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the Hongkong Hotel Company, at a price to the latter (including the furniture) considerably below the sum at length realised. If I am not mistaken, too, Mr. Humphreys had gone into the question of forming another limited liability concern to take it over.
The fate of the two companies interested in Peak hotels no doubt helped to deter him from this experiment. The investing public have not yet forgotten how the shareholders and debenture holders in those concerns fared. They are not likely, I think, to again subscribe capital to continue the provision of luxurious homes either for cheap boarders or for wealthy residents who wish to reside at the Peak during the hot months, largely at the expense of proprietors.
For this is what it comes to. If the Military Authorities were to consent to the prayer of the suggested memorial, they would not be prepared to do so without being provided with a fair quid pro quo. An equally large and commodious building erected, say, on Mount Cameron, would certainly not cost less than $400,000, probably $500,000, and the necessary roads and drains giving access to it would absorb another $100,000. Taking it, however, at the lower figure, $500,000 would have to be subscribed to run an establishment or philanthropic lines, for if business rates were demanded from boarders, the tariff would necessarily be prohib- itive to a large proportion of them.
It is well known that large boarding houses (and the Mount Austin really fell under that category) rarely or never pay, the exceptions being when personally managed by some ex- ceptionally thrifty and argus-eyed proprietor. The hotels that pay well are those enjoying a large transient traffic, with a well frequented bar, and a range of shops or offices on ground floor yielding good rents. The Hotels at the Peak cannot have these advantages, and in order that they should be able to pay their way they must be able to considerably angment their Even under rates and keep no empty rooms. those conditions there would not be, as the phrase goes," much money in it.”
Since the time the hotels at the Peak were erected and the terrace called Mountain View was sold by auction at a loss on the cost of erection of $100,000, there have been many new arrivals in the colony. Some of these griffins may cherish the delusion that a fine property has been lost to investors. Let them rest assured that if there had been the faintest chance of the Mount Austin Hotel turning out a bonanza neither Messrs. Humphreys & Son nor the Hongkong Hotel Co, would have missed
the opportunity.-I am, sir, yours faithfully, INVESTOR. Hongkong, 8th June, 1897.
THE HONGKONG WEEKLY PRESS AND
**
THE YELLOW RIVER AGAIN.
The Weihien correspondent of the N. C. Daily News writes under date of 31st May:-
China's Sorrow" is again manifest in a flood of tears more destructive than the novelist's most passionate flow. The river has again broken out at Lichin city, and baffles the Governor's attempts to stop the gap. It is said that he (Li Ping-heng) is on the ground in person superintending the job. Since the recent floods in the Mississippi valley the American has no advice to give the Orient upon the subject of controlling its large rivers. Formerly we knew just how it ought to be done. The subjugation of a stream like the Yellow River is a problem not to be solved in a day.
AN UNPURGED SCANDAL. Notwithstanding all the excitement aroused at the time, the extraordinary proceedings in the late Carew case still remain unexplained, and,, owing to the general apathy of public opinion among foreign residents in Japan ap- pear likely soon to be forgotten. Mr. Lowder has apologised for acting as a "private citizen in securing the arrest of an innocent woman and her incarceration in a jail on a false charge, and he has even obtained a sort of certificate from Mr. Troup, the Assistant-Judge in Yokohama, that his action in the matter was taken in perfect good faith. It was, of course, only a coincidence that the course of discrediting the principal witness for the prosecution by charging her with the actual murder was likely to materially assist his client. Doubtless Mr. Lowder on his side is quite will ing to give Mr. Troup a certificate that when or Assistant-Judge, or the British Consul
whatever post Mr. Troup was filling at the time, allowed Miss Jacob's box to be taken away to the "private citizen's" chambers and there over- hauled, Mr. Troup was also acting in perfect good faith, if with somewhat deficient knowledge of British law and custom. We are recalled to a consideration of the case by some remarks in Truth by Mr. Labou- chere, who, having perused one of the Carew case pamphlets published in Yokohama, remarks that "the proceedings against Miss Jacob throw a most unpleasant light upon the administration of justice in the British Consular Court." These words are not a whit too strong; but the fact that British residents in Japan and news- papers edited by British subjects appear inclined
to let the whole matter fall into oblivion with- out demanding a thorough investigation is, in our opinion, still more unpleasant. Had a Japanese Court been guilty of such questionable proceed ings we should never have heard the last of THE AUDIENCE OF THE SPECIAL the case. Why, in common honesty and fairness,
RUSSIAN AMBASSADORS.
1997.
June 17, originally laid. True, after the proceedings in open Court Mr. Lowder "apologised" and Mr. Troup granted a "certificate" of Miss Jacob's innocence stamped with the Consular seal, which, besides being wholly irregular, is not worth the paper it is written on, as it would not prevent Mr. Lowder or any other "private.
from securing a fresh warrant for citizen Miss Jacob's arrest on the same charge as that under which she lay for several weeks. Mr. Labouchere says that "the Consul's share in these outrageous proceedings has been very the notice of properly brought under
We are
27
the British Minister to Japan."
not
aware if this is the fact, nor do we hope much therefrom should it prove to be the case. What ought to be done in their own protection by British residents is to communicate the whole of the facts to the home authorities by means of a memorial, and to secure the assistance of Mr. Labouchere or some other member in bringing them before the notice of Parliament. It would perhaps be painful to Miss Jacob to have these matters revived, but it seems to us that the justice of the case de- mands it. We may say that, so far as we our- selves are concerned; we have no knowledge of any of the parties in the case, but in our opinion neither an apology from counsel nor a certificate from Consul should stand in the way of a strict investigation into all the circumstances.--Kobe Chronicle.
