162
THE HUNAN MURDER,
(Contributed.)
THE HONGKONG WEEKLY PRESS AND
to
[August 30, 1902.
Disputes between employers and employed are of course time-worn subjects all the world over and elsewhere generally adjust themselves; but in Hongkong circumstances are peculiar and call for special treatment.
The native population is essentially a floating one thousands come from the mainland, earn for a brief period what is to them fabulous pay, and then return to their homes for good. Thousands are attracted to the Colony by the high pay but, finding the surroundings uncon- genial, likewise return f、r good.
The stream of change is ever flowing and there is no failure of supply. There is no permanence of residence; practically every man's home is elsewhere, and the Colony is looked upon as a place wherein to try one's luck and clear out winner or loser, the result being con- tinual change of employment. Cook to-day. tallyman to-morrow, coxswain, gardener, watch- man, shroff in turn, jacks of all trades, they are good at none.
of our most important possessions, as this missionary body than free intercourse and island undoubtedly is, can only he looked trade with foreigners. The ignorance and on as a menace, necessitating a strengthen- superstition of the people, on which the ing of our resources in this part of the Chinese pamphleteers had so successfully world. Kwanchau-wan, we are quite pre-traded, would be in great measure dispelled pared to believe, was occupied and will be by actual contact with the for. igner, and the converted into a naval base, without any opening up of the province would be a blow hostile intentions against Great Britain; to the pride and prejudices of the Hunanese but, nevertheless, the threat is there, latent which was most thoroughly deserved. The though it may be.
much enduring and long-suffering British Government would not, however, for some reason unknown, then press for this repara- tion, and the anti-foreign party in China were emboldened to further efforts The murder of two missionaries in Hunan, fan the anti-foreign flame which culminated, which was first announced by telegraph by at the end of the nineteenth century, our Shanghai correspondent, is said by in wholesale massacres of missionaries REUTER to be causing considerable uneasi in the Northern provinces and the daring ness, the remoteness of the district making attack ol the Legations in Peking. it difficult to obtain information. The mis- Even now, so little have we learned by
To further emphasise this evil the Colony is sionaries, who are stated to have been beaten the lessons of the past that the mission-honeycombed with so called" clubs," otherwise to death by a riotous mob, were Messrs. aries have been allowed to return to places societies of those following the same employ- J. R. BRUCE and R. H. Lowis, who belonged in the interior, far from the reach of help, ment which, supported by subscriptions, afford to the China Inland Mission, and were and completely at the mercy of the semi- food and shelter to those out of work, and where stationed at Ch'en-cheo, or Cheng-chou, a savages who can in a brief half-hour be matters connected with their particular interests considerable city on the Siang river, south stirred to outrage and murder by incendiary are discussed, the decisions of the club, often of the capital, Changsha. Our correspon placards or speeches in the tea-houses. If illegal, being binding on every member.
There is no incentive to honest work, no dent has thrown some light upon the the missionaries are to be encouraged to seek disgrace in dismissal; it is so easy to obtain new outbreak, for le tells us that the riot the crown of martyrdom in the interior of employment and wh n out of it there is the was caused by the dissemination of a China, then it is absolutely necessary that club or lodging with a friend at his master's rumour to the effect that the missionaries efficient protection should be afforded to them expense. There is no family influence for good,. had administered poisoned medicine. An-nd the public spared the shock of hearing and as the lower class Chinaman's ambition does not as a rule extend beyond his daily meals, other report is that the foreigners were held periodically of some appalling outrage iù
it is not difficult to see the causes which have responsible for au outbreak of cholera in the the so-called Celestial Empire. There is one city. The rage of the mub also induced them sure and certain way by which such pro faithful and useful servant into the slip-shod, changed what 20 years ago was an industrious, to attack the Chinese Imperial Post Office-tection could be assured, but could the worthless, ind leut creature with which the probably the only other semi-foreign build-flaccid policy of the British Foreign Office Colony swarms to-day, ing in the city-which they succeeded in by any possibility be stiffened to demand demolishing, the Postmaster being severely it? We mean that whenever a foreigner, wounded in the fray. It is clear enough whether merchant or missionary, is foully from even these scauty particulars that the done to death in China, the head of the anti-foreign agitators in Changsha - who viceroy responsible should roll in the dust poured such a stream if utterly disgraceful as atonement. literature from the presses of that city all through the Yangtze Valley in 1891, when
a most determined effort was made to arouse such a demonstration against the Christian religion as would lead to its effectual sup- pression-have again been actively at work. On the former occasion a member of the literați and an expectant Tantai, CHOU HAN by name, distinguished himself by causing the issue of a host of most libellous anti- foreign placards, distributed broad-cast, and it is believed that he was the author of a vile and disgusting book, entitled Kwei Kian Kai Sz, or "Death to the Devil's Religion," which was also published by the Hunan printing presses, A collection of cartoons with the descriptive letterpress was in 1891 printed at Hankow by the missionaries for the information of foreigners and to give an idea of the manner in which the populace were being misled by the anti-foreign officials and geutry of Hunan. This book, which is entitled The Cause of the Riots in the Yangtsze Valley: A Complete Pic. ture Gallery, showed most conclusively how the misrepresentations of and slanders upou foreigners were calculated to goad the natives to the commission of the most serious utrages, an these
were per petrated in about half a score of places, and included not only the destruction of mission-premises and the wholesale slaughter of converts, but also in several cases the barbarous murder of the mission-
aries as well. At that time the opening up
of the province of Human to foreign trade and residence was earucsily advocated in these columns both as a punishment to the Hunan gentry and as a measure of precau. tion to avert these outbreaks with their too frequent fatal results. It was thought, and we still think, rightly, that nothing would more tend to dispel the foolish and wicked aspersions which had been cast upon the
|
THE NATIVE LABOUR QUESTION.
