result of a stirring appeal by Mr. G. Gutzlaff, the missionary, at a meeting of the Society in August 1848, the project was approved, although it was not carried into effect until the governorship of Sir John Bowring (the younger John Bowring's father), and then the Garden was placed under Government control and not under that of the Society. During the twelve years of its life, the Society was dogged to some extent by the personal animosities prevalent in Hong Kong in the early days; but it flourished under the inspiration of Sir John Davis, and also for a time under Sir John Bowring, who enjoyed a European reputation as a scholar—as President he preferred to be called Dr. Bowring—and who animated the Society with his personal influence and by his contributions to its discussions. The Society had no permanent home of its own, but in 1849 it was granted by Sir S. G. Bonham a room in the Supreme Court building. It published six volumes of Transactions, the first in 1847 and the last in 1859. With the departure of Sir John Bowring in May 1859 and the death in the September following of the Branch's devoted Secretary—Dr. W. A. Harland, M.D.—the Society collapsed. The efforts of Dr. James Legge, as well as those of Sir Hercules Robinson, the new Governor, as President, of the Bishop of Victoria and of the Acting Chief Justice as Vice-Presidents and of Harry (later Sir Harry) S. Parkes were of no avail. The collapse of the Society came at an unfortunate time and deprived it of the prestige and momentum which it would have gained from the work of some of its famous members. Legge was on the eve of publishing his famous translation of the Chinese Classics, which could be printed and distributed only through the generosity of Joseph Jardine, and his successor Sir Robert Jardine, and of John Dent, the heads of the two largest merchant houses in the Colony. A little later, in 1865, T. W. Kingsmill had to resort to the aid of the Shanghai Branch for the publication of his studies on the geology of Hong Kong. ================================================================================ RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-1963 https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/4m90m091v The keen and active interest in the Society shown by our patron, Sir Robert Black, and members of his family is very gratifying and is warmly appreciated. Despite the exacting calls on their time they have been attending our meetings, and this is a noble example to other busy people in the Colony. We appreciate also the zeal of many other prominent personages including the Chief Justice, Sir Michael Hogan, and the Hon. W. C. Knowles who is a member of the Council and whose business house has provided us with both an Honorary Treasurer, Mr. T. J. Lindsay, and an Honorary Librarian, Mr. John Le Mare. I should like also to refer to the interest in the Society taken by members of H.M. Forces and particularly to the interest taken by Col. Halliday and Col. Mackenzie, both of whom have now left the Colony, but it is greatly hoped that this interest will be sustained by their successors. In this connection it may be interesting to mention the first office-bearers of the Society in 1847: President: Sir John Francis Davis (Governor); Vice-Presidents: Major-General D'Aguilar, Major H. P. Burn, John Stewart, Dr. Kinnis; Council: Lt.-Col. Brereton, Peter Young (Colonial Surgeon), W. T. Mercer (Colonial Treasurer), J. C. Bowring (Son of Sir John Bowring); Secretary: A. Shortrede; Corresponding Secretary: Capt. Clark Kennedy; Chinese and Foreign Secretary: Thomas Wade;* Treasurer: F. Bevan; Curator: C. T. Watkins. In conclusion I wish to thank all the officers and members of the Society for their loyal and wholehearted support. I am probably in a better position than anyone to appreciate and also to pay tribute to my colleagues on the present Council, in whom you have a hard working and active body, and each of whom pulls his or her full weight in the furtherance of the objects of the Society. * Afterwards Sir Thomas Wade, K.C.B., G.C.M.G., British Minister at Peking from 1871 until 1883, and later first Professor of Chinese in the University of Cambridge. ================================================================================ RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-1969 https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/9g553n20d 28 T. C. CHENG NOTES 1 During these early years, schools like the Morrison School, operated by the Morrison Education Society founded by Dr. Robert Morrison, the Anglo-Chinese School (or Ying Wah School) operated by Dr. James Legge of the London Missionary Society (Dr. Legge is best known for his translation of the Chinese classics and for his appointment as the first professor of Chinese at Oxford University in 1874), and St. Paul's College operated by the Anglican Bishop, were dismal failures whether from the missionary or from the educational point of view. In 1855, the Governor Sir John Bowring had this to say about St. Paul's College: "For the last six years, £250 a year has been voted by Parliament to the Bishop's College for the education of 6 persons destined to the public service, and not a single individual from that College has been yet declared competent to undertake the meanest department of an interpreter's duty See E. J. Eitel, Europe in China, London; Luzac and Co., 1895, p. 349. 2 On p. 60 of Fragrant Harbour by G. B. Endacott and A. Hinton, a statement was made that Ng Choy was "educated at the old Central School (Queen's College)". I find no evidence to support this. 3 As a result of the founding of the Government Central School (the present Queen's College) in 1862, a number of educated Chinese well-versed in both Chinese and English had been produced, who began to regard Hong Kong as their home town and who began to develop a keen interest in the welfare of Hong Kong. Thus leading Chinese founded the Tung Wah Hospital in 1870 and the Po Leung Kuk in 1880. It is of interest to note that in the 1870's, the educated Chinese actually pressed for the election of representatives to form a Chinese Municipal Board. In 1878, when the foreign community protested against Sir John Hennessy's policy of lenient treatment of prisoners, the Chinese in Hong Kong for the first time despatched an address to Queen Victoria which was in effect a vote of confidence in the Government. 