76
THE HONGKONG WEEKLY PRESS AND
M
consider the question very carefully without loss of time. Why wait for Singapore ?
CAUSES OF GERMAN
PROSPERITY.
[February 5, 1906.
strivings of a halfpenny press after
originality!
THE VICEROY AND THE
CANTONESE.
possible to put a solid object so close to the The Singapore Chinese were said to be is accused, the Briton should therefore hold eye that one sees over and under it while it
averse, not to the principle of the Bill, but fast to that which is good, his consciousness remains nebulous if not invisible. The to its form. It is the principle only that of ability to maintain supremacy. ... But, it ignored fact referred to is that all modern interests this Colony just now. Would the may be argued, what of China's arrogance business is conducted on the tacit under- Chinese business people regard it favour and self-sufficiency; does the case of the standing that the parties thereto are poten-ably? It has been pointed out that Chinese Chinese not present an exception? We do tially dishonest. Every formal contract is mercantile guilds are already in a great not so regard it. The ideal here varies. per se an implication that its signatories, measure equivalent to such registration; The brain at the back of all European without it, might not meet their obligations. they find partnership records useful for the aggrandisement has been The law affords further safeguards, which, protection of Chinese creditors.
thinking Com- Imperially," aiming at material conquest while by no means uniformly effective, are pulsory registration, even without being and achievement; it has been a good hater unanimously accepted as necessary to penal, would afford similar protection to all.
as well as a good (self) lover. The Chinese... business. The Registration of Partnerships, There would be fewer fraudulent Lank-conceit has been intellectual superiority, a properly devised, is merely an extension of ruptcies; and even if men of straw were profound philosophical contentment accom- an admitted principle; and it is, therefore, registered instead of the real partners, who||panied by a contemptuous indifference to- sheer nonsense to talk of its "demoralising would be more likely to suffer the firms wards aliens. The VICOMTE notes how a the Chinese "--who, by the way, despite that did so, or creditors? Such firms would successful war encourages, those rare gifts tradition, are no more to be trusted in a deal lose credit; or if they got credit. those who which have been necessary to bring it about; than the foreign contractor-or to talk of had trusted men of straw could not very and if his mind had been turned this way, its "harassing trade," or of its "interference well complain if they lost by doing so. At he might have indulged in some prophecy with the liberty of the merchant and present complaints are frequent and numer. with regard to Japan. Thanks to the plague trader." The best of our laws is an inter-ous; and the Government ought to re- of croakers that has spread over Britain, ference, and all stipulations whatsoever are
the British are rapidly losing those rare in the nature of things harassing to any
gifts which the Germans and the Japanese persons liable, either wilfully or involuntari-
enjoy. The last British war was said to ly, to make default. Registration of Part- nerships, either general or of Chinese only,
have been entered upon with a foolish self- confidence. We doubt if it was the old will not drive away any business that is
national faith which animated the past and worth keeping, iu this or any other Colony.
gave birth to "the NELSON touch; if it Another Singapore objection was that the
(Daily Press, 31st January.) Government finger was a nuisance in the
Very suggestive are the remarks quoted and neutralised by those unfortunately not- was, it must have been seriously diluted commercial pie, which is merely another in our Hamburg correspondent's letter
mute inglorious heroes who criticised and form of the parrot-cry already mentioned. published to-day. The VICOMTE, who has called it reprehensible. If Britain ever The Bankruptcy Ordinance represents a
written for la Revue des Deux Mondes for falls at the leat of a couqueror its real con- very big finger in that same pie, and is twenty-six years, and had in additionqueror will have been this wave of pessimism equally exposed to such an objection. diplomatic experience, has been an earnest which has been encouraged, to its everlasting Shifting their ground, and by implication student of history, and is, at 58, a matured shame, by a cheap and nasty" press. The abandoning their noble stand for "the fair thinker. The fact that he is a Frenchman terrible reflection cannot be repressed, that fame of the colony," the objectors protested guarantees to a great extent the strict|
a nation's decadence may be started by the that "a new kind of fraud would arise, a impartiality of his musings on the causes kind of legal fraud."
