RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-1970
https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/ww72j0241
170 

S. F. BALFOUR 

or jumping with great agility from one mast to another cutting down rigging and sails, managed to defeat the rebels.25 This must have happened just after the turmoil of civil war under the last Sung Emperor. During the Ming dynasty (1368 to 1644) the problem of local disturbance was still present. The Tanka were always predatory and for the first time an attempt was made to control their anchorages. Tai O and the islands stretching southwest into the sea continued to be a centre of piracy. The famous pirate Man, who gave his name to Lo Man Shan island group known to the Portuguese as the Ladrones, arose in Tai O during the Ming dynasty.

This local problem was resolved by placing garrisons along the coast. In the very first year of the Ming dynasty, as soon as Kwangtung was pacified, they began to be organised. In our region forts were built at Tai O and Fat T'ong Mun, and the foundation of Kowloon City as a small administrative centre also dates from the beginning of the Ming dynasty. It was then called Kun Fu Cheung and had little population and no fortifications; its main use was as one of the stations used to enforce the salt monopoly. More important was the military garrison at Po On which had been for generations the site of the Tung Kun commandery, under which the garrison at T'un Mun had controlled the entrance and exit of ships to the Canton estuary.*

In 1386 instructions were given to the garrisons of Kwangtung as follows: "Walls and forts are to be built, waste land must be reclaimed, and cultivated land must be protected from the inroads of the Dwarf Robbers (Wo K'ou)."26 This was the name given to the Japanese and Formosan pirates who were active along the entire South China coasts, making forays inland for plunder, during the entire Ming dynasty, and who made an additional problem of coast defence.

Foreign traders continued to live in Canton, the city still had its Mohammedan quarter and T'un Mun in our region remained an important anchorage and a place from which foreigners conducted their trading negotiations. These foreigners had been Indians, Persians, and Arabs until the beginning of the 16th century when

25 讀史方語

26 倭寇

* See plate 20 for the local forts. Ed.
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RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-1974
https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/x633mp077
THE HONG KONG REGION

115

Various local accounts show that many craft came from northeast Kwangtung and elsewhere for the seasonal fishing. The presence of pirate fleets, sometimes in very large numbers, was also a feature of the local scene.

This activity, and the importance it gave to the local seaways is reflected by the Chinese records. The Kuang-tung K’ao-ku Chi-yao gives what at first appears as a disproportionately large amount of space to the subject of coastal defence.3 The provincial gazetteer devotes many pages to maps of the coast line and the off-shore islands, and it is significant that these are included in the coastal defence section and not in that dealing with administrative boundaries.4 Another long work, the Kuang-tung T'u-shuo, which deals with the administrative geography of the province, gives maps that show the outer islands in the districts on each side of the Pearl River delta. Some of these maps showing outlying areas are blank, for all but a corner of a page, but have still been included. It also lists the garrisons and naval forces responsible for the area.

In the Hong Kong region, Lantau and the islands are the subject of much of an article by Hsü Tei-shan on Hong Kong and its past, included in the compendium to the exhibition of Kwangtung Culture assembled at the University of Hong Kong in 1940.6 As is to be expected, the fall of the Sung takes up much of his attention,7 but he then considers Lantau itself. Hsü's discussion on one of its Chinese names, Tai Yue Shan, is relevant here because it

1 Orme, para 53; CR 1947, p. 10.

2 Lo-shu Fu, p. 597 has a long note on pirates in the Ladrones c. 1779-1810.

3 KTKKTY 30/1-11. See also chuan 28 on military matters.

4 KTTC, vol. 2, pp. 2394-2433, especially 2406-2410 for the islands between and outside Hong Kong and Macau, the Ladrones. Two chüan, 123-124, (pp. 2359-2442) deal with coastal defence. The district maps for the Delta are in chuan 83, Hsin-an at pp. 1454-5 and Hsiang-shan at 1464-5. The late Ming work Wu-pei Chih lists posts, garrison strengths and ships for the Central, East and West lu of Kwangtung; chüan 215/12-13, 15-16 and 17, 18 being of special relevance to Hsin-an and the adjoining area. The maps for the outlying parts of the Canton Delta are in chüan 210/9-10 and 215/6-7. For this work see Franke, p. 209. Ku Yen-wu's celebrated T'ien-hsia chün-kuo li-ping shu has eight chüan (97-104) on Kwangtung, much of which is devoted to military organisation and defence.

5 See the general map at the beginning, 1-2, and detailed maps under reference chuan 11-12/7-9.

6 KTWW, pp. 425-426,

7 ibid. He gives a clear exposition of the various problems surrounding the identification of the various places at which the last struggles of the Sung occurred.
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RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-1974
https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/x633mp077
The Hong Kong Region

125

the inhabitants were less fortunate and had either to flee into the hills or stay to oppose or meet the pirates' demands. Walls were built or repaired, and a defence by desperate men of even these not very imposing defences might help to stave off an attack. Village refuges, into which cattle and livestock, valuables, women and children and old people were put, were also utilised. One of these places existed at Shek Pik, but was already in ruins by about 1900.1 Most villages kept arms and even cannon available for use up to 1899 and some of these remain to this day.2

Nonetheless, the villagers' position was pitiful in the event of attack, and their attitude towards pirates was probably too often similar to that recorded by Commander Vansittart of H.M.S. Bittern from the River Min in March, 1855:

+ miserably poor boats followed the Brig begging assistance; one Village sent me a well drawn up petition; another a present of waste paper and Joss-stick; fishermen, and passage boats, small Traders, all telling the same pitiable story; landing on Hootow, I was quickly surrounded by Peasantry; desiring the Interpreter to ask them why so many fine looking fellows permitted strangers to molest them; they declared it was useless to resist Pirates, and so whenever Pirates came the villagers hid themselves and cried.