4 G. B. Endacott, Government and People in Hong Kong, p. 94. *G. B. Endacott, Government and People in Hong Kong, p. 94. 6 In 1862 an Institute of Foreign Languages was founded in Peking and translation bureaux were established to translate scientific books into Chinese. In 1866 the first modern shipbuilding yard was started in Foochow, Fukien, and from 1872 to 1875 four batches of selected young Chinese scholars, totalling 120, were sent to the U.S.A. to further their studies. 7 General Chan (陳炯明, Chen Chiung-ming) revolted against Sun Yat-sen in Canton in June 1922. For details about this revolt, see Tang Leang-li's The Inner History of The Chinese Revolution, London, p. 140. 8 G. B. Endacott, A History of Hong Kong, p. 199. 9 G. B. Endacott, Government and People in Hong Kong, p. 98. 10 After 2 years there, Yung Wing (容閎, Rong Hong) went to Yale University and was the first Chinese to graduate from that famous institution in 1854. Yung later became a famous person in the history of modern China, being responsible for the opening of the first school of mechanical engineering in Shanghai; the formation of the China Merchant Steamship Navigation Company; the translation of many scientific books into Chinese; and the sending of young Chinese scholars to the U.S.A. for western studies in the 1870's. In the case of Wong Foon, after 2 years' study in the U.S.A., he crossed the Atlantic to Scotland and entered the University of Edinburgh where he graduated with honours in medicine and surgery. He returned to Canton in 1857 and distinguished himself as a surgeon. See also Lo Hsiang-lin, Hong Kong and Western Cultures, Honolulu, East-West Center, 1964, Chapter 4, "Yung Hung (Yung Wing) and Foreign Schemes". ================================================================================ RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-1971 https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/z029vt43g TEXT OF A LETTER SENT TO THE HON. THE COLONIAL SECRETARY ON THE SUBJECT OF A NEW CITY MUSEUM FOR HONG KONG. 24th May, 1971. Dear Sir, A NEW CITY MUSEUM At a meeting of the Council of the Hong Kong Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society held earlier this year, the question was raised as to whether we, as the executive committee of a Hong Kong learned society, could, with advantage to all concerned, formulate our views on the above-mentioned subject which is exercising the minds of many residents of this Colony at the present moment. The members of the committee were unanimously of the opinion that we should do this, firstly because the main purpose in founding our Society as long ago as 1847 was to foster the preservation, and to encourage the study, of all matters concerning the history of this part of Asia; and secondly and more specifically because in the inaugural address of our first President, Governor Sir John Davis, he urged the adoption by the young Society of two practical aims in addition to the lecture and discussion programmes usually adopted by learned societies. His suggested aims were the establishment in Hong Kong (a) of Botanic Gardens, and (b) of a City Museum. A brief statement concerning what was accomplished towards achieving these aims about a century and a quarter ago was recently made by Dr. J. R. Jones, the past President of this Branch of the Society, in his letter published in the South China Morning Post on Friday, 18th December, 1970, under the title of "Sir John Davis, and Hong Kong's First Museum". After some discussion which was purposely confined to generalities, and did not extend to the consideration of details, it was unanimously decided that we should support the proposal that the present museum should be re-organized and that the opportunity should then be taken of re-housing it in a new and specially designed building situated on a site chosen for its suitability and adaptability rather than for reasons of expediency. ================================================================================ RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-1972 https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/gm80qf99h The other accommodation problem that required for our meetings you will remember I touched upon briefly in my report last year. The problem still exists but in a more intensified form, and there is no doubt in my own mind that Dr. Jones's oft-reiterated solution-premises of our own — is the ideal one. But the cost of that is, at the present moment and in the near foreseeable future, far beyond our financial means. But the recent proposal concerning a HONG KONG ARTS CENTRE may well be a practicable solution, and your Council has already taken steps to associate itself actively with this well worth-while proposal. In my view it will be one of the most important subjects on the agendas of Council meetings during the forthcoming year. Community Problems. It is a very controversial point as to how well advised the executive committee of an organization such as ours would be in becoming actively or even theoretically involved in general matters of community interest. There is one field however in which your Council felt no doubt about the direction in which its duty lay, and that was in the consideration of the problem of a CITY MUSEUM which was exercising the minds of many resident members of our community earlier last year. The members of your Council present at the meeting when this subject was discussed, were unanimously of the opinion that we could and should discuss the subject in council. For this decision there were two main reasons. Page 44 First, because the main purpose in founding our Society as long ago as 1847 was "to foster the preservation, and to encourage the study, of all matters concerning the history of this part of Asia; and second, and more specifically because in the inaugural address of our first President, Governor Sir John Davis, he urged the adoption by the young Society of two practical aims in addition to the