RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-1977 https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/np198x23n NOTES AND QUERIES 193 For the general background the reader is referred to pp. 419-433, 697-700 of Kung-chuan Hsiao's monumental study of late imperial China Rural China: Imperial Control in the Nineteenth Century (University of Washington, Seattle, 1960). Also to Chapter X of Frederic Wakeman Jr.'s Strangers at the Gate, Social Disorder in South China 1839-1861 (University of California Press, 1966): 'Class and Clan' 109-116. It is of interest that as late as 1905 and 1908 villagers of Honam Island, Canton were fighting out their feuds on the campus of the Canton Christian College, the future Lingnan University: see Lingnan University by Charles Hodge Corbett (New York 1963) p. 40. The self-government of Chinese villages existing alongside what A. R. Colquhoun styles ‘a long common frontier' with 'centralised autocracy', i.e. the situation which allowed this kind of independent action to subsist, is interestingly handled in his China in Transformation (London, 1898): 238-288. Hong Kong, December 1977. C. MOVE OF THE SHING MUN VILLAGES* JAMES HAYES The Shing Mun villages of Shing Mun Lo Wai, Pak Shek Wo, Pei Tau To, Shek Tau Kin, Fu Yung Shan, Nam Fong To, Tai Pei Lek and Ho Pui contain about 855 Hakka Chinese, mostly named Cheng but having among them also Cheung's, Ko's, Lo's, Tang's and Tsang's. In a hollow in the hills about two miles broad by two and a half long, formed by Tai Mo Shan, Grassy Hill and Needle Hill, and sloping from Lead Mine Pass southwards to Pineapple Pass and Tsun Wan, the inhabitants of these villages own 180 acres of agricultural land, 1180 acres of forestry rights and 42 acres of pine-apples. The whole of this area will have to be evacuated, and after careful search in co-operation with the villagers, suitable sites have been found to accommodate them at Kam Tin, Wo Hop Shek, Nam Shui Po, Tsat Sing Kong, Ping Kong, Fung Yuen (Yue Kok), Shek Ku Lung, and Pan Chung, and to these it is proposed to move all the inhabitants of the Shing Mun valley above Pineapple Pass. Details of the transfer are as follows:--- * Taken from the Hong Kong Government's Sessional Papers 1928. ================================================================================ RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-1983 https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/j9607p61v 109 Nam Tong Island (“Southern Hall Island"). This island is large and mountainous. Military defence work is currently going on there. It was formerly cultivated, but in 1929 the cultivated area was abandoned. There is an Aga light on the southern point. The channel to the north of this island is "Buddha's Head Pass". The harbour within this channel is well sheltered: there is a big temple on the mainland to the north of the channel. The chief place of interest on this island is the old fort near the north point, with a south wall thickened, apparently for mounting cannon. This fort is probably Chinese, perhaps built by pirates. Here we leave the islands of the South District, and enter the North District as we pass into Port Shelter. The interest of this place lies in its extraordinary geography and geology, and its wonderful beauty. The surf which beats on the high pillared cliffs of High Island, Bluff Island, and Basalt Island dies away as your launch passes into the long calm channels, and under the hills of the mainland there is perfect shelter, though I do not think the anchorages are good. Grassy hills come down to the waters' edge, and near Saikung the sea is studded with diminutive islets. The soil of these islands appears extremely barren, as the population of the islands is very small. Fishing seems the chief occupation. Settlements are few. Yim Tin is named after some abandoned salt fields a little to the south of the (Roman Catholic) mission church: Kau Sai ("West of the Channel") explains itself. There is also a group of settlements in the southern part of High Island. These have the remarkable names of "North Fork", "Tribute Rice Junks Bay", and "White Insect Wax",32 This group and Yim Tin are the only places in these islands where cultivation is of any extent. "North Fork" is a most remarkable place. Someone has lavished money on it, the houses and the ancestral temple are well built, a high platform held up by a big masonry retaining wall stands in front of them, and a small stream by the village is crossed by a fine three-span bridge all of stone: it is the sort of stream for which the rest of the Territory think six stepping stones are ample. I have no idea how these names originated, except that the bay may have been an anchorage for junks carrying the tribute rice north from Canton to Peking. ================================================================================ RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-1992 https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/qf85tx75x 207 100 boys in the Boys' School and 100 girls in the Girls' School. The Prep School, as the primary school was called, was in an old building and I can well remember the misery of homesickness. After tea at six o'clock we were sent to bed, which seemed ridiculous. My father stayed a few days before sailing for Hong Kong but I saw very little of him. When he left I felt abandoned. Others even younger suffered the same fate but seemed to survive. In fact these schools were run by a most devoted staff of missionaries who took great care of us - body and soul. They were of a fundamentalist persuasion and expected very high moral behaviour from all of us. The standard of teaching was high and the students got good marks in the Oxford School Certificate exams. The Four Seasons School life was regulated to fit the climate. The winters were bitter and so cold that one year we came back from holidays to find the sea frozen over. We walked from the docks to school over the sea. The summers were glorious. I suppose they were hot as I remember hearing of temperatures of 100°F or more but it was dry and on the whole not so hot as Hong Kong. The sea was perfect for swimming, which was allowed once it had reached the temperature of 64°F for three successive days. Spring and autumn were intermediate - considerably colder than the summer but not the freezing temperatures of the winter. To cope with these extremes in climate we had three sets of clothing - khaki shirts and shorts for summer, wool jackets and shorts for spring and autumn and thick wool jackets and plus fours for the winter. The school buildings were also designed to cope with these extremes. The spacious verandahs round the playground of the Boys' School kept the hall and common rooms cool in the summer. In the winter, wooden frames with glass were put up in the arches of the verandahs giving an extra layer of insulation while central heating was going full blast. There was always some excitement with each change of season. Watching the removal of the glass frames on the verandahs heralded the abandonment of our plus fours. The production of khaki shirts and shorts meant swimming and rowing was not far off. I can remember so clearly gazing out of the bedroom windows across the glassy calm sea in the early mornings wondering if it had reached the magic 64°. In the autumn the halcyon summer days would end abruptly with the ================================================================================