ENG-1949 — Page 25

and New Kowloon is estimated at 699,500. On the same basis the population of the New Territories is estimated at about 200,000. Included in the above figures is the population afloat, estimated at 114,400.

The population of the New Territories is composed of Cantonese and Hakka, with a sprinkling of Hoklo. The farmers are the Cantonese, mainly settled, some families for several hundred years, in the comparatively fertile western plains, and the Hakka, whose incursion into the more difficult hilly land of the eastern peninsulas is said to have started about two hundred years ago and may not have finished yet. Generally speaking, the Hakka appear to have occupied any potentially arable land disregarded by the Cantonese. Thus long fingers of Hakka penetration have been extended from the eastern peninsulas over passes down into the southwest of the mainland, and out on to the islands. The two sections maintain excellent relations, and although Hakka help Hakka more noticeably than Cantonese help Cantonese, it is remarkable that in their penetration the Hakka have been partly guided by existing Cantonese settlement. Thus, for instance, one of the biggest New Territories villages, Wang Toi Shan, to the north-west of Taimoshan, is populated chiefly by Hakka of the Tang clan, who undoubtedly chose that locality because of the existing prodominant influence of the Cantonese Tang.

There are few exceptions to the rule that Cantonese and Hakka in the New Territories do not intermarry. There are a few recent settlements which include both Cantonese and Hakka, but in such cases the families live distinctly, and normally a village is either clearly Cantonese or Hakka. There are however certain well defined exceptions, notably the villages of Ting Kok and Ping Shan Tsai in the Taipo area, whose inhabitants speak Cantonese and Hakka almost bilingually. These villages are nicknamed "pun kong cham" the half filled pitcher.

Certain occupations are exclusively Cantonese or Hakka; for instance, the oyster fisheries are entirely Cantonese, while the manufacture of bean-curd and the quarrying of stone are the exclusive sphere of the Hakka. Farmers of both sections, when they live on or near the sea, combine fishing with agriculture, though, unlike the boat people, their homes remain in their villages even though they may spend nights away on the water. Their women never go fishing.

In the New Territories sailing and rowing boats, and the people in them, fall into three classes: the genuine Cantonese boat people (the Tanka), the genuine Hoklo boat people, and the farmers' boats and ferry boats. The boat people live entirely by fishing. The types of boats are not difficult to distinguish; Hakka boats, for instance, are

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