December 12, 1908.]
SHIPPING NOTES.
CHINA OVERLAND TRADE REPORT.
The Formosan Government would not agree to, this and the arrangement to run the steamer Kaisha has consequently had to be abandoned. under, the management of the Osaka Shosen The Marine Society has therefore decided to present the steamer to the Navy. Before the close of the year the Umegaka-maru will be launched, and doubtless she too will be handed over to the Navy.
The Pacific Mail steamer Asia seems to have
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When the bald announcement is made that the Nippon Yusen Kaisha has been able to declare a dividend at the rate of 13 per cent. for the past half year a dividend which the Company has maintained for many years now - it excites a little curiosity to know whether the shipping trade is, after all,so terribly depressed as it is commonly reported to be. It is therefore just as well to mention that, although the had a terrible experience in a typhoon on her Company receives a heavy subsidy from the voyage across the Pacific to San Francisco. Government, the Directors a few months She encountered the gale on November 1st, just ago were faced with the gloomy prospect three days after she had left Yokohama. The of being able to pay no dividend at all for the seas were terrific. half year.
A curious thing connected! That they have been able to do so with the water blown over and down into the is due entirely to the fact that the Direc. smokestack was the fact that later when the tors resorted to drastic economies, stopping smoke box was opened to steam the tubes there services on which they were losing heavily and were found sixteen fish which had been sent dismissing a large number of officers. By these down the funnel with the water that had heen, means the Company was able to make up lee-blown over and into the stack. Three lifeboats way, and pay the regular dividend.
were washed away.
The President of the Company at the half- yearly meeting of shareholders was unable to make a hopeful forecast. He feared, indeed. that the Company would experience "far greater diffi- culty" in the immediate future than they had in the period just terminated. He stated the causes of the depression to be the continuing effects of the financial pl Lite United States, the Chinese boycott of Japanese goods; the depreciation of silver; the business de- pression in China following upon the deaths | of the Emperor and Empress Dowager of China: and, finally the volume of shipping traffic had been reduced by the restrictions on Japanese immigration into America, and further by the postponement of various public works which the Government of Japan had in contemplation.
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The latest
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Shipping Strike" is at the Philippines. The native deckhands, stokers. coal-passers and oilers of the coastwise vessels were ordered by their union last week to stop work. The strike threatened to assume serious proportions and effectively tie up inter-island traffic. Latest mail news i Oth strike bes been settled, temporarily at least, in the tact au diplomacy of the Collector of Customs (ieorge R. Colton. The grievance seems to be not only inadequate pay. bat the alases they are subjected to by the shipping sa ka At a meeting of shipowners and the labour leaders, responsible for the walk-out, called at the instance of the insular collector, the matter was thoroughly discussed and Pedro Guevara' president of the gremio de marineros declared his willingness to use his good It is, however, a long lane which has no offices to have the strikers return to their turning Mr. Koudo regarded economic condi-work.-this to enable the vessels cleared during tions abroad as gradually assuming a healthy tone, and hoped that the marine trade of Japan would at no distant date recover its former position. The President also said it was reas- suring to note that while in 1897, in the shipping entering the ports of Japan the Japanese flag was represented by only 20 per cent. 2 in 1907 Japanese steamers represented about 44 per cent. of the shipping. That, of course, is due not to diminution of foreign ships but to the extra- ordinary growth in the Japanese mercantile marine. The total tonnage entered at Japanese ports in 1897 was 3,700,000; in 1907 it was 20,000,000. so that foreign shipping now is represented by more than thrice the total tonnage entered which Japan ports ten years
ago.
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A Nagasaki despatch says that the Russian East Asiatic S.S. Co. has decided to withdraw all its steamers from Far Eastern waters, with the exception of the irregular liners running between Vladivostock and Hankow. We notice, however, the British Consular report on the trade of Libau states that the Russian East Asiatic Steamship Company are building exten- sive offices there, and are going to make arrange ments with the town authorities for building accommodation for the housing of emigrants with special rooms for their medical inspection. baths and luggage warehouses, which will cost. some £40,000. Besides, they have had one large steamer, the Russia, built for them in Glasgow (now running), and, it is said, have ordered two
more.
At the conclusion of the Russo-Japanese war the Imperial Marine Society of Japan decided to organise a Volunteer Fleet, which was to engage in trade in time of peace and act as auxiliary cruisers in wartime. The experience of the war having apparently demonstrated that such steamers were necessary, public subscrip- tions were collected towards the fund for the
maru
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construction of the steamers. Sufficient sub- scriptions having been obtained to build two vessels, the "Sakura-maru " and Umegaka- were ordered from the Mitsu Bishi yard and the first-named was recently completed. It was arranged that the "Sakura-maru" should be put on the Formosan service under the management of the Osaka Shosen Kaisha, and the Formosan Government was asked to contribute a subsidy of 260,000 yen per annum.
the day to depart, and pending the settlement of the differences between the strikers and shipowners by arbitration. The perfection of organization and discipline of the union and the powerful influence that body exerts over the Filipino workingmen is testified to by the fact that within five minutes after the close of the meeting, the striking employees were back on board of their vessels, steam was got up and the Venus, Vizcaya. Dos Hermanos, Neil Macleod and Fernandez Hermanos, tie up during the day, were getting under way to their respective destinations.
