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prevented him hearing any conversation among the pirates. There were two watchmen on board. Neither they nor anyone else. offered resistance when the pirates came on board at Tai O. There were nine persons on the launch at the time. He was afraid to cry for help. Their anchorage was near the new Police Station, the water being very shallow there, and two fishing junks were anchored near.
Such is the gist of the engineer's story. The other members of the crew give a similar account of the seizure of the launch. Vigorous efforts are being taken by the police to lay the pirates by the heels.
CURTAILING THE WATER
SUPPLY.
We have received from the Hon. the Colonial Secretary a copy of the following letter :—
FROM THE HON. THE ACTING DIRECTOR OF PUBLIC WORKS TO THE HON. THE COLONIAL SECRETARY,
Public Works Office, Hongkong, 4th November, 1901. Sir, I have the honour to address you with regard to the question of the water supply for the City and Hill District, which, in conse quence of the meagre rainfall during the past wet season, is far from adequate to enable the system of full supply to be maintained until next year's rains arrive, unless some very unusual fall of rain occurs during the present dry season. As this cannot be reckoned upon, I consider it necessary to take steps to curtail the supply at an early date.
The quantity of water in the reservoirs on the 28th ultimo aggregated 258 million gallons and the quantity drawn from the reservoirs during the preceding seven days amounts to 183 million gallons.
At the same rate of draw-off, there was there- fore 15 weeks' full supply in the reservoirs on the 28th ultimo, or sufficient to last until nearly the middle of February. From this it will be seen that the full supply cannot with safety be continued.
Allowing the full supply to be maintain d until the 11th instant, the storage will then have been reduced by two weeks, leaving 13 weeks' full supply or 26 weeks half supply. On the latter basis, there is sufficient water to last until about the middle of May next, by which time next year's rains may safely be relied upon.
It has been found that, by turning on the water in accordance with the notice which I enclose, the consumption is reduced by about half, and I therefore submit that the notice be published in the newspapers and the supply be curtailed on and after the 11th instant. I have, etc.,
(Sd) W. CHATHAM, Acting Director of Public Works.
THE NEW TUNG WAH HOSPITAL,
Building operations have already been began at the new Tung Wah Infectious Diseases Hospital at Kennedy Town, and we understand that the ceremony of laying the foundation- stone will be performed by His Excellency the Governor on Monday, the 18th inst. The site adjoins the Government Infectious Diseases Hospital, and, when completed, the now institu- tion will be devoted entirely to the reception of Chinese patients, who up till now have for the most part been housed in matsheds during epidemics. Being practically open on all sides, the site is eminently suited for an hospital. The plans have been prepared, and the work is being supervised, by Mr. B. Brotherton Harker, architect, Hongkong. The new buildings will be in the Renaissance style of architecture, and the finished structure will have an imposing appearance. It will be of two stories through-
out.
From the main entrance, which opens into the reception hall, corridors lead to the three ward pavilions constituting the principal part of the hospital. On the right and left of the grand entrance are the two administration blocks, containing doctors' rooms, dispensaries, offices and stores on the ground floor, and nurses' dormitories on the upper flat. In each of the pavilions there will be twenty beds-ten on each floor-so that accommodation will be given for
THE HONGKONG WEEKLY PRESS AND sixty patients in all. But besides these, the convalescent ward will have seven or eight beds. The mortuary is to the south of the main buildings and is connected with the wards by a covered way. On the same side are the kitchen, wash-house. servants' quarters, &c.
The interior of the buildings will be executed in modern style, and plastered with Keene's cement. Ventilation, lighting, nd sanitary arrangements are to be of the most approved kind. Present-day requirements will be met by the structural separation of the lavatories from the wards, as well as in many other minor respects.
The memorial stone will be placed at the north-west corner of the buildings, in one of the administration blocks. It is expected that the erection of the hospital will be completed in a little more than a year, and it may be added that ground is available for a considerable
extension of the institution should it be desired.
DR. CANTLIE ON HỒNGKONG.
In Vol. I. of the
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himself
[November 9, 1901. of the Crown colony in which he takes up his residence, will be woefully disappoint- ed. He must politically throw back to ante-Magna-Charta days; he must be content to lay aside all the freedom his fore- fathers fought for, and submit to a régime of autocratic rule paralleled only by political life in Russia. Nay, more than this, he mast expect to find himself made a burlesque of, inasmuch as he is given a vote which bas no influence, and a voice in public matters which has all the machinery of Government against it and fit to render it abortive. A wise autocracy is per haps the ideal form of government, but it is one British subjects have been trained to look at askance, and it is a little difficult to recur to a system which for well-nigh a thousand years has found no favour in Great Britain."
In his remarks concerning the policing of the Colony, our author says there is a divided opinion as to the expediency of loading the expenditure with Chinese prisoners of all sorts. The gaol does not present to the Chinaman The the bogie it is to most Europeans. coolie, condemend to incessant labour, and on a starvation diet, finds within the precincts of the gaol rest and food and does not resent his
incarceration as a rule."
