1939-01-13 — Page 30

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THE HONGKONG TE LEGRAPHI, FRIDAY, JANUARY 13, 1939.

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CASE No. 2489 DID NOT SURVIVE

Perhaps the tone of this article is not pleasant. But the "Telegraph" prints it

By

in order to draw attention to the other A Staff

half of the world we Hongkong people Reporter

live in, and to plead for a worthy cause.

'N OUR RESPONSE to

the appeals for assis tance for refugees from China we are apt to forget the whole tragedy affecting a great section of our own people-a tragedy which has influx of destitute new- comers from the war torn areas of China.

Before me as I write lies the Annual Report of the Hongkong Society for the Protection of

Numbers

that each teli a tragedy-and what, ugly figures they are.

A "GRAND" TONE! Hongkong Telegraph. Children. Cold Cucts here,

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'Phone 26615 January 13, 1939

THE SUEZ CANAL

THE THREAT by Egypt's Minister of Finance that the Suez Canal concession will be renewed when it expires twenty years hence is probably an idle one. Egypt would be involved in claims for immediate payment, in cash, of compensa- tion. exceeding £1,200,000,000 were she to attempt to take over the canal herself.

more

Here is a family of five living on $9 a month, or which they pay $2 for a bedspace which they take turni Lo occupy

another family of six living on $6 a month, baby, suf fering from marasmus and tuber. calosis due to lack of food, dies widow with four children pleads for help after twice being arrested and fued for hawking without licence, her sole means of gaining a livelihood... the list goes on and

11.

A

郾

•

iL

WIDOW with four children, all five starving. They have 24- where to live except in the street. Conjure up a vision of this case--- Case No. C.267 in the Society's filer. The widow is an earth-coolic-xhe

earth. But she can no longer work,

A whisky-soda? Man, the price of two whisky-sodes won the average monthly inccme of every Case dealt with by the Society in 1918,

Incidentally, the average was the lowest in the Society's history. In 1032, the average Income for 2 month of a family was $2.93. Last year it was only $1.57.

Try and imagine that. Two thou- sand and Afteen families last year lived on an average of $1.57 a month cach. That's why they ate the rice that gave them beri-beri, and why they died like flies. Not even like Ales For a fly usually has his belly full when he dies.

When I sald 2,015 familles, I was referring to those handled last year by the Sociely,

Its revenue for 1938 was only $28.121. For instance, it received sufficient money to buy only $8,000 worth of milk foods and cod liver oil. Medicine, hawkers' lleences and other relief took $3,000.

SPACE IS FOUND in the Society's Annual Report for only 20 of the 2015 cares dealt with last year. In thear 20 cases the words "ar- rested for hawking without a licence" in usrdno sa than 13 times-that is, in nearly half the cases members of the family can foul of the police for trying to obtain a living by sell- inst things in the street,

Some people would say that the police could be better employed, that the money wasted in arresting. charging, detaining, ferding und in- prisoning the unlucky hawker would alleviating

go a long way towards alley distress among the poverty-atrieken if diverted to proper channels. the arrest of a hawker does not rest with his or her bring marched un to

For

13

The threat from Italy works for ten eents a day carrying

the palice station by an Indian Con- is probably

stable. A European Inspector immediate, her frail. under-sourished form is

there to note down the particulars for she has been particularly unequal to the strain imposed upon

on the Crime Sheet, a warder looka

the insistent of late in her demands it. The eltiest boy--twelve years of

arrested person in the lock- some of age-desperately hawks for a share in the Suez Canal their meagre belongings in the

The Society paid his bail so that for European bables is cleaner than up, the Indian, an Inspector and an- Company-in which Britain streets in the hopes of selling some he could mother his four pitiful any country in the world except other policeman are required to at- thing to buy food for his mother bundles of cars and bones. Next Australia and New Zealand (where tend to the case before a Magistrate and his younger brothers and sis day the Selety paid his fine,

lers.

He hawks too near constable and is arrested.

An

Indian

+

ofter!