We have received from the Secretary of the Hongkong General Chamber of Commerce, with a request for publication, the following letter. Mr. Lowe at the same time informs us that the Attorney-General has drafted a Bill to meet the cause of the complaint.
Hongkong, 5th June, 1992,
SIR, I beg to bring to the notice of your Chamber a matter which affects the commercial interests of Hongkong, viz., the growing ton- dency of Chinese in the service of foreigners to leave employment without notice and the inconvenience and loss to which employers are subject in consequence. And if your Chamber is of opinion that the evil is of sufficient extent and importance to justify remedial measures I beg to request that representations be made to Government with a view to legislation on the subject.
Thus matters are and thus must they continue until the evil fiods its cure; meanwhile much good could I think be done if, as in the case of domestic servants, it were made a punishable offence to leave regular employment without notice and I beg to ask that the Chamber will be good enough to address Government on the subject with this object in view. month's salary in lieu of notice, whereas the As the law stands, employees can demand a employer has no redress against his servant, except he be a domestic. It seems to me unfair that this should be so and that if it be compulsory for the master to give his servant a month's
notice it should also be incumbent on the ser- vant to do the same, especially so in Hongkong where if there is any class needing protection against another, it is tho foreigner against the native servant.-I am, Sir, Your obedient servant,
EDWARD OSBORNE,
Secretary.
A. R. Lows, Esq., Secretary,
Hongkong General Chamber of Commerce.
sentence
DARING ROBBERY IN BARKER ROAD.
an W&S
With regard to the extent of the evil I can A week ago wo chronicled the fact of the European lady in Battery Path, of course speak with certainty, only of those robbery of a instances under my immediate notice, but from when a street coolie, in almost broad daylight, enquiries made of others I find the case of the snatched away her gold watch and chain. Chinatuan entering foreign employ has ap-months' hard labour, fourteen days to be spent Wharf Co. is not singulur. The average Capture followed, and he was sentenced to six parently no intention of giving fair service for in solitary confinement and two whippings of fair pay.. He takes employment as a matter of twenty strokes each to be administered. The convenience; he intends to stay just as long as
exemplary will enable him to learn a little English, find higher wages or other more congenial employ- ment; then without the slightest warning and having received his pay, he departs, leaving the employer to shift as best he can without him. The inconvenience caused by this state of affairs, bad though it be, is however trivial compared with the serious consequences arising from a strike.
A Chinaman rarely follows the practice of other nationalities by giving his employer an opportunity of remedying a grievance, so that as a rule the first indication of it is stoppage of work, and the employer is face to face with that most effective weapon of theirs-combina- tion whilst the absence of legal protection from anjust combination, gives no alternative but to submit.
bat опе, Now We have thoroughly well deserved to report another robbery equally daring in execution, and differing only slightly in its attendant circumstances. The victim in the present case is Mrs. Stephens, wife of Mr. M. J.D. Stephens, solicitor, upon whom a representa- tive of this paper called on Thursday and received the following particulars of an adventure from
which she emerges the poorer by a leather hand- bag containing a silver watch, a gold pencil- case, and about eight dollars in money, besides & handkerchief, a tram-ticket, and some papers. but an adventure nevertheless in which the lady acquitted herself with a high degros of pluck.
Mrs. Stephens was walking along Barker Road, from the Magazine Gap end, when she passed a lady and child, behind whom she noticed an ordinary-looking coolie, clad in the usual
}
1
No comments yet.
Private notes are available after approval.