lecture and discussion programmes usually adopted by learned societies. His suggested aims were the establishment in Hong Kong (a) of Botanic Gardens, and (b) of a City Museum." ================================================================================ RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-1973 https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/8910rj06r 22 H. A. RYDINGS We began this review of the China Medico-Chirurgical Society with some account of those who were officers during the first year of its existence. It is therefore appropriate to finish with a look at the office-bearers of the 'Philosophical Society of China”, and to note how many of them had been associated with the former society. The original office-bearers (22) were: President Major H. P. Burn Vice-Presidents Dr. Kennedy Council Dr. Balfour A. Shortrede J. C. Bowring General Secretary W. F. Bryan Treasurer Curator Dr. Young C. T. Watkins Dr. Harland Dr. Barton There are five doctors on this list, of whom three are known to have been members of the Medico-Chirurgical Society, namely Drs. Kennedy, Balfour and Barton. The Dr. Young was probably Peter Young, the Colonial Surgeon, and not J. H. Young, who had been Secretary of the Medico-Chirurgical Society but had resigned. Dr. W. A. Harland, who read a paper on "The Chinese system of human anatomy and physiology" (23) at the meetings in September and October 1847, was later to become the Society's "devoted Secretary" (24), but is not included in the membership list of the Medico-Chirurgical Society, though he may have joined it after the list was compiled. A new set of office-bearers was appointed with the first change of name of the Society (21) and adoption of a constitution on 19th January 1847, with His Excellency Sir John F. Davis, Bart., F.R.S. as President: but that is another story. NOTES 1 [J. R. Jones] in JHKBRAS, v. 1, 1961, p. 1. 2 There are three copies recorded in libraries in the U.S.A., i.e. the National Library of Medicine at Washington; the Boston Medical Library; and the Library of the New York Academy of Medicine. 3 Trans. China Med. Chir. Soc., v. 1, 1845-46, p. 28. 4 Memoirs of the life and labours of Robert Morrison, comp. by his widow, London, 1839, v. 2, p. 148. 5 Chinese repository, v. 16, 1847, p. 187-9. ================================================================================ RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-1974 https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/x633mp077 LIST OF MEMBERS 249 LIFE MEMBERS: SU, Dr. Chung Jen TAN, Khek-seng TANG, Mrs. Madeleine TANG, Sir Shiu-kin, C.B.E. THOMAS, L. F. 155, Blue Pool Road, Flat A, 1st floor, H.K. A-1, Villa Monte Rose, 7th floor, 41A, Stubbs Road, H.K. 8C, Grenville House, 1, Magazine Gap Rd., H.K. The Kowloon Motor Bus Co. (1933) Ltd., Room 1701, Central Building, H.K. c/o Lowe, Bingham & Matthews, Prince's Building, 22nd floor, H.K. TON, Mrs. Chen Chu-ching St. Paul's Convent School, Causeway Bay, H.K. TORRIBLE, G. R. WATSON, K. A. WEINREBE, Harry W. WERLE, Helga WESLEY-SMITH, Peter WHITELEGGE, D. S. WILLIAMS, Roger A. WILLIAMS, Mr. & Mrs. W. D. F. WINKLER, Mrs. E WONG, Peng-Cheong WOLF, John YOUNG, Miss Pauline c/o The Hong Kong Club, H.K. c/o Lammert Bros., Pedder Building, H.K. Weinrebe & Pennell Ltd., Room 805, Bank of Canton Building, Des Voeux Road, H.K. 3, Wood Road, 6th floor, H.K. Dept. of Law, University of Hong Kong, Pokfulam, H.K. 58, Mt. Nicholson Gap, H.K. Dept. of Extra-Mural Studies, University of Hong Kong, Pokfulam, H.K. 1, Riante Rive Apartments, 14 Milestone, Castle Peak Road, N.T. Flat 402, 12 May Road, H.K. Wong, Tan & Co., 732/735 Alexandra House, H.K. P.O. Box 147, H.K. The Peak School, Plunkett's Road, The Peak, H.K. Page 255 Page 256 ================================================================================ RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-1975 https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/j0995146d 158 DONALD C. BOWIE thought fit to fight was discharged from hospital, but there must have been many of those manning the mainland defences whose legs felt weak and shaky following the fever and anaemia of the disease as they covered the hilly and terribly uneven country they were called on to defend, The news from Europe, North Africa and the United Kingdom during 1940 and the first part of 1941 was very bad, while the stories of the German advances in Russia after June 1941 added to the general depression. In October 1941, two battalions of Canadian infantry, the Winnipeg Grenadiers and the Royal Rifles of Canada, disembarked in Hong Kong. With these came a number of Canadian Army Medical Officers, with Major John Crawford in charge, and two Canadian Army Nursing Sisters. The sight of these strongly built young men was momentarily, and quite irrationally comforting, but this feeling was soon replaced by astonishment that anyone should have dreamed that reinforcements of this order could possibly have altered the situation. In the event the Japanese attacked before the poor Canadians, who were not even accompanied by their transport, had time to settle down and they merely added to the numbers of casualties incurred and prisoners taken by the enemy. In February 1941 it might have been agreed that there were no ships available to withdraw the troops from Hong Kong, but in October of the same year ships were found to bring in more. I have chronicled my own thoughts on the situation in Hong Kong in the years leading up to December 1941 only to give some idea of the position as it appeared to one individual and as a background to an account of the events which followed. I do not know that these thoughts were shared by many others though it would be strange if they were not. There was certainly no defeatist spirit abroad and the general feeling seemed to be one of some confidence in our ability to hold the Japanese for a time. I imagine that many shared my own feeling in 1941 that since I could not change the situation I would have to put up with it. And so, on the morning of 8 December 1941, Dr. J.W. Anderson, who had most generously shared his house with me, and I stood at Magazine Gap and had a spectacular grandstand view of the short Japanese air attack on Kai Tak airport by the end of which no British planes remained able to fly. Together he, now a Major R.A.M.C., and I moved into ================================================================================ RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-1976 https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/hq382988q 130 CARL T. SMITH 4 London Missionary Society Archives, London, England (hereafter given as L.M.S.A.), South China Box 5, Folder 3, Jacket C, letter of Legge, 26 Sept., 1853, and Jacket D, Yearly Report of the Hong Kong Mission, 25 Jan., 1854. For a brief notice of Keuh A-gong see my article, "A Register of Baptized Protestant Chinese 1813-1842, Chung Chi Bulletin, No. 48 (Dec., 1970), p. 24. For Ng Mun-sow see my article, "Dr. Legge's Theological School", ibid, No. 50 (June, 1971), pp. 16-22. 