But the purpose of this article is not to cover so wide a field me that provided by the hawking problem.

owns 330,000 of the 800,000

they look after their babies so well and then, after the conviction, there shares and for a reduction of

that only four in each thousand die is the prison, where the hawker is its dues. In this demand she

YOU DIDN'T know, did you, that in the first year of life), has the most again surrounded by a bevy of offl- terrible infant mortality of any coun- cials, and fed and housed for any- has been supported by Germany

a man can be sent to prison for try for its Chinese children. Each thing up to a month. and, of course, by Japan, whose

- Prison may await this lad-whore truing to sell newspapers in the year, of every thousand bables born, appetites are similar. It has, only crime is that he sought food street. The Law calls that a crime. 350 din,

first. Just to make sure that too however, became a specifically for his family. The law in Hong- unless the man bups himself & ilcener

kong makes no distinction between many ponte don't sell newspapers, IT'S WHAT we call, in our smug Italian demand for two reasons: the person who attempts to earn his or the other things that hawkers sell, faghim, the "survival of the fit- since her conquest of Abyssinia livelihood by selling a Chinese news- the number of fleeces issued each test." We call it one of the lates of 15 to plead for more generous Italy's share of trade passing paper and the one who gains it by wear is strictly limited. through the canal has risen to pilfering or stealing second place and she finds the dues, which must be paid in sterling, a heavy strain on her finances; also, since the Abys-

Fortunate

that Es support for a Society struggling to fulfil the Colony's most worthy cause,

It is to ask that you divert one one-hundredth of the sum you spend each year on pleasure and entertain-

Nature!

We binme God for many things,

the

children who but to blame Him for this terrible. for the youth that the Society for

crime re tolerate in our midst inale up the hundreds of cases the Protretion of Children heard of F COURSE, his case. Ile was reclaimed from

dealt with carh year by the Socitly the clutches of the law and sent the China Youth Socfety, where he for the Protection of Children should YOU MAY FIND this article un- ment to the Society for the Protec- probably be instrumental in saving now attends school. The mother and consider themselves lucky. They're pleasant reading: truth can be ton of Children. Or to asit you to her brood were fed until the mother alive, aren't they? They've survived unpleasant--and this is the truth. smoke one cigarette a day less and was well enough again to go to work the first hurdle-escaped the clutches Phone the Society for the Protec

of them before they reach the age Annual Report and peruse it when much savings to the Society's Tren- round for her by the Society. Case of death that claims thirty per cent. tion of Children for a copy of their one or two lives by sending just that

of twelve months.

you sit by your warm fire to-night surer. No. C.207 was closed.

You didn't know that, either, did Keep your mind of the fact that the In Hongkong dies hours represents sufficient wealth for OR TAKE Case No. A.2480, re- you? More than one out of every coal consumed by that fire in four

ported to the Society by a mem- four babies born ber of the Women's Auxiliary when before it reaches the age of one year. the Society to cheat death of another two little girls, aged 11 and 3. were This Colony, whose infant mortality young life. arrested for hawking and begging.

sinian War, she has been haunted by the fear that Britain and France may close the canal to her shipping in time of war. There is actually a strong case that the Suez Canal, like other international waterways, should be put under proper inter-":

The mother was an unlicensed old baby. control. national

But there hawker, with a month

She

was suffering from beri-beri.] seems no good reason, beyond you do not know what beri-beri fat the general desire for appease-Eat insufficient food, and make wh

rice

You can get enough for one returnment, to grant Italy (or for that for you da eat the cheapest type of cent to give you a meal, und beri- matter Germany or Japan) a share in the present manage-beri. Incidentally, you'll die before ment. None of these Powers

Hanoi-Kunming-Chungking-Chongtu Line

from Hanol to Kunming

Every Thu. & Sat.

Every Sun., Wed. & Fri, from Kunming to Chungking

from Chungking to Chengtu and

Every Mon., Wed, & Fri. from Chungking to Kunming

Every Wod, & Fri.