SPORTING NOTES.
Last Saturday's league cricket matches were not followed with very much interest because neither of the three leading toaus were com- peting and the rest are at present the running that the results do not affect the competition to any appreciable extent.
so far out of
Kowloon played the Royal Engineers on the Kowloon ground, disposed of them for 111 and succeeded in compiling 118 for the loss of seven wickets, thus winning fairly easy against a team which had beaten the HongkongA" team. Walter Dixon appears to have found his old form and is bowling better this season than he has done for some time. Martin's bowling on the other hand, appears to have lost a lot of it, sting. Power, playing for the R. E.. put up a nice 45. He is a very useful man and would no doubt on present form be included in representative Hongkong eleven.
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The other math between the R.G.A. aul Craigengower resulted in a draw.
The only scores of any note being Lammert's 48 for Craigengower and Owen's 34 for R.G.A. Lum- mert's score was very creditable when one considers what havoc the R. G.A. trundlers made
with the first half of the "B" team on the same ground three weeks ago. The position of the teams remains unchanged.
The league matches for next Saturday are Civil Service v. Telegraphs and R.G.A. v. Police. The Civil Service are very strong in bowlers this year, and should beat the Telegraph's, but it is its glorious uncertainty that makes cricket so fascinating a game. It is
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probable that the scoring will not be big on either side. Reid, one of the Civil Service trundlers, gave a good account of himself against Canton on Saturday, securing four wickets for 15 runs in the first innings and three for nil in the second. On the previous Saturday he got four wickets in the last over, capturing the bat trick with his last three balls, playing against Craigengower.
The R.E's should beat the Police team unless their crack hat, Edwards, makes a stand. He is in good form this season and has put up some good scores already.
Shanghai is to have its Marathon Race. At least, such is said to be the intention of the re- cently formed Athletic Association, but as yet no public announcement has been made. Such an undoubtedly be welcomed in the Settlement but event, remarks the Shanghai Times, would
plenty of time for training would have to be allowed, as a twenty-six mile run requires considerably more preparation than an eighteen mile walk. Shanghai has ideal roads for such an ercut, with the last mile round the race course. and it is hoped that the suggestion will not be allowed to fall through without a deter- mined effort being made to hold the event. A committee has the matter in hand.
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the tour of the Australian cricketers next year. Thirty-seven matches have been arranged for They include two each against Yorkshire, Surrey, Gloncester, and Essex. and Yorkshire and Lan- cath're e unbined and one each against the rest of the first-class counties and Scotland, Cam- bridge-Oxford, and the West of England. The tour will commence on May 6th.
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THE FOREIGN POPULATION IN
CHINA.
China for 1907 is given in the Customs return The returns of the foreign population o
us 69.852 as follows:-
Japanese British German Portuguese American
from
French Italian Russian
45,610
}
9,203
3,553
3,188
2,862
2.201
854
479
Belgian
292
Dutch
286
Spanish
266
Austro-Hungarian
259
Danish
197
Norwegian
182
Swedish
157
41
219
Corean
Brazilan
Non-treaty Powers
to
The number of firms is given as 2,595 against 1.837 in 1906, an increase of 758, made up of Japanese 677, German 40, Spanish 30 and a few more divided over nine other nationalities. The British commercial attache notes that Nor- wegian firms decreased by 4, Dutch by 3 and Austro-Hungarian (17) and British (490) each
there by 2, but
are firm's and firms, big hongs petty shopkeepers and numbers give no idea of the
status or importance of commercial houses. These figures must be looked upon as only approximate, as it would be absurd, for example, to put the Russian population and commercial houses of the large city of Harbin, containing as it does thousands of Russians and hundreds of Russian firms and shops at 479 and 24 respectively."
Great sums of money, the British Consul terprises of all kinds at Chinan-fa, in Shantung, says, have been expended on Government en-
such as the mint, the arsenal, numerous schools and colleges, a model reformatory, two indus- trial schools, an agricultural college and forestry department, a steam silk filature, a steam flour mill, dredgers and much else, though now, since the accession to office of the present Governor, a policy of strict retrenchment which the Ger terises as man press in Tsingtan picturesquely charac results still to be seen.
the iron broom" has set in with.
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