HONG KONG
GEOGRAPHICALLY, of course, Hong Kong is very far from North China. But it was the base of our expeditionary force in the recent campaign. From it went the first troops that helped to save Tientsin; and one brigade of Indian regiments was diverted from General Gaselee’s command to strengthen its garrison. For in the event of disturbances in Canton, or a successful rebellion in the southern provinces, it would have been in great danger. As our base for all future operations in the Far East, it is of vast military as well as naval and commercial importance and well merits description. In complications or wars with other Powers, Hong Kong would be the first point in the East threatened or assailed. Lying as it does on what would be our trans‐Pacific route to India, it is almost of as much importance to our Empire as Capetown or the Suez Canal. Its magnificent dockyards, which are capable of taking our largest battleships on the China station, are the only ones we possess east of Bombay; and so it is of equal value to our fleet, besides being the naval base for coal, ammunition, and supplies, without which the finest ship that floats would be helpless.
Looked at from other than a military point of view, Hong Kong is an object‐lesson of our Empire that should fill the hearts of Imperialists with pardonable pride. A little more than half a century ago it was but a bleak and barren island, tenanted only by a few fisherfolk. It produced nothing, and animal life could scarce be supported on it. But now, touched by the magic wand of British trade, how wonderful is the transformation! A magnificent city, with stately buildings climbing in tier after tier from the sea. The most European town between Calcutta and San Francisco. The third, some say the second, largest shipping port in the world. The harbour to which turn the countless prows of British, American, German, French, Austrian, and Japanese vessels; where the vast current of the trade of the world with the Far East flows in, to issue forth again in an infinitude of smaller streams to every part of China and the Philippines.
Yet, though the barren hillsides are covered with houses, though a large population of white men and yellow inhabit it, and its harbour is crowded with shipping, the island itself is still as unproductive as ever. Not merely is mineral wealth unknown and manufactures practically nil, but Hong Kong cannot provide enough of foodstuffs to support its inhabitants for half a day. From Canton, almost a hundred miles away up the Pearl River, comes everything required to feed both Europeans and Chinese. Each morning the large, flat‐bottomed steamers that ply between the two cities carry down meat or cattle, fish, rice, vegetables of all kinds, fruit, even flowers; and were communications interrupted by storm or war for a few days, Hong Kong would starve. For neither the island nor the couple of hundred square miles of adjacent mainland, the Kowloon Hinterland, which we took over in 1898, could produce enough to feed one regiment; and although two months’ supply of provisions for the whole population, white and yellow, is supposed to be stored, it is never done. Therein lies Hong Kong’s great danger. Let Canton refuse or be prevented from feeding her, and she must starve.
The secret of her rapid rise and present greatness lies in the fact that she is the great mart, the distributing centre, whence European or American goods, arriving in large bottoms, are sent out again in small coasting steamers or junks to reach the smallest markets for Western commerce. And her prosperity will continue and be vastly increased if the long‐projected railway to Canton, to meet another tapping the great inland resources of China, is ever built; although the Americans fondly hope that Manilla under their energetic rule will one day rival and even excel her.
Hong Kong is an island of irregular shape, about nine miles in length and six miles broad in its widest portion, and consists of one long chain of hills, that rise almost perpendicularly from the sea. Scarcely the smallest spot of naturally level ground is to be found. Around are countless other islands, large and small, all equally mountainous. It lies close to the Chinese mainland, the Kau‐lung, or Kowloon Peninsula; and the portion of sea enclosed between them forms the harbour. At one extremity of the island this is a mile across; and at the other it narrows down to a strait known as the Lyeemoon Pass, only a quarter of a mile broad. In the centre the harbour is about two miles in width. The high hills of island and mainland—for the latter is but a series of broken, mountainous masses rising two or three thousand feet—shelter it from the awful typhoons that ravage the coast.
Approaching Hong Kong by steamer there lies before us a confused jumble of hills, which gradually resolve themselves into islands fronting the mountainous background of the mainland. All, without exception, spring up from the water’s edge in steep slopes, with never a yard of level ground save where an occasional tiny bay shows a small stretch of sparkling sandy beach. Granite cliffs carved into a thousand quaint designs, or honeycombed with caverns by the white‐fringed waves; steep grassy slopes, with scarcely a bush upon them, rising up to a conical peak; here and there a fisher’s hut, the only sign of human habitation—such are they almost all. At last one larger than the others. On the long ridge of the lofty summits of its hills the slated roofs and high walls of European buildings outlined against the sky, and we know that we are nearing Hong Kong. Swinging round a bluff shoulder of this island, we enter the land‐locked harbour. On the right the myriad houses climbing in terraces above each other from the water’s edge, long lines of stately buildings, the spires of churches come into view. It is the city of Victoria, or Hong Kong. The harbour, sheltered by the lofty hills of island and mainland, is crowded with shipping. The giant bulks of battleships and cruisers, the tall masts of sailing vessels, the gaily painted funnels of passenger and merchant steamers, the quaint sails and weird shapes of junks, the countless little sampans or native boats, a numerous flotilla of steam launches, rushing hither and thither. Ahead of us the hills of island and mainland approach each other until they almost touch, and tower up on either hand above the narrow channel of the Lyeemoon Pass. On the left a small, bush‐clad, conical isle, with a lighthouse—Green Island; another, long and straggling—Stonecutters’ Island, with the sharp outlines of forts and barracks and the ruins of an old convict prison.
