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RAILWAY CONSTRUCTION IN CHINA.
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The era of railway construction in China appears now to be commencing in carnest, and within the next few years important developments may be looked for. The line from Tientsin to Kaiping, constructed originally for the conveyance of coal from the mines to the port, broke the ice, and was found to be of such practical utility that it has now been extended beyond Shanhaikwao. The other day a line con- necting Peking and Tientsin was opened, and already there is talk of duplicating it. The construction of the Shanghai and Woosung Railway is proceeding rapidly, and on the 28th August work the Chinese Eastern Railway, in Manchuria, was commenced. Work is also reported to have been commenced the great trunk line that is to connect Hankow with Peking, though the real posi- tion in regard to that undertaking is still involved in some doubt. The JAMESON- HOOLEY Syndicate has secured concessions for railways from Shanghai to Nanking and from Soochow to Hangchow, and they are not likely to let the grass grow under their feet in securing whatever benefits may result from the carrying out of those pro- jects. Nor is it likely that the system of locomotion will be long in mak- ing its appearance in the South. commercial province like Kwangtung will not lag far behind the other provinces in a matter of that kind, and it is possible that the Canton and Kowloon line may be- come an accomplished fact before many more years have passed.
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It is under pressure from without that China has been compelled to move forward. Her defeat by Japan not only exposed her weakness, but brought with it a strength ening of foreign influence through the financial obligations that had to be contracted. Left to herself Chinn would have continued in the old way indefinitely, and would speedily relapse into it if the ressure to which she is now subject were removed. The construction of railways under such circumstances cannot in itself be taken as evidence of an intellectual awakening. Railways have not regenerated Turkey and it remains to be seen what effect, they will have in China. That they will lead to a large development of trade is certain, but whether that development will be accompanied by any corresponding im- provement in the government of the coun- try is, to say the least, doubtful. A hopeful feature is the anxiety displayed in some quarters to promote the study of foreign languages and modern science, but the con- servatism of the race is deep seated, the ruling classes are devoted to the squeeze system, and the reform movement is as yet an exceedingly tender plant. It is unlikely that we shall see in China any such intellectual development as that which has during the past thirty years worked a trans- formation in the Japanese nation.
The Mainichi Shimbun is urging the passing of laws for the better control of the merchant marine of Japan. It points out the utter powerlessness of the captains of Japanese ships when their men refuse to obey orders, neglect their duty, or assault officers on the voyage; and further remarks that the provisions of the Penal Code at present do not provide punish- ment of an adequate nature in any of these cases. It is certainly time that something like the discipline enforced by the Merchant Ship- ping Act on English vessels should be applied to Japanese ships if the good name of Japan is to be preserved.—Japan Mail,
THE HONGKONG WEEKLY PRESS AND
MEDICAL INSPECTION OF SHIP:
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[October 7, 1897.
the boarding officer, though it would be more satisfactory, and in the long run perhaps not more expensive, to have the duty dis
We do not charged by a medical man. suppose that the experience of Calcutta in the matter of medical inspection will be found very alarming. In Hongkong it seemed to be assumed that every individual arriving in the colony was to be subjected to an examination as searching as if he were a candidate for life insurance, but we take it that in the case of vessels arriving from
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healthy port and which had had 110 sickness on board during the voyage a duly attested declaration to that effect by the master would be accepted as dispensing with the necessity of an individual examination of the passengers.
SALE OF THE OLD COLONIAL CEMETERY.