and effects of German prosperity; while This seems to us more puerile still: since it seems clear that it also enables us to make allowance for every law ever promulgated can be charged the soupçon of exaggeration that might with creating a consequent. crime, in the otherwise chill our appreciation of his attempt to break or evade it. Indeed, after
comments. Le Vicomte EUGENE MELCHIOR carefully extracting and weighing all the
DE VOGUE Shows Fo trace of that Germad cons brought forward at the southern port we fail to find one with any more weight than the objection that there might be temporary 'annoyance and inconvenience; and that, it will be conceded, does not require serious consideration. In the case of the Singapore Bill, we read that its main idea is that every person who trades under a name which in dicates that he is in partnership with an- other person, or who trades under a name not his own, should be required to register the constitution of the partnership, or, if he be a single individual trading under a fancy name, his true place of business. It will thus be possible for any one who is asked to give credit to ascertain whether the firm is worthy of credit. The bill does not propose to make any alteration in the existing Eng- lish law, except that the penalty for non- registration is loss of claim to the benefits of partnership, and, on the other hand, innbility to be sued. At Hongkong, a Bill securing these points would be hailed with approval; and by none, we imagine, more than the banks, the bankruptcy officials, and the business men who deal largely with Chinese firms. One Singapore gentleman, the Hon. Mr. A. HUTTENBACH, held the opinion that it would be difficult to find a case of a man representing himself to be a partner who is not
really a partner. Experience teaches us that is not the correct formula to em- ploy; the trouble is that sometimes men are represented by others to be partners, when they are not; the firm prospers on the credit of such representation; and if things go wrong, it is easy for the lawyers to prove that the man (who may have secretly derived profit from the firm) never held himself out as a partner; and of course he denies that he authorised any to do so.
I
31
+1
race.
11
pessimism whose expression we quoted only the other day; he regards the German commercial prosperity as very evident so marked, in fact, that he represents it as already toppling over the aclinic line. This is certainly in marked contrast to the backneyed pleas emanating mutually from England and Germany, in the spirit of Wake up! We are being beaten in the The picture of a brotherly cop- vergence of effort" among all the German industries seems just a little overdrawn, perhaps, and may be put down to the Gellic exuberance already allowed for. The other picture, suggesting the influence of the KAISER as pacemaker for the nation, is better worth contemplation. There is a tendency on the part of those not his subjects to smile at the energy of the Imperial Hustler; and it is possible that the world has been underesti- mating the value of WILHELM I's example. He possesses in bis own proper person all that self-reliance, boldness of enterprise
44
and
consciousness
national greatness," which we held out a day or two ago as the supreme desiderata; and which the VICOMTE now mentions as those rare gifts." We maintain that it is to these rare gifts that England chiefly owes her greatness; it is not so much that the English have enjoyed qualities superior to those of other races, but that they have assumed and believed they had, and this great faith has been followed by great works. The faith that moves mountains, in short, is merely self-confidence. The VICOMTE's
consciousness of national greatness of course, the nationalisation of the in dividual good conceit. Instead of being ashamed of the "insularism" of which he
44
39
is,
(Daily Press, 1st February.) By hook or by crook, says (in effect) the Canton VICEROY, the Cauton-Hankow Railway must be constructed, and that with the least possible delay. A vory able translation of his latest despatch to the Cantonese Chamber of Commerce appears elsewhere in this issue, from the pen of our well-informed correspondent. The Viceregal decision is one that should start the new year for us with some show of cheerfulness; but alas! all that glitters is not gold, and there are indications that while His Chinese Excellency has a will, be has not yet found a way—or at all events, no way that can be called the right way. The position at present is fairly well understood, and needs but little recapitulation. The concession is now in the hands of the Chinese, and so far as British opinion counts, may be said to have been rescued from the frying pan onlý to fall into the fire. The line is partly. constructed, and the short section in operation has done so well as to promise great things for the whole line when- ever it is opened. Some little capital is available to continue the work of construction; but at present there is very little prospect of the rest being forthcoming. The special taxation intended to raise part of it has proved obnoxious, and has confirmed the public unwillingness to invest in a concern so patently under the official thumb. Viceroy SHUM asks for more meetings to consider
the business, while he is still persisting in his old-fashioned policy of suppressing free discussion. In the same breath that he bids the members of the Chamber of Commerce convene meet- ings, he warns them **abstain from disobedience," by which, we take it, His EXCELLENCY means there must be no more
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