Sessional_Paper_1899 — Page 307

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DISTRICT WA ATCHMÉN.

A full statement of the revenue and expenditure for the year is given in Table VIA, and the state of the force on 31st December, and other particulars will be found in Table VIB.

The District Watchmen were instrumental in bringing 455 cases before the Police Magistrate, and the Committee is indebted to the Chinese Newspapers, the Tsun Wan Yat Pó and the Wai San Yat Pó, for continuing to publish weekly lists of these cases for the information of subscribers.

It was proposed in February, 1897, to make use of the accumulated balances to the credit of the Fund to build a central watch-house in which to accommodate the watchmen of Districts III, IV, V 1 and VI. Should the plan be carried out the discipline of the Force would be much improved and a saving effected. The annual rent paid for the premises now rented as watch-houses in the above- named districts is $1,340. The Government was asked to grant a piece of land in the Taipingshan Resumption area, but the matter is still under consideration.

The contributions to the Fund for the year were $8,357.76 as compared with $7,853.75 for the preceding year. The actual expenditure was $11,033.25 as compared with $9,528.78 in 1897. The balance to the credit of the Fund is $8,745.06. In April an allowance of $2.00 a month was made to each watchman on account of the scarcity, almost approaching to famine, which prevailed in the spring and summer. This allowance is still continued as the Committee thinks that the increased cost of living in Hongkong necessitates an increase of pay. Comparing prices with those of two years ago firewood has risen about 35 per cent., oil 30, pork 40, fish 60 and vegetables 100; whilst the rents of Chinese tenement houses in Victoria have risen at least 20

per cent. The increased cost of living

is also, I believe, the reason for the number of resignations in the Force in the years 1897 and 1898. These amounted to 27, whilst in the three preceding years there were only 8.

Canton subsidiary coinage now stands at a discount of a little over 2 per cent., and causes a loss on exchange of $74.81. Only 7 per cent. of the subscriptions paid in subsidiary coins is paid in Hongkong coins. This probably represents the actual ratio of the two classes of coin in circulation. There is no reason to believe that Canton coins are "forced" on the collector. The sum paid in each instance is small and the shopman pays the first coins that come to his hand in the till.

CHINESE RECREation Ground.

A statement of revenue and expenditure is given in Table VII. The total expenditure for the year was $721.30, whilst the revenue obtained from the rent of the shops, letter-writers' tables, &c., was $1,347.31. There is a balance of $2,437.45 to the credit of the Fund.

CHARITABLE FUNDS.

Tables VIII and IX give statements of account of the two Funds administered by this Office.

TUNG WA HOSPITAL.

During the months of May and June the hospital maintained a branch hospital for the treatment of plague cases at Kennedy Town. The extra expenditure was defrayed out of the balance remaining from a Special Fund left at the disposal of the Directors,

The mortuary at Kennedy Town has been condemned as a nuisance by the Sanitary Board, owing to its proximity to the Cattle Depôt and to the quarters of the Officer in charge. A site for a new mortuary has been selected.

The number of patients admitted to the hospital during the year was 2,898. The highest number admitted in any one of the seven preceding years was 2,823, whilst the average number was 2,509. There are no longer private paying patients, as the ward in which they were accommodated was con- demned in 1894. During the last six years the number of out-patients decreased from 135,608 in 1893 to 90,880 in 1898. The Directors attribute the decrease to the following causes-(1) the fear people have, when plague is epidemic, of having their illness diagnosed as plague, and of being sent to the Plague Hospital, (2) the reform of certain abuses in connection with the dispensing of plasters, &c. in 1895, and (3) the displacement of population caused by the resumption of Taipingshan.

GENERAL.

The question of the reconstruction of the Western Market is under the consideration of the Government. In November separate petitions were presented by the pork-sellers, the fishmongers, and the poultry-dealers asking that the Market should be rebuilt on the present site, or, if it must be rebuilt elsewhere, then on a site nearer the Praya. The petitions also contained a suggestion as to the arrange- ment of the shops.

In March a petition in Chinese with 68 signatures and 207 chops affixed was presented to the Government, asking for the grant of a site on which to erect a small-pox hospital for Chinese and requesting that the disinfection of premises in which cases of small-pox occur might be carried out by a Society which the petitioners proposed to form for that purpose and for the management of the hospital. Petitioners understood that the hospital would have to be conducted in such a way as to ensure isolation of the patients and they recognised the improbability of the Government consenting to a less thorough disinfection of infected premises, but asked that the actual work of disinfection and cleansing might be done by their own employés, under the same supervision as is now exercised. The application was not granted.