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and footpaths by so-called hawkers, who should T be restricted to bona fide hawking, the Colonial Secretary wrote:
"I am directed. to inform you that, in view of the fact that the policy of allocating cer- tain positions to hawkers where they can be easily supervised and can cause no feal ob- struction is adopted all over the city, His Excellency sees no reason to interfere with the discretion of the Captain Superintendent of Police. His Excellency has ridden frequently through the lanes mentioned in the Wanchai district. The stalls are the restaurants of the working coolies, and in His Excellency's opinion their removal would impose a hardship upon that class and increase the cost of their living. They offer no obstruction to light and air, and as these lanes are only used by foot-passengers there is practically no obstruction to the traffic."
THE HONGKONG WEEKLY PRESS AND
to congregate there. The policy of the police was that in strests which were fre- quented and traversed almost entirely by Chinese hawkers were allowed to squat, but they were not allowed to squat in streets where Europeans resided or which were traversed and frequented by Europeans. Wing Fung Street was such a street. He admitted it was an oversight on the part of the police- or they might call it neglect of duty- | in allowing the hawkers to congregate there, That was stated in his report. He thought the street His Excellency referred to was Nallah Lane, a street exactly behind the Wanchai Market. That was a street which was entirely used by Chinese, and it was a street which His Excellency frequently rode down. This street was about the only place where coolies who went out at four o'clock in the morning could get a bit of breakfast, houses and Dr. HARTIGAN said it seemed to him that in shops not being open. There were simi- this communication His Excellency's good- lar stalls in streets in the great European nature and Irish kindliness of heart had made cities, including the first city of the world-the him look leniently on a practice which, though city of London-and upon his word of honour, its prohibition might entail a temporary he could not see that they did any harm. He hardship on the coolie class, undoubtedly by might state incidentally that where hawkers its continuance did serious injury to the drain- were allowed to squat the police--and there age system. It appeared to him that in this were special police told off for the work-saw letter undue prominence was given to the ques that the hawkers swept up the refuse, and he tion of street obstruction, which though unques- ventured to say that if any member of the tionably a nuisance in the ordinary acceptation Board chose to go down Nullah Lane or Cross of the term, was only really harmful through its Street--the other two streets complained of results. What the Board wished to put an end at say nine o'clock in the evening, when these to was the obstruction underground, the block-hawkers had done their day's work, they would ing of the drains and the consequent sagging find the street swept and garished and as clean back of fetid sullage, which might be seen as Queen's Road at the bottom of that building. oozing up through the street ventilators The PRESIDENT asked Dr. Hartigan if he and overflowing from the unsealed traps into was content to leave the matter there. the kitchens and backyards of Chinese houses. Decaying vegetable matter, as was well-known to them, formed even more offensive sewage than animal refuse, and had the further more serious objection that its fibres, which long resisted decay, tended to encourage the deposit of the more consistent portion of the liquid sewage, and bound the whole into a thick, tough puttaceous mass, which then formed an admirable plag for a pipe-drain. Now this was precisely what happened where- over these coolie out-door restaurants were situated. Any of them could establish the truth of the fact by walking along Bridges or Aberdeen Streets, near Victoria College, or the streets in the neighbourhood of the Eastern Market, Elgin Road, Kowloon, or the Hunghom Villago. In these places when the sewers were being cleaned great quantities of black stinking slush were removed. He had stood over the man-hole when the cleaning plug had been drag ged through the drain with the greatest dif- ficulty and had seen, after summer drought, the dried concentrated mass being actually "I am directed to inform you that His gouged or scraped out of the drain pips. Excellency has received a report upon the site This stoppage was not due to insufficient from the Honourable the Director of Public fall, for though at Hunghom and Wanchai Works and the Acting Principal Civil Medical the gradient was small, at Aberdeen Street Officer, who visited Kennedytown on the 9th it was very steep. This blocking constituted January, to the effect that there is no swamp a public danger, rendered nagatory the beside the glass works and below the said Hos advantages of their very expensive drainage pital. The place so described is an ordinary system, and, as furthermore they must of course building lot, though from the description given bow to His Excellency's decision, they must in your letter it cannot be positively ascertained endeavour to minimise its injurious results. whether you refer to Inland Lot 1,082 or In- He would ask the Board to request the sub-land Lot 1,293. The latter, being below the committee for sanitary improvements in Vic- toria to give this matter their immediate atten- tion, and draw up some scheme by which proper eating-houses could be provided, or devise some practical plan by means of which restaurant garbage would be prevented from getting into the drains, which they could ask the Govern- ment to put in force.
L
Mr. OSBORNE said that as one of the com- mittee who drew up the report which gave rise to this correspondence he should like to say that he agreed with Dr. Hartigan. He did not think His Excellency the Governor had clearly under stood the recommendations they made in their report. He did hope, notwithstanding this de- cision of His Excellency, that the matter would be seen to by the Captain Superintendent of Police, and that he would se his way to put some check upon this trading in the streets.
Dr. HARTIGAN said no. The blocking of the streets was a minor matter. He did not ap. prove of it, but what ho complained of par- ticularly was the blocking of the drains. No doubt all the rubbish was swept up, but it found its way into the drains. He asked the M. O. H. if their inspectors had not com- plained over and over again about the blocking of the drains in these streets.