EL
The writer of "Notes by the Way" in a later issue of the Chronicle" says :-A Yokohama resident who read the recent article in the Chronicle on An Unpurged Scandal,". has given me some particulars which show the flabbiness of public opinion in the Nothern port. In the first flush of indignation at the conduct of Mr. Troup in allowing Miss Jacob's box to be overhauled by the "private citizen" who had laid the information against her, a numerously signed petition was forwarded to Sir Ernest Satow, the British Minister, setting forth the whole of the circumstances in the case with reference to the conduct of Mr. Troop, and asking that such steps should be taken as would prevent a recurrence of what was a serious reflection upon the administration of justice in the British Court. Sir Ernest Satow kept the memorial for some weeks, and then, after the first excitement had somewhat cooled down, he approached the promoters of the petition with a suggestion that its term should be modified. He was, he said, powerless to deal with the petition himself, and must therefore
send it home, but before doing so he would
like to point out that it was likely to do Mr. Troup serious injury, and he thought the signatories should have this view placed before them. The injury that had been done Miss Jacob was of course of no consequence when weighed in the balances against the injury a British Consular official might suffer.
should any different course be adopted because the proceedings took place under the sanction
That under the circumstances of the case, this Prince Ukhtomsky and suite arrived at Pek- and with the approval of a British Court?
action should be, taken by a British Minister ing on the 21st ultimo, but owing to the absence Mr. Labouchere says it is almost "incredible of the Emperor at Eho Park it appears that the that a box containing Miss Jacob's papers sounds incredible, but I am solemnly assured special Russian Ambassadors did not have their was allowed to pass into the hands of Mr. that such is the fact. What is of more import Of the British audience until the 26th of the month. In the Lowder, who-though securing Miss Jacob's ance, the appeal was successful.
residents of Yokohama who had signed the meantime the Russian Princes stayed at the arrest as a "private citizen "and being more- Russian legation instead of the quarters over the counsel for Mrs. Carew-yet "broke petition, only four had the courage of their specially prepared for them near the Board of the Consular seals and examined the contents." convictions and refused to withdraw their names. Bites. The time between their arrival and Incredible it may be, yet it is a fact, and, what The others, including the editor of at least one their audience of the Emperor was occupied is even more remarkable, scarcely a word of Yokohama journal, cancelled their signatures in with visits between the Ambassadors, the Mini- protest was publicly uttered by either of deference to the appeal of the British Minister, ters of the Grand Council, the Ministry of the prosecuting counsel in the Carew case, and the document was sent back with four names it was to protect their only attached to it. Of such is the civic War, and the Tsungli Yamên. On the 26th, whose business but
A Consular official her defence
left virtue of Yokohama ! was the day of the audience, his Majesty having witnesses, returned on the afternoon of the 25th-the wholly in the hands of her counsel, who, for- Russian Princes after presenting an auto-tunately for her, was an American and there. graph letter of the Czar also presented the fore not under the influence of the amiable tra list of presents sent to H. M. Kuang Hsü ditions of the English bar. Mr. Labouchere by their Sovereign and impressed upon the describes the accusation against Miss Jacob as Emperor that several of the presents had been an entirely tramped-up charge, not a scrap of personally selected by his Russian Majesty, evidence worthy of the name being produced in The Emperor smiled and said he would "value support of it." He remarks further that "nearly them all the more for this." The audience
a month elapsed before the charge was finally took place in the usual Throne-hall-the Wen dismissed." As a matter of fact, however, the Hua Tien. It is reported that the Russian charge was not dismissed. Mr. Troup was es- Ambassadors also wish to present the Czarina's pecially punctilious upon this point, and could gifts to the Empress Dowager personally, and find no ground for a dismissal, the evidence, ap- have requested a private audience to do so; but parently, that had induced him to issue a it is not yet settled whether this audience will warrant not being sufficient to elevate the be accorded, although there ought not to be proceedings into a
ao-the any difficulty, since Manchu ladies are customed to meet male guests at their own homes,-N. C. Daily News.
富蓄
formal trial, and so "private citizen" was allowed after the conviction of his client to withdraw the monstrous charge almost a month after it was'
said to have expressed the opinion that even if the petition had been sent home, it would only have been pigeon-holed and nothing more would have been heard of it. If this be
true, what fudge it is talk of immaculate British law and British officials, and to profess a fear of coming under Japanese administration. where life and liberty could certainly not be more seriously threatened than it was in the Jacob case.
Nevertheless, I am very glad to know that notwithstanding the invertebracy of Yokohama, the matter is not to be allowed to rest where it stands at present. rangements have been made to bring the
Ar-
whole of the circumstances before the home Government, and Mr. Labouchere, or, if he is too busy, other members of Parliament, will be approached in the hope that they will take the
ཝུནུཎ, )... ... ''སྶ;
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