5 L.M.S.A., South China, Box 6, Folder 2, Jacket C, letter of Legge, 28 Jan., 1869, and Folder 1, Jacket A, letter of Wong Foon, 8 May, 1857. Another missionary estimate of Hung Jen-kan is the testimonial the Rev. John Chalmers sent to the Rev. Rudolph Lechler, Basel Missionary Society Archives (hereafter given as B.M.S.A.), Vol. IV, 1857-1862, letter dated, London Mission House, Hong Kong, 24 Dec., 1857: “I have great pleasure in giving my testimony to the Christian character of Hung Jin, the relative of Hung Sew Tauen, who, since his return from Shanghai in the year 1854, has been in the employment of our mission; first as a Christian teacher, and afterwards as a preacher and assistant missionary. His general behaviour has been such as becomes the Gospel; the work which we have given him to do, he has always executed to our satisfaction and not only so, but his zeal for the promotion of the cause of Christ has been marked. He is a young man of superior abilities, and I hope he may yet be honoured to labour successfully in the preaching of the gospel to his countrymen for many years. 6 L.M.S.A., South China, Box 6, Folder 1, Jacket B, letter of Chalmers, 5 June, 1858. 7 L.M.S.A., South China, Box 6, Folder 1, Jacket C, letter of Legge and Chalmers, 11 Jan., 1859, with enclosure of translation of letter of Hung Jan: "Translation of Hung Jan's last letter, sent from Shanghai by Mr. Muirhead, who received it from a Chinaman who had been with Lord Elgin's expedition up the Yangtze. He wrote in 170 or 180 miles on that river below Hankow." Letters from "Shau Kwan, Nan Gan [both on the north boundary of Kwangtung], one from the capital of Keangse, one from imperialist camp at Yaou Chow [in north of Keangse]" are mentioned as having been written by Hung Jen-kan. 8 L.M.S.A., South China, Box 6, Folder 2, Jacket C, letter of Legge, 24 Aug., 1860, and Folder 3, Jacket B, letter of Legge, 14 Jan., 1861. 9 L.M.S.A., South China, Box 6, Folder 1, Jacket A, letter of Legge and Chalmers, 14 Jan., 1857. 10 L.M.S.A., Legge Family Papers, letter of 28 Mar., 1861 and 24 Mar., 1871. 11 For identification of Hung K'uei Hsiu see Jen (Chien) Yu-wan “**太平£Ø*^£$*M”, (Record of Visit with Descendants of the Taiping Hung Family) ***@** (Taiping Kingdom Miscellany), No. 4, and * Lo Hsiang-lin, (Historical Sources for the Study of the Hakkas), (Hong Kong, 1965), p. 409, 12 B.M.S.A., Hong Kong School Report, 14 Feb. 1875, "Teacher Schui Thin will shortly change places with Fung Khui-syu in Tschong Hang Kang, because the last as a son of a Tai Ping Rebellion King, cannot stay anymore in the mainland without danger to the life of himself and family." 13 B.M.S.A., Hong Kong School Report, 16 Apr. 1873, and Die Evangelischen Heidenboten, Jan., 1866, letter of Lechler, 2 Oct, 1865. 14 B.M.S.A., Chinese Mission Yearly Report 1885. The ship Dartmouth left Hong Kong 25 Dec., 1878 and arrived at Georgetown, British Guiana on 17 Mar., 1879. Among its 516 emigrants were seventy Christians. ================================================================================ RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-1980 https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/kh04md207 PRESIDENT'S REPORT FOR 1979 (Covering the period March 27, 1979- March 23, 1980) I am pleased to report tonight on your Society's activities over the past year and on our ongoing projects. During the period we organized twelve lectures which, because so many members and most of your Council are away from Hong Kong in the high summer season, were arranged mainly for the Spring and Winter months. There were two overseas excursions and one local tour. Let me briefly review the lecture programme first of all: Talks to the Society In April 1979 two lectures were given. The first had Dr. Margaret Ng as our speaker: well-known in Hong Kong for her newspaper column, and also as a social philosopher concerned with different facets of the Chinese world-view. She spoke on "A Chinese theory of Discontent". The other speaker in April was Professor Rulan Chao Pian who talked to us once before, in 1975. She is presently visiting professor in Music at the Chinese University of Hong Kong and her talk, entitled "A Musicological trip to China”, was related to a recent visit to China where she had lectured to the National Academy of Musicology at Peking. In May Mr. Leonard Rayner lectured on "Communism in the Association of South East Asian Nations”. Mr. Rayner who moved to Hong Kong from Singapore a few years ago is a journalist and perhaps best known to us for his regular column in the South China Morning Post. In June Professor D. W. Y. Kwok, who has been Director of the Asian Studies Programme at Hawaii for the past six years, spoke on "The New Culture Movement in China”. Also in June, Dr. John Young of the Extra-Mural Studies Department of Hong Kong University, lectured on "The Hong Kong-Canton Connection, 1905-1925”, at the same time sharing his experience with us of a research trip to Canton and pointing out the archival research opportunities which exist in that city. In October Rev. Carl Smith talked on "The Amateur Dramatic Club (founded 1860) and the early history of Dramatic arts in Hong Kong. Since the new year we have had a relatively full programme. In January there were two lectures: one by the