RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-1973 https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/8910rj06r 152 NOTES AND QUERIES The making of verses was a gentlemanly pursuit in early Victorian days, encouraged of course by the system of classical education which emphasised translation from Latin and Greek and hence a detailed knowledge of the rules—or mechanics—of prosody. Mercer received such a traditional education: he was educated at Exeter College, Oxford, where he took a B.A. degree, and for a time was at the Inner Temple, though he did not take the Bar examination. When he came to Hong Kong as his uncle's private secretary, he sought solace from the chores of day-to-day colonial administration in his poetic exercises and the result was Under the Peak. There are five poems in this book—‘a string of sonnets’—which refer specifically to Hong Kong. They are, respectively: The Peak; The Bay; The Triads' Cave; The Water Fall; The Temple on Taplichow; The Pic Nic Cottage at Heong-Kong; and The Chinaman's Grave on the Lonely Hill Side. According to Mercer's note on the poem, The Triads' Cave, ‘a cavern romantically situated, has now disappeared before the utilitarian demand for granite. It was long the chosen resort of the members of the infamous San hop hwai, or Triad Society', where: The robber horde oath-bound to mutual aid Would plan foul murder and unpitying raid O'er midnight counsel in their secret den? The gem among these sonnets is without doubt The Chinaman's Grave, and should be given in extenso: Oh Chow, or Wong! or by whatever name Men call'd thee, or the Gods may call thee now, Why so extravagantly vast thy claim To mortuary earth upon the brow Of yon fair hill? If all men spread as thou No room for things created would be found Throughout the Seric land, but all the ground Would teem with graves, and well might it be said That living ones were push'd from off their stools By men all useless, now that they are dead And vanish'd. Did Confucius leave no rules To bind a soul's ambition by the tomb? Then let survivors show themselves no fools, But dig thy bones up to make elbow-room ================================================================================ RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-1989 https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/8336pm92h 328 winter. Once in a year they practised shooting at a police shooting range near Man Kam To. In earlier times the guards had used gwan sticks. C. The village market At present there are a few shops, mostly food stalls, in Kam Tin Shi. Some Dangs also live there. They are descendants of the senior branch, including descendants of Wan-Guk and Wan-Gaan. The place used to be the local market. It was active before the Japanese occupation. It had a sign in the form of an arch, which was removed by the Japanese. Some documentary information about the market has survived in a rent record.29 One of the shops entered into the rental contract in 1851. The rent book included entries for five shops in Kam Tin Shi. Among them one was run by a tailor. It also mentioned the names of three streets. These were Upper Main Street (Sheung Taai Gaai) and Lower Main Street (Ha Taai Gaai) as well as Middle Street (Jung Gaai). The elders remembered that the market had two or three butchers and two or three fishmongers. Besides these there were a few other shops. Two sold jaap-fo (“sundry goods”). Kam Tin Shi is remembered to have mainly catered for the needs of the Kam Tin people. Very few outsiders came. Some informants added that there was even one pawn shop inside Kat Hing Wai. The owner was a descendant of Wan-Gaan jou. I have no idea when the pawnshop was started. There was also a peanut oil factory which was started more than 100 years ago. It was owned by a Wan-Yu jou person. IV. SETTLEMENTS AND LINEAGE SEGMENTS 4 According to Sung (1973:111) Hon-Faat, the first Dang ancestor to come to the province, built the first house at the bottom of a hill called [Gwai Gok Saan] about three-quarters of a mile away from the present Kam Tin". His grandson Fu-Hip lived there on retirement and founded a school called Lik Ying Jai (ibid.: 116). The descendants of Fu-Hip's grandson Seui, lived in the Naam Wai and Bak Wai villages around the beginning of Ming dynasty (1368). The division of the Kam Tin settlement into Naam-Bin and Pak-Bin remain today. Yun-leung, father of the gwan-ma and one of the sons of Seui, remained in Kam Tin. The other four descendants of Fu-Hip moved to nearby Ping Shan and places in Dongguan county, among other places. The descendants of many of the sons of the gwan-ma moved away to Lung Yeuk Tau, Tai Po Tau, 30 ================================================================================ RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-1989 https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/8336pm92h deui-lyun dim-dang Wif ding-hau T`LI Dongguan 東莞 dong-ji Dung Ping Guk 東本局 faan Fa-Gung Fa-Mou (EAEN fa-paai TEMP Fau-Ng ởH Fong 兒 fong fong-jeung Fu Qing (47 fu 伏 Fu-Hip gwan-ma 郡馬 Gwok-Yin Gwong-Yu K Gwong-Yu Tong Gwun-Yam #E Gyun 銷 Ha Tsuen 厦村 Ha Che 下崟 haang 坑 ha-fu F Hak-Sa ha-yan FA Hei-Ye 起野 heui-lok Heung heung Fui-Sing !! Fung Yuk-Daan MƒU!! Gaai-Yut gaam-sang Gai-Jau # heung-on Ho fil hoi-dang EH hou 號 Hung-Fan Taam gam-taap Gam-Tin Gaozong h Gau Ga Chyun **† hung-jeuk FL Hung-Ji 孔子 Hung-Ji 洪贄 Hung-Sing # Hung-Yi 洪儀 geui-yan git-jing #7 Git-Sau gu l Guangdong MAC Guangzong 光宗 guk 榖 gung-chou Y gung-sang Gwaan-Dai BNR Gwai-Ting gwai-waan (?) Gwai-Wong E gwan 棍 Gwan-Haak 7K Gwan-Leung R jaap-fo 雜貨 Jai Baak-Fu Jan 鈞 Jan-Ting Jau M Jau-Man B jau-tung 州同 Jeung Hoi Jeung 張 Jeung-Luk A jeun-si 進士 Jiangxi 江西 Ji-Ga Tong #18 2 Jik-Gin jiu BE Page 369 ================================================================================