Every Wed, & Fri,

from Kunming to Hanoi Kunming-Chengtu-Sian-Lanchow

Line

tong.

The mother in case No. 2430 was!

walk when the Scelety withered her. fer poor, Every Thu, & Sat. from Kunming to Lanchow via Chengtu & Sian believes in international control unable to

found Every Sun. & Fri, from Lanchow to. Kunming via Sian & Chongtor

breasts were unable to feed her month old baby

Lanchow-Ninshia Line.

Every Fri. from Lanchow to Ninshia and return Chungking-Kweilin-Kunming · Linc

J

wock

Chungking-Kweilin and Kweilin-Chungking trico a wook Kwailin-Kunming and Kunming-Kweilin once

EURASIA AVIATION CORPORATION Hongkong Office.

King's Bldg., 4th Flr.

Tel. 25552, 25553.

CANTON AGENTS

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Hongkong

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WM. FARMER & CO.

Victoria Hotel Building. Shameen, Canton.

Tel. 13501.

cares for the interests of other countries; and if Britain and France have little right to a monopoly of control, Italy has less.

of

The two girls begged-Jusi orce- to get enough money to buy a bottle) of milk for the dying baby. They were arrested.

The Society was loo late to save

mother..

*

read mare? About

This

al was Case No. C.183.

If international" control waterways is of such terrific im- the baby. It died. They saved the portance to the totalitarians, will Germany and Italy support WANT TO

W Japan in demanding that the family who occupied a bed-space. United States should withdraw Which means that six people lived from the Panama Canal? We in a room, occupied by another ten could imagine the reaction in families. Thele share of the room was a narrow space, probably six feet long by three feet wide by four! Washington if such were made.

feet high. Yet it is just as logical.

air. Europeans would consider i h

Luck of sun soon!

Naturally there was no light, and Britain depends upon the there was only a little hot, foetid! Panama Canal as much, pro-ving grave this home of the! bably, as Japan or Germany do family of six upon the Suez Canal. Yet brought tuberculosis, lack of food Britain does not seem to have brought beri-beri. The father was any qualms regarding American administration

tho vitał of waterway that links the Pacific asa and Atlantic oceans.

arrested-also

for huwklog. He

tried to earn a few cents by selling Chinese newspapers. The mother was in hospital. The Society was in the police court when the father's Cao was called. He told his pitiful talo.

GRIN AND BEAR IT

By Lichty

shot treture Minklə21, 119,

SEW/ 12-28

"Noto mind, Cadwell-just anip the price tags off the inexpensive

prezental

centres.

*

•

•

T'LL JUST quote the Society's Re-

port by way of conclusion: "The Society la mointaining four But four centres Orc not enough. The value of the centres varies inversely as the distance be- tween them and the homes of the mothers. Buses and irams are not for these who seek the Society's help. A long walk to the nearest centre may involve the loss of a day's wage which, with an income rate of less than $2 per head in family, cannot Bhtly be foregone. The mother

has to deelde between the day's wage and the child's treatment, which may be a matter of a few minutes each day but repeated day after day will rescue it from the death the mother tears

or frem the handleopped adolescence which is the chief cause of poverty, crime and disease and therefore of importance to the coni- munity as a whole.

or

"But a centre costa more thun $5,000 a year and, with the exccp- tion of 1930, the Society has spent

cachi more than Income

its from 1932 onwards,

year

"If the present efficiency of the Society's restricted efforts are ever to approximate to that effectiveness of which adequacy of scale is an essential condition, new centres must be brought into being.

Twn new centres would require an addition to the Society's Income of $10,000 and in 1939 we shall alm nt a total income of $40,000. We shall not be appealing ter an inde falte sum with which romething will be done but for $40,000 to carry on with our present commitments and establish two centres in places more accessible than those now ex- Jating.

The Government grant of $5,000 amounts to approximately 22 cenis for each doilar äcerving in 1938 from other sources. An Increase to

02

cents per dollar would have enabled the opening of ene mor nooded centre."

sorely

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