Rev. Father Harold Naylor who spoke on "Wah Yan College; a case study of an Anglo-Chinese school directed by an Irish Jesuit". Father Naylor has X ================================================================================ RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-1981 https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/ff36bt18m PRESIDENT'S REPORT FOR 1981 1 I am pleased to report, tonight, on your Society's activities over the last year: on our lectures, expeditions, publications and other projects, and on membership. I start with the lecture programme. Lectures to the Society Lectures during the year covered topics concerned with Chinese natural science, law, culture and society, and history, most of the material presented being based on original, sometime on-going, research, and the emphasis this time being on Hong Kong itself. We opened, however, with a film and short talk from Mrs. Peggy Craig on the culture and people of Rajasthan. This was in connexion with tours Mrs. Craig was arranging to Rajasthan later in the year. In May, a talk was given by Professor Ho Peng Yoke, who was a physicist at one time working with Joseph Needham on his Science and Civilization in China, and who had recently taken up the Chair in Chinese at the University of Hong Kong. He spoke on science and technology in ancient China. In June Professor Allyn Rickett spoke on Chinese law and thought. Professor Rickett is in charge of Chinese Studies in the University of Pennsylvania and in the "fifties had the dubious participant-observation experience of being caught up in the penal system of China when, while engaged in research, he was arrested and imprisoned for four years. Miss Barbara Ward, an old friend of the Society, spoke in November on the "real" boat people, the Tanka fisherfolk, whose way of life — literally on their boats as a floating population — is rapidly disappearing as they are becoming housed ashore. Also in November we welcomed Miss Betty Wei Peh T'i, whom many of you will know from her column "Sweet and Sour" in the South China Morning Post. Miss Wei, who had just completed her dissertation on Juan Yuan, Governor-General at Canton (1817-1826), spoke on her researches into his work. In January Dr. Mary Turnbull, who has lectured to us several times, spoke on Clementi, one-time Governor of Hong Kong, and his relation to the Chinese revolution. Dr. Turnbull is with the History Department of Hong Kong University. In February Dr. John Young of the Extramural Department of Hong Kong University (Hong Kong U was well represented this year) gave us a second lecture. His topic was Sun Yat-sen. Page 15 Page 16 ================================================================================ RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-1981 https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/ff36bt18m 212 LOÈS, Dr. Sabine de WONG, Mr Kwok Fong LOSEBY, Miss Patricia LUK, Mr. George Ping-chuen WONG, Mr Peng-cheong YEUNG, Mr Walter W.T. LUM, Miss Ada MACKENZIE, Mr. John MACKEOWN, Dr. P.K. MARDEN, Mrs. J.L. MCCRARY, Mr. Michael MCINTYRE, Mr. W.M. MCKEIRNAN, Rev. Michael NORONHA, Mr. J.E. OGDEN, Mr. B.J.N. OU, Miss G. PAIN, Mr. John H. PICCUS, Mr. R.P. RAE, Mr. John Allan RAWLINSON, Mr. M.C. RAYNER, Dr. Mary RIDE, Lady May RUST, Mr. H.A. RYDINGS, Mr. H.A., MBE SEED, Mr. Brian SELLETT, Mr. George SERSALE, Miss Shelia M. SHAW, Dr Brian C. SHAW, Mrs Felicity SMITH, Rev. Carl. T. SMITH, Mr Leslie C. SPOONER, Mr Michael G. SU, Dr Chung Jen TAN, Mr Khek-seng TANG, Sir Shiu-kin, CBE TANG, Mrs Madeleine THOMAS, Mr Louis F. THOMPSON, Mr. P.J. THROWER, Prof. L.B. THROWER, Dr Stella TON CHEN, Mrs Chp-ching TORRIBLE, Mr Graham R. URE, Mr Gavin M.N, WATSON, Mr K.A. WAUNG, Mr William Sikying WEINREBE, Mr Harry M. WERLE, Ms Helga WESLEY-SMITH, Dr Peter WILLIAMS, Mr Roger WILLIAMS, Mr Bernard V. WILLIAMS, Mr & Mrs W.D.F. WINKLER, Mrs E. YOUNG, Miss Pauline INSTITUTIONAL MEMBER AGRICULTURE & FISHERIES DEPT. The Director LOCAL ORDINARY MEMBERS ABBOTT, Mrs Elizabeth Lee ADDIS, Mr Stewart ADDIS, Mrs Diana AIKEN, Mrs Lorna AKERS-JONES, Mr D. ALLCOCK, Mr R.C. ARCHER, The Hon. Mrs S. ASHCROFT, Miss Jacqueline P. AUM, Mr K.N. BARD, Dr S.M. BARRETTO, Mr Ruy 0. BATSON, Lt. Col. J.F.S. BEHRENS, Mr Ernst H. BERTRAM, Mr James BIRCH, Dr Alan BLAIKLEY, Mr P.E. BONAVIA, Mrs Judith E. BOWMAN, Mr S.A.W. BOWMAN, Mrs Dorothy BOYLAN, Mrs. Catherine BRAGA, Mr Paul BRAMWELL, Mr Hartley BRANDON, Miss Jacqueline N. BRAUN, Mr Francis BRAY, Miss Jennifer M. BROMFIELD, Mr A.C. BROMFIELD, Mrs Jeanne BROOM, Mr Michael B. BROUWER, Mrs R.P. BROWN, Mr Edward de R. BROWN, Mr Gerald H. BROWN, Dr H.O. BURNS, Dr John P. CAMERON, Mr Nigel CAMERON, Mrs Susan CAMPBELL, Mr Mark C. CANTERS, Mr Rene CAREY-HUGHES, Dr John CENTRE OF ASIAN STUDIES ================================================================================ RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-1981 https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/ff36bt18m SALMON, Mrs P.A. SAPSTEAD, Mr Gordon A.G. SCOTT, Dr. Ian SEARLS, Mr M.W., Jr. SHAM, Mr Francis SHANNON, Major J.M. SIDDLE Mr Oliver R. SIEGFRIED, Mrs Stephanie S. SIU, Mr Anthony Kwok-Kin SMITH, Mr Reginald C. SMITH, Mr Stewart P. SMITH-ROBERTS, Miss Karen A. SO, Dr Chak Lam STEAD, Miss S.M. STEINER, Mr Henry STEWART, Miss Jessie STRICKLAND, Mr John E. STUMF, Mr Karl L., O.B.E. SU, Mr Samson SURECK, Mr Joseph SURECK, Mrs Joseph TAM, Miss Adelaide Chiu-hor TANG, Mr David TANG, Mr Hai Chiu TANG, Mr Stephen Wing-hung TAYLOR, Mrs V.V. THATCHER, Mr Melvin Paul THOMAS, Mr Reginald THOMAS, Mrs S.E. THOMPSON, Mr F. John TING, Mr Joseph Sun Pao TING, Mr Thomas Kam-Shu TISDALL, Mr Brian TOCHRANE, Miss Vera TOH, Miss Esther TOOGOOD, Mr C.W. TRETIAK, Professor Daniel TSANG, Mr Augustin Chung-Kong TSANG, Mr Hin Sum TSO, Miss Priscilla TURNER, Mr H. David TWITCHETT, Miss Yvonne VINE, Mr P.A.K. WALKER, Mr A.P. WALKER, Mrs Prudence WALTERS, Mrs Sandra L. WATERS, Mr D.D. WATT, Mr James WATT, Mr Mo-Kei WEBB, Mrs Susan M. WEI, Miss Peh T'i WHITTAM, Mr Anthony R. WHOLEY, Mr. J.W. WILLIAMS, Miss Stephanie WILLIS, Mr David Nye WILLOUGHBY, Prof. P.G. WILSON, Mr Brian D. WILSON, Miss Elinor WIN, Mr Oliver 215 WINKLER, Mrs Rowena WONG, Miss