ENG-1949 — Page 175

PART III

HONG KONG

Deep Bay

Frontier

Mirs Bay

Lantau

Cashe Peak

Kamlin

Tai Mo Shar

Kowloom

Victoria

GEOGRAPHY

CHAPTER I.

Hong Kong lies just within the tropics, on the south- eastern coast of the Chinese Province of Kwangtung, and east of the Pearl River estuary. The Colony includes Hong Kong Island (32 square miles), on which is situated the capital city of Victoria, the ceded territory of Kowloon (31 square miles) Stonecutters Island (4 square mile) and the New Territories which consist of the remainder of the moun- tainous peninsula of Kowloon together with numerous islands (355 square miles) leased from China on 1st July, 1898, for 99 years.

The total area of the Colony is thus roughly 391 square miles, a large proportion of which is steep and unproductive hillside. The leased territories include also the waters of Deep Bay to the West and Mirs Bay to the East.

Hong Kong Island is eleven miles long from East to West and varies in width from two to five miles. It rises steeply from the northern shore to a range of treeless hills of volcanic rock of which the highest point is Victoria Peak (1,809 feet) near the western end. Between these hills and the harbour lies the city of Victoria. The oldest part of the urban area ran up the steep hillside for hundreds of yards in narrow stepped streets and terraces, but the modern town stands mostly on a strip of reclaimed land averaging 200-400 yards wide which extends 9 miles along the southern shore of the harbour from Sulphur Channel to Lyemun Pass.

Between the island and the mainland of Kowloon lies the harbour, a natural and almost landlocked anchorage

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