This extract, quoted from Miss Fox's book,3 shows how Chinese on land and sea suffered at the hands of their less scrupulous fellow countrymen.

Things were no better on the sea at the end of the century. L. C. Arlington of the Chinese Maritime Customs, who spent six years 1893-1899 in charge of the Customs station at Cheung Chau, says;

'as well as other numerous islands forming the Ladrones, [it] was the rendezvous of pirates, who kept all of us on the qui vive, foreigners and natives alike. Gangs of pirates would get together and attack the villages, even in broad daylight, and after looting and killing, escape either to Macau or Hong Kong, where they disposed of their booty. The Customs Officers had many tussles and narrow escapes from these pests of the sea.

1 The elders told me about it after I had come across a reference to it as a place name in an old deed of sale of fields in the valley.

2 R. L. Ozorio, personal communication on the village armoury of Kak Tin, Shatin Valley, 1973. These arms were, of course, sometimes used against other villages.

3 Fox, p. 130.
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RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-1983
https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/j9607p61v
92

3.

4.

These 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.

Hoklos, 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.

Political divisions

The 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.
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RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-1983
https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/j9607p61v
94

On drier land are grown pea-nuts, taro, ginger, onions, and many other crops. Pineapples are grown in some places, always on the hillsides, and nearly always among pine trees; these help to shade the plants and hold the soil together, otherwise the heavy summer rains would wash it all off and make the hillside a desert. The plants last seven to nine years. On the Islands pineapples are grown only on Tsing Yi, Ma Wan, and Lantau. Other fruit is grown near villages: laichis, oranges, lungngan, pumeloes, and papaya; the last especially in North Lamma.

Fishing is almost entirely in the hands of the Tan Ka and the Hoklos. Big junks go out from Tai O, Cheung Chau, and Hong Kong to trawl on the continental shelf beyond and around the Lemas and Ladrones; smaller boats go in for line fishing and prawn catching; the dried and salted shrimp paste is what gives to Cheung Chau its "ancient and fishlike smell". But the main fishery of the year is that of the "wong fa", which migrate from near Kwongchau Wan every autumn up the coast towards Swatow. Night fishing with acetylene lamps is very common: these first came into favour about 1920. Stakenet fishing is very common, but does not pay very well. Rock oysters, the sort that cut your feet when bathing, are picked in great numbers by women and children, especially at low tides in summer, all round the coast. Crabs and lobsters (the sort without claws) are caught in nets and traps.

Forestry is confined to the growing of firewood for use and sale. The plantations are generally near villages, but some on the islands belong to owners who live elsewhere. Nearly all Tsing Yi is divided between three forestry lots: yet on Lamma there are no forest lots, though there are trees all right. The biggest forestry lot is at Tung Chung. Very little planting is done except when encouraged by the District Officer: trees are allowed to sow themselves. Grass, growing thick in summer, is cut for fuel everywhere in autumn; it is the chief cooking fuel of the New Territories. Its cutting is women's work.

Other island industries are salt-making, confined to Tai O; lime-burning at Pingchau, Tsing Yi, and formerly at Naikwuchau; shell and coral are used. Limekilns on a small scale are found everywhere along the coasts; the place-name "fui yiu", not ...
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RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-1983
https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/j9607p61v
97

in the N. E. corner. My pilot not being acquainted with the channel, I got a fisherman's boat to go up with one of the Chinamen I had on board, to see if he could recognise his property. He shortly returned on board, saying his boat was there, and that the other boats were pirates. I immediately stood in under easy steam, when the pirates seeing my intention, made sail, and ran through the channel towards Wanchowchow (Stonecutters). I fired a few shots at them, but they soon got under the cover of the land. Then sending my boats after them, and running round outside the Island. I had the satisfaction of driving them on shore, and destroying five, as well as liberating two market-boats with several passengers who had been in confinement for several days.

Three captured men are sworn to by one of the owners of the boats, and I have sent them in irons to Hong Kong.

These piratical boats had all the rebel flag flying and fired upon our boats, without however doing any damage.

Ma Wan ("Horse Bay"). This island is low-lying, although the geological structure is the same as Tsingyi and Lantau. The east coast has a fine bay, almost unapproachable for rocks. The inhabitants are mostly Hakka. One of the Customs stations built for the so-called "Blockade of Hong Kong" during the 1870s and 1880s still stands on this island; it is now used as a school.

The waters around Ma Wan are known as Kapshuimun ("Rushing Water Channel"). The name is apt since Kapshuimun has about the swiftest tiderip of any channel in Hong Kong. It is 25 fathoms deep. It is the track of all steamers from Hong Kong going to and from the Delta. Opposite Ma Wan, on the south shore of Kapshuimun, that is, on the northernmost tip of Lantau, are the only wolframite mines in the islands.

Lantau. This is our biggest island, two and a half times the size of Hong Kong Island. Lantau Peak is the highest peak in the Ladrones 3061 feet.

The northern end is almost deserted except for a few tiny hamlets round Yam O (“Hidden Haven"), a perfect smugglers'
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