British Empire Series," published by Messrs. Kegan Paul, Trench, Trübner & Co., Ltd., of London, appears an interesting article by Dr. James Cantle on
For the British manufacturer-exporter. Dr. Hongkong. During his residence in the Cantlie has, as we should have expected from Colony. Dr. Cantlie took an active interest in such a keen Colonial observer, a word in season. all that made for the betterment of the social. It is not for want of warnings that the home civil, and sanitary life of its inhabitants. Ex-manufacturer has allowed himself to be ousted pressions of his views upon these aspects he was from, or never been permitted to enter, the by no means backward in giving while he was huge market fields of the East by his more amongst us; concrete results of his strong ad pushful American rival and by the more adapt- Wide-awake. British Consuls vocacy of necessary reform and advancement in able German. the sanitary administration of Hongkong he keep on writing appeals to our merchants to has left behind him; but no excuse is required adapt themselves to the needs of their foreign for quoting this retrospective utterance of his, customers: their wails are smothered in Blue- for the shortcomings and deficiencies which as books; hard-headed business men who see with. a resident he endeavoured to rectify are still dismay trade slipping through British fingers with us in a greater or lesser degree, and, in join in the chorus, but Lombard Street heareth fact, his words acquire an additional weight not. Oh, for a Haliburton, a Sam Blick, to when we consider that he writes in England, spur them out of their plethoric lethargy! dispassionately and calmly viewing from Dr. Cantlie says:- the other side of the world our life here, and drawing his conclusions with an unbiassed mind. On Dr. Cantlie's brief historical description of Hongkong we need not tonch. It is written with verve, and painstaking as to Pacts and dates. More interesting to the dweller in the Colony are the author's opinions upon general matters.
Dealing with the personnel of the Legislative Council, Dr. Cantlie returns to the attack in characteristic fashion. In this connection he
says:--
D
It will seen that the official element outnumbers the unofficial, and the sop to the public, that they are represented on the Legislative Council, is a puro fiasco. When one elects to reside in a Crown colony one must be content to resign all rights of c'tizenship and be content to be ruled by a system of bureaucracy, which may be admirable, but it is one against which the British elector is inclined to revolt. The spectacle of all the officials voting one way, and all the unofficials the other, with the official majority assured by their number on the Council, is one calculated to provoke derision, and to a people with less forbearance than the British, not unlikely to cause disturbance. What is demanded in hon- our to the self-respect of the community is thut whilst Imperial matters are dealt with by the nominees of the Crown, municipal matters should be left to the control and direction of those who subscribe the money for municipal work. The residents in Crown colonies are recruited, with but few exceptions, from the middle classes, and are surely as well qualified to manage the municipal affairs of their place of adoption as are the representatives of the working classes at home."
:
"The British manufacturer is, again, so conservative, so obdurate, that he will not cut his cloth according to his customer, but will endeavour to dictate to the natives what they ought to buy. In other words, he will not alter his looms to suit his customers, but will send out for sale goods in such a form and of such a quality, that it is impossible to get a market for. Take an example in Corea all merchan- dise is carried on men's backs, on peculiarly arranged saddles'; of course a man is capable of bearing a burden of only a certain weight, and form, and before British-made goods can be transported to the interior it is necessary to unpack the goods, cut them up, and adapt them to the means of carriage. The British mer- chant declines to acquiesce in the matter, and plainly tells the Coreans that if they do not take them as they find them they can go with- out. Not so the German, not so the Japanese; with an acuteness which is highly commendable they prepare their goods in a 'packablz' form, and naturally obtain the custom. Practically they have got a hold on the commerce of this and many other countries by the obstinacy of the British merchant, and especially the manu- As in Corea, so in many countries, facturer. even in the British colonies themselves, Ger- mans and Japanese are ousting the British, and one cannot help thinking that the incursion is well deserved. The Germans believe that the days of the commercial traveller are not num- bered, the British seem to think they are. Consequently the German finds, as he travels with his sample-book beneath his arm, that people will deal with him rather than with their own countrymen, who have appeared to have given up commercial travelling, and rely on the telegraph as a means of communication between manufacturer and merchant. bitterness of the lesson has not yet come home to people in the British isles, but it will and So as to perpetuate the burlesque of pre- must come, and the starving millions of Lan- tending to govern by popular methods, we find cashire will rue the day they neglected the evident lessons set them to learn. The goods in Hongkong a Sanitary Board. The conces sion to the Board of a majority of unofficials sent possess neither the shape nor colour wanted was rendered completely futile by withholding by people who know their own minds, and It is whose customs and habits are not to be altered all executive power from the Board. merely a deliberative body, with power because a Lancashire proprietor has put up a .to recommend to the Council.
mill which will produce articles they do not The elector, trained in Britain to believe want." that he is entitled to a 'say' in the affairs
On the subject of the Sanitary Roard, Dr. Cantlie is similarly outspoken, No apology is needed for quoting him in extenso :-
The
We have touched on only a few of the matters
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