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The recrudescence of the plague in the Bombay Presidency has induced the Bengal Chamber of Commerce to address the Government on the necessity of taking every possible precaution with a view to keep the scourge out of Bengal. The Committee of the Chamber dwell on the disaster that would follow on Calcutta being closed as an export port, to the agricultural, planting, and manufacturing industries of Bengal and Assam, and they point out that any further steps which can be taken to materially reduce the probability of the plague reach ing the Presidency, will meet with the entire approval of the mercantile com- munity. From the quarantine regulations recently adopted for Calcutta, which were laid before the Hongkong Sanitary Board at its last meeting and a precis of which
In the last issue of the Government Gazette appeared in our columns, it will be seen that Calcutta has not shrunk from the adoption appears a notification of the intended sale by of a system of medical inspection of ships and auction of a piece of land which, we hear, medical surveillance. If the latter measure is forms part of the old Europeau cemetery at all feasible in a city like Calcutta how between Kennedy Road and Queen's Road much more feasible would it be at Hong- East. Some years ago all the tomb stones It were removed from this old burying ground kong, where the population is smaller. may be remembered that the Hon. F. H. to the cemetery at Happy Valley, together MAY, in a letter taking exception to certain with such of the human remains as were comments which appeared in this column of found; but we bave heard that some time the discussion at the Sanitary Board, said:—after this a number of coffins were exposed, Surveillance is the very essence of the and it is believed there are many more system of medical inspection which Dr. about the place, for in addition to the "CLARK advocates, and it is the surveillance graves marked by tombstones, which were on shore of passengers landing out of an dealt with as above described, there must "infected ship, or arriving from an in-have been many nameless graves whose fected port, that some, including_myself, | existence was unknown. The question has regard as impracticable here." For our been raised whether it is seemly to dis of this land for building pur- own part we can hardly conceive of any pose place where the system would be more poses. It is seldom that disused grave- one in the yards in England are at the present practicable. However, as no
to the builder; they colony with the exception of Dr. CLARK day turned over appears to have any actual acquaint- are more generally utilised as recreation The same policy is ance with the working of the system, grounds or gardens.
followed by the Hongkong Government it will be an advantage to have the ex- perience of another Eastern city as a guide, with regard to other disused graveyards. and we would suggest that after the Cal-There is, for instance, the old disused cutta regulations have had a few months' Mahomedan cemetery on Robinson Road, trial a full report on their working should below the house known as Ravenshill; the be obtained. Such a report, we opine, bodies were removed from this cemetery would remove much misapprehension and many years ago, and the ground has since show that the anticipated "difficulties have been repeatedly applied for for building pur- been exaggerated. In ordinary times very poses, but the Government has consistently few persons would be subjected to medical declined to sell it, and within the last few surveillance, and in times when epidemic years it has been utilised as a
ground. There is also a disused disease was prevailing in our neighbourhood tion
Chinese cemetery to the eastward of the such a system would be less prejudicial to the trade of the colony than the total city which, it is understood, is also held as prohibition of immigration from the in- unavailable for sale. Why, it may be fected ports, a system which not only entails asked, should a different course be adopted much direct and indirect loss, but which with regard to the first European cemetery, has also been shown to be ineffective, where the pioneers of the colony were buried, inasmuch as persons from the infected ports and whose tombstones bore in several in- cau reach the colony by the simple ex- stances names that have become historical? pedient of proceeding first to some other In the case of the old Mahomedan cemetery we believe a promise was made to the port.
But while some, including Mr. MAY, ob- Mahomedan community at the time the ject to the system of medical inspection on burying place was changed that the old one account of the assumed impracticability of should not be sold, and of course the Govern- medical surveillance, the objection of the ment is bound by the promise; but must it majority, we believe, was directed to the not be held that in the case of the old. examination of ships and their passen- European cemetery there was an implied gers. On this point also the experience of promise to the same effect, implied Calcutta will be useful, for the system is to simply because no one could have thought be applied there, as it was proposed it should it necessary to exact an expressed promise? be here, to native as well as foreign craft; and At the time the change was made the it was in relation to native craft that the chief community would probably not have con- difficulty was anticipated in Hongkong. It will templated with equanimity the probability be observed that the duty which in England is of the ground being built over, had thrown on the Customs officers of ascertain- such ય course been suggested, any ing in the first instance if there has been any more than the present generation would sickness or the voyage is in Calcutta thrown like to entertain the idea of the cemetery upon the pilot. In Hongkong it might, if at Happy Valley being some day built it were deemed advisable, be thrown upon | over. The matter is largely one of senti-
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