Marion WONG, Mr Siu-Lun WOODS, Mrs Rowena WORKMAN, Dr Gillian WRIGHT, Mr D.A.L. WRIGHT, Dr Leigh R, WRIGHT, Miss V. Moya YANG, The Hon. Mr Justice YEUNG, Mr Michael Wing Chiu YOUNG, Dr John D. YOUNG, Mr Richard YUNG, Mr David C.W. ZIGAL, Mrs Irene OVERSEAS LIFE MEMBERS ARMERDING, Mr Ludwig E. BAKER, Dr Hugh David R. BAKER, Mr William Ernest BALL, Mr John M. BARNETT, Mr K.M.A. BENNISON, Mr Larry L. BERTUCCIOLI, Dr Giuliano BLACKMORE, Mr Michael BLACK, Sir Robert BLAKER, Mr D.J.R. CAPLAN, Mr Malcolm CARLSON, Miss R.E. CATER, Sir Jack CLARKE, Rev. Cyril S. COCKELL, Miss Juve V. COLLIN, Mr P.H. COSBY, Mr Ivan P.S.G. COSTANTINI, Dr Giulio COSTANTINI, Mrs G. CRANMER-BYNG, Prof. J.L. CUMMING, Mrs Dorothy M. DUNCANSON, Mr J.D. EWING, Miss E. ================================================================================ RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-1986 https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/jq08c7063 155 Dr. Legge arrived at Malacca in 1840 as a young missionary teacher. He came having read the glowing reports of the school's progress written by its Principal. Dr. Legge expected to find a school of high standards on the lines set forth in Dr. Morrison's original prospectus. What he came to was something quite different. While the school operated under the name of a college, it was actually little more than an elementary school. Dr. Legge was critical. This naturally did not endear him to his superior, the Rev. John Evans, the man who had been in charge of the school for more than six years. Mr. Evans attributed the criticisms to the inexperience and brashness of a young man unacquainted with the local situation. But Dr. Legge was not the only person to criticise. A Singapore missionary wrote to his board in America: “They have made much noise and excited large expectations as to the prospects of usefulness of the college. A strange sort of reserve and mystery was kept up about the Establishment. Part of this has probably been due to the haughty manner and uncourteous deportment of Mr. Evans.” One of Mr. Evans' innovations was to prohibit the students from visiting their homes. He felt that if they were away from the school even for a brief time, they would be exposed to bad influences. The principal of a missionary boarding school at Singapore thought Mr. Evans' policy very unwise as it ran counter to traditional Chinese practice. He explained: “The ties which bind parents and children together cannot be rudely torn asunder, where they are as fully developed as they are among the Chinese, without great danger to the child. Should the boys ever become able to think for themselves, and have the Bible in their hands, they will find it difficult to respect the authors of such a system.” ================================================================================ RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-1986 https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/jq08c7063 156 CARL SMITH When Dr. Legge took charge, he immediately changed the system. When he arrived at Malacca, Mr. Evans was already suffering from a fatal illness and he died some months after. This change gave Dr. Legge the opportunity to put his own ideas of management and teaching into practice. The student body had dwindled from seventy students in 1837 to twelve in 1840. Six more left after Dr. Legge took over. With the remaining six, he began to build anew. After two years he wrote: "I have about thirty boys from ten to sixteen years of age, and four young men . . . My maxim is to communicate ideas to them, to call their faculties into exercise, and to make them teach themselves, just as they feed themselves, it being my task to furnish them with the appropriate nourishment.” Prompted by the suggestion of John Morrison, the son of Dr. Morrison, Dr. Legge began to think about the removal of the college to China. Political events were leading to the opening of China for foreign residence and the British possession of Hong Kong. Within days of the planting of the British flag on Hongkong Island Mr. John Morrison was writing letters anticipating the transfer of the Anglo Chinese College. He believed that neither money nor support would be a problem, for he wrote: “On a settlement of commercial and political affairs... there is no object that will so much open men's purses here as the Anglo Chinese College. Can we but give a fair ground of assurance that it is to take new life, and progress as rapidly as for some years past it has been retrograding.” Dr. Legge responded to Morrison's suggestions with enthusiasm. Both men wished to revive the college in accord with original plans. By the time Dr. Legge was prepared to move, there was the prospect of amalgamation with a school already established in ================================================================================ RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-1986 https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/jq08c7063 158 CARL SMITH British Plenipotentiary, informed them that missionaries would not be welcomed at the Treaty Ports. British officials felt missionary efforts to convert Chinese would provoke the hostility of the mandarins and hinder the proper development of commerce and trade with foreigners. Sir Henry maintained that the treaty extended only to commercial relations between Great Britain and China and not to religious activities. During the discussion about the Anglo Chinese College some of the missionaries were rather critical of Dr. Morrison and his work. This deeply hurt his son, John Robert Morrison, who had been invited to attend the Hongkong meeting by the Mission Society's directors in London. This did not please some of the missionaries in the field, for the young Mr. Morrison was not a missionary but had the office of Chinese Secretary in the Government. A disinterested observer who attended the meetings remarked: "Indeed it seemed to be the studied purpose of some of them to cast discredit on Dr. Morrison by all means. John Morrison was affected to tears on learning of the way in which some of them spoke of his father." Fortunately there was a peacemaker present, W.H. Medhurst, the observer