It was understood that the committee should take the matter into consideration without a formal resolution.
THE NUISANCE ON THE HILLSIDE AT
KENNEDYTOWN.
Replying to the letter forwarding the recom mendation of the Board that measures should be taken to remedy the dangerous nuisance existing on the hillside at Kennedytown above and in proximity to the new Infectious Hos- pital, and also that the malarious swamp situated besides the old glass works and below the said Hospital should be drained or otherwise made healthy, the Colonial Secretary wroto:-
level of the road in places, may in wet weather form a stagnant pool; but the only remedy for this rests with the owners, who will be asked to take preventive measures. There is, howover, a stream running past the site and into a swamp above the sito which Dr. artigan appears not to have noticed; but it will be impossible to do anything in the case until the foundations and retaining walls of the new Hospital are complete, when this water can bo run along a paved gutter to the back and the swamp can be filled in. The stonch arising from the hillside seams to be due to the practice of putting out hoofs, pieces of skin and hair (chiefly of goats) to dry, and His Excellency suggests that this practice should be put a stop to by the officers of the Sanitary Board. The Director of Public Works and the ở cling Principal Civil Medical Officer report that in no case was there any smell arising from the graves, nor were any portions of dead bodies
[February 9, 1901.
the report of the Director of Public Works and the Acting Principal Civil Medical Offloor, His Excellency is of opinion that the site for this Hospital is not unsuitable and is the most con- venient that could be found for the purpose for which it is intended."
The following minutes were appended
Dr. Clark I cannot understand how the Hon. D.P.W. and the Acting P.C.M.O. failed to see the swamp indicated in Dr. Hartigan's motion and in the Board's letter of December 21st, 1900. I have bien down to Kennelytown to-day (January 25th) and found swampy ground and pools of water in the waste land called Cadogan Streat immediately to the west of the old glass works, while to the south of the remaining portion of the lot occupied by the silk works is a flourishing water-cress bed, which can only be traversed by brick stepping stones. To the south of this again is the land marked on the map as Forbes Street, which is also water-logged. A reference to the attached map will explain this, and I do not see how the locality could have been better described than
beside the old glass-works,' as the swampy land can be traced from west side of glass- works, past silk works and round into Forbes Street. It cannot be said that any rain has fallen lately, and yet the water-cress beds are in a most flourishing condition, and there are pools of water here and there over this area. I did not observe any stench there to. day, but it was undoubted when the committee of the Board, consisting of Dr. Hartigan, Mr. McKie, Mr. Tooker, and myself visited it ou September 14th last."
Mr. McKie: "It would be interesting to see the report of the D.P.W. and the P.C.M.O. They cannot have been to the same place that I iuspected."
•
Dr. Hartigan:-"I regret to differ in toto from the report as given in this letter. I was over the ground yesterday (January 26th) and it was still a swamp both above and below the soil. There are none so blind as those who will not see. If His Excellency does not believe the report of the Board's committee let His Excel. lency appoint an independent one.
I had no object in stating anything but the truth, and am supported by the Board's Surveyor's report as well as by the minute of the M. O. H."
The PRESIDENT said that before going fur. ther in this matter, and with a view possibly to prevent a good deal of sp aking on the subject, he might say that the P. C. M. O. and himself were entirely misled by Dr. Hartigan. He described this swamp here as being a malarious swamp situato beside the old glass works and below the site of the Hospital. The P. C. M. O. and himself went to the site of the old hospital. The land beside it was not a swamp, but a hillside which was being cleared It belonged to Mr. Dorabjee Nowrojee. They then went below the Hospital, and took the direction of the glass-works, where there was some land owned by Mr. Chater. Ho had since learned that the site mentioned by Dr. Hartigan had nothing to do with the glass works, but was below the silk works, 500 or 600 feet away from the old Hospital.
Dr. BELL quite agreed with the President. The day they inspected the place they did not see this site on account of the vague description. He went down on Saturday, and saw what he thought was the site mentioned by the M. O. H. He thought the man there had a squatter's license and was trying to grow vegetables. Of course where there was water-cress there was a swamp. If they hal seen that they might have recommended that the squatter's license should be cancelled.
Dr. HARTIGAN said for fear of being mis- understood he should like to state, before com. menting on this lett r, that when he raised the question of the insanitary surroundings of the proposed site for the Kennedytown Infectious Hospital he did not know by whom the in- tended site was chosen. He supposed some officer of the P. W. D. had selected it, but had no idea that the P. C. M. O had been consulted. In fact such a question would ho thought have been referred to the M. O. H. as the official responsible for sanitation. Hav- ing thus promised, it certainly seemed to
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The Hon. F.H. MAY said the report of Messrs. Osborne and Mokie was referred to him, and when he went down to inspect the streets com- sticking out of the graves. His Excellency would, a most unusual proceeding to depute plained of he found that the hawkers had been turned out of Wing Fung Street. He admit ted that they ought not to have been allowed'
however, suggest that the carcases of cattleshould be more deeply buried in order to obviate any chance of a nuisance in the future. In view of
two officers responsible for the selection and who at that Board had maintained that the objections pointed out by him did not exist,
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