remarked. “If it had not been for him, I fear there would have been unpleasant consequences.” The outcome of all the troubled waters was that Dr. Legge was authorised to reopen the school in Hongkong, with four pupils in temporary quarters. FINDING A HOME FOR A COLLEGE It was no easy task reestablishing the Anglo-Chinese College in Hongkong. A new student body had to be gathered, a site for a building obtained, the building erected, the new financial support arranged. The Rev. James Legge, Principal of the school, had brought with him from Malacca only one student, an orphan boy he had taken into his family. Mrs. Legge had under her care a Chinese girl ================================================================================ RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-1986 https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/jq08c7063 261 nor, Sir Arthur Kennedy. Both incidents reflect inner tensions within the Chinese community and the difficulty Europeans had in recognising which leaders of the Chinese had the support of the majority. The Europeans favoured those Chinese who were most thoroughly Anglicised. These were such men as Ng Choy, Ho Kai and Wei Yuk, all of whom had been educated in Britain. The Chinese, on the other hand, were inclined to feel that men who had been elevated to a position of leadership by the Chinese community itself were better representatives. The Honourable Ng Choy had been able to straddle this difference, keeping a foot on both sides. Ho Kai and Wei Yuk, however, at the time of the controversy, were young and inexperienced and the majority of the leaders of the Chinese community resented their being pushed to the front by the Europeans. When the news of Sir Arthur Kennedy's death reached Hong Kong, a public meeting was hurriedly convened to discuss a suitable memorial to him. The organisers issued an invitation to all sections of the community. They arranged for Dr. Ho Kai to be the spokesman of the Chinese. In his remarks at the meeting he promised the support of the Chinese community to the proposal for a statue of Sir Arthur Kennedy. He also asked to make additional comments expressing the desire of the Chinese to have a fitting memorial for Sir Richard Macdonnell, Sir Arthur's predecessor. The chairman rightly suggested that the two objects were different and as the present meeting was to consider only the honouring of Kennedy's memory, the matter of a Macdonnell memorial should be left for discussion at some later time by those interested in the project. Dr. Ho Kai had dutifully fulfilled his obligation to the Chinese community when he raised the point; however, he did not mention a further desire of the Chinese to honour Sir John Pope ================================================================================ RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-1988 https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/ft84gb83q 181 proceeding to New York to see Sarra Sam. While she and I were on a sight-seeing trip to Coney Island, we were bombarded with the exciting news of the end of the Second World War. We immediately returned to Chinatown where there was already great rejoicing. After a return visit with Dora and her family, and a short one with Mrs. Johnson, I left San Francisco on the Monterey for Honolulu, arriving home on 5 December, 1945. In April 1946 I was briefly seconded to the American Red Cross to interview victims of a huge tidal wave that swept the islands and claimed a number of lives. I was assigned to the island of Molokai, where I found that those with losses were mainly Hawaiians leading a simple life of agriculture and fishing along the seacoast. Out of the clear sky in 1947, I was invited to apply for a scholarship from the Honolulu Chapter of the National Foundation of Infantile Paralysis under the chairmanship of Mr. Riley Allen. I had been recommended by Miss Mary Cattan, Director of Social Services at Queen's Hospital, who had given assistance to Ruth during her hospitalization. It was a generous grant and the only condition was that I would return to serve the community for two years. Accepted by the New York School of Social Work, Columbia University, during the presidency of Dwight D. Eisenhower. I studied there from March 1947 to August 1948 for a Master of Science in Social Work degree. My field work was at the Presbyterian Hospital and my thesis was "An Explanatory Study of Thirty Poliomyelitis Patients Having Social and Emotional Difficulties”, patients selected from the Poliomyelitis Research Project, Department of Rehabilitation and Physical Medicine, New York University, Colleges of Medicine, at Bellevue Hospital, under the direction of Miss Mary C. Jarrett. I lived with Sarra Sam on 135th Street, between Riverside Drive and Broadway. She also shared her apartment with her sister Esther and with a friend from Fresno, Eunice Ma. Although the apartment was small and crowded, we managed to have some enjoyable gatherings there. We had many visitors from Hawaii: Ching Wan and his son Edmund; B. Y. and Mary Kamin Wong; Dr. F. H. Tong and his wife; and Bernard Young. Lillian Louis, Charlotte Wong and Jean Shigemura, all studying at Columbia, often shared our pleasantries. Dr. John Kometani, after ================================================================================ RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-1990 https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/d79206299 17 with its inculcation of “right thinking", the complete process has been summed up in a few well-chosen words by Dr. Monlin Chiang, one of the most prominent educationalists of the early Republican period: “These moral precepts came from the Confucian classics. Moral ideas were driven into the people by every possible means — temples, theatres, houses, toys, proverbs, schools, history and stories until they became habits in daily life, 233 The effect of both the legacy and the drilling was not lost on competent Western observers. Writing over 150 years ago, in his standard work on China first published in the 1830s, a future governor of Hong Kong, Sir John Davis, then only lately returned to England from many years' membership of the Honourable East India Company's Select Committee at Canton, had this to say: "The Chinese lower classes are better educated or at least better trained than in most other countries”. PART THREE: “Right Thinking" in Action in Tsuen Wan 134 + Tsuen Wan District (like all the rest) provides plenty of evidence for the effectiveness of the indoctrination, as well as occasional examples of emulation and performance. People knew what to think and what to do, and recognized the attainment of the prescribed high standards of conduct and behaviour even if they themselves did not measure up. Men who did so were greatly respected, to the point of veneration. It is the general opinion among Tsuen Wan natives, then and now, that such a one was the late Mr. Chan Wing-on, a former Tsuen Wan Rural Committee leader and also Chairman of the New Territories Heung Yee Kuk. Mr. Chan, who unfortunately died comparatively young, left a fine reputation behind him. He is commemorated by a tablet in a traditional-style pavilion, named for him, which was erected the year after his death near the entrance to the Chuk Lam Sim Yuen, one of the large religious houses located above the town. The memorial tablet records his life and achievements as a teacher and as a public figure; with an emphasis on his virtuous conduct and character and how it had influenced others for good: "Entering the teaching profession, he taught the village ================================================================================ RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-1990 https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/d79206299 198 in Hong Kong. Legge set up schools for Chinese girls which were run by his wife and, later on, his two daughters. After arrival in Oxford in 1876, Legge also took up the cause of women's education. He was, for instance, on the initial committee which founded Somerville College at Oxford in 1879, helping to draft its "religious but not sectarian" rules. A photograph provides us with a fitting symbol of Legge's life, love for Chinese, and his educational commitment. Students in his class during November, 1897, took a picture of his notes in Chinese left on the blackboard from the last class with the Professor. The picture one sees there manifests a startling simplicity: Professor Legge was still teaching a beginner's class in classical Chinese, and so had left there, in the very shaky hand of an octogenarian, situational phrases meant to prompt discussion. They began with, "On the top of the mountain there are three men" and went on describing animals on the mountainside and a river at the bottom. Somehow in the midst of this simple lesson religious issues arose, for in the bottom left-hand side of the board, in a portion where he may have been drilling students on specific characters, he wrote the two characters for "Jesus". • 52 Thus Legge had a deeply thought-out programme of educational philosophy and scholarship. It is a misapprehension that Legge was simply portraying China for Western audiences. He was just as much involved with teaching Chinese, and promoting education generally. IV. Legge's Sense of Mission and Duty This sense of duty is central to Legge's intensity of study, his drive for excellence, and the unwavering convictions which were deeply embedded in his academic writings. Dr Legge's academic approach to Chinese culture was prompted by the desire to make the Christian message known to Chinese people. Although the young Legge had reacted against some aspects of the form of Calvinism brought to Scotland in the reformed theology of John Knox (which he learned by memory with his classmates through the medium of the Shorter Catechism), the adult James Legge gained a new appreciation for the sovereignty of the true God, especially ================================================================================ RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-1998 https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/1g05n0794 408 was said to have been a British Member of Parliament. Alice was a gracious lady. Choa gives her maiden name as Walkden. It is sometimes elsewhere, puzzlingly, quoted as Whitcome. Did she have a step father one wonders? Or was this an unfortunate mistake by some writer and a case of give a slip-up five minutes start and the truth never catches up with it?' This could be the case. Certainly the name on the huge family memorial, in the Hong Kong Cemetery at Happy Valley, is carved as Alice Walkden. Before the couple arrived back in Hong Kong in 1882 the then Governor, Sir John Pope Hennessy, announced to the Legislative Council that this young Chinese had taken the highest honours at Lincoln's Inn. 'It was something that a gentleman belonging to the Colony should have gained such honours.' Anyway, back in the British colony in those days the 'superstitious' Chinese generally did not take readily to 'newfangled,' western medicine and Ho Kai switched to law. But a brilliant Chinese with fluent English was rare in those days. He was enticed into business. He also entered public service and, in addition to sitting on a number of other government committees, sat on the Sanitary Board (the forerunner of the Urban Council) and, in 1890, became a Legislative Councillor. He was the third Chinese to sit on this august body. He was also a Justice of the Peace. Having lived in the West for a number of years it is not surprising he developed strong views about social reform and the modernisation of China. He became an associate of statesman Dr Sun Yat-sen. This was at a time when China was striving to rid itself of the Qing dynasty and there was danger the country would be assimilated by colonial powers. In his latter life Ho Kai spent most of his time serving the community. He helped, together with his colleagues, to mould the Territory in which we now live. Ho Kai was capable and, understandably, there was no need for him to take to heart the Chinese axiom: 'If you do not become a good minister be a good physician.' He was 'lionised and eulogised' after his death by all sectors of ================================================================================