Behind them the mainland. A small extent of comparatively level land covered with houses, the curving line of a pretty bay, low, pine‐clad hills. This is the very modern suburb of Kowloon, which has been created to take the overflow of European and Chinese population from Hong Kong. Here will be the terminus of the railway to Canton—when it is built. And behind, towering grim and dark to the sky, stands a long chain of barren mountains that guard the approach from the landward side. Behind them range upon range of other hills. Such is the Kowloon Peninsula.
Hong Kong, with the blue water of its harbour, the dark hills towering precipitously above the town, the walls of whose houses are gaily painted in bright colours, is one of the loveliest places on earth. After long days on board ship, where the eye tires of the interminable monotony of sea and sky, it seems doubly beautiful. And one marvels to find this English lodgment on the coast of China a city of stately buildings, of lofty clubs and many‐storied hotels, of magnificent offices and splendid shops, of well‐built barracks and princely villas.
The town of Victoria—for Hong Kong, though used for it, is really the name of the island—stretches for miles along the water’s edge, being for the most part built on reclaimed ground; for the hills thrust themselves forward to the sea. Up their steep sides the houses clamber in tier upon tier until they end under the frowning face of a rocky precipice that reaches up to the summit. And there along its ridge, which is called the Peak, 1,800 feet above the sea, are more houses. Large hotels, villas, and barracks—for it is fast becoming the residential quarter for Europeans—are perched upon its narrow breadth, seemingly absolutely inaccessible from below. But a thin, almost perpendicular, line against the face of the hill shows how they are reached by a cable tramway, which, in ten minutes, brings its passengers from the steamy atmosphere of Victoria to the cool breezes of the Peak—another climate altogether.
The city practically consists of one long street, which runs from end to end of the island and is several miles in length. On the steep landward side smaller streets run off at right angles and climb the hills, many of them in flights of steps. On the slopes above the town are one or two long roads parallel to the main street and consisting altogether of residential buildings, churches, convents, and schools.
But this main street—Queen’s Road as it is named—is wonderful. At the western extremity near Belcher’s Fort, the end of the island round which our steamer passed, it begins in two or three‐storied Chinese houses, the shops on the ground floor being under colonnades. Then come store and warehouses, offices, and small Chinese shops where gaudy garments and quaint forms of food are sold, interspersed with saloons, bars, and drinking‐shops of all kinds, which cater for merchant sailors, soldiers, and bluejackets of every nationality, the well‐paid American tars being most in evidence among their customers. Beyond this the Queen’s Road is lined with splendid European‐looking shops with extensive premises and large plate‐glass fronts, finer than many in Bond Street or Regent Street, though not as expensive. Some of them, mostly kept by Chinamen, sell Chinese or Japanese curios, silver‐work or embroideries, pottery or blackwood furniture. Others, generally, though not always, run by Europeans, are tailoring and millinery establishments, chemists, book or print shops. The side‐walks run under colonnades which afford a grateful shade. Here are found a few of the smaller hotels; and the magnificent caravanserai of the high Hong Kong hotel stretches from the harbour to the street. Then come some fine banks, the building of the Hong Kong and Shanghai Banking Corporation being a splendid piece of architecture. Opposite it a sloping road, with lovely fern‐clad banks and trees, leads upward to the cathedral and to Government House. Past the banks, a little back from the thoroughfare, is the fine City Hall, which contains a museum and a theatre, as well as large ball and concert rooms, in which most of the social gaieties of Hong Kong take place.
Here occurs the one break in the long line of the Queen’s Road. On the seaward side, fenced in by railings, lies the cricket‐ground with its pretty pavilion. Between it and the harbour stands the splendid structure of the Hong Kong Club, a magnificent four‐storied building. Few clubs east of Pall Mall can rival its palatial accommodation. From the ground‐floor, where billiard‐rooms and a large bowling alley are found, a splendid staircase, dividing into two wings, leads to a magnificent central hall on the first floor. Off this is a large reading‐room, where a great number of British, American, and Continental journals are kept. Electric fans, revolving from the ceiling, cool the room in the damp, hot days of the long and unpleasant summer. On the same floor are the secretary’s offices, a luxurious public dressing‐room, and a large bar, which opens on to a wide verandah overlooking the harbour. From it one can gaze over the water, crowded with shipping, to the rugged hills of the mainland. In front lie the warships of many nations. Close inshore is a small fleet of sampans crowded together, their crews, male and female, chattering volubly or screaming recriminations from boat to boat. From a tiny pier near the Club the steam pinnace of an American man‐o’‐war shoots out into the stream, passing a couple of gigs from British warships conveying officers in mufti ashore.
On the next floor are the dining‐rooms and a splendid library. Above these again are the members’ bedrooms, bath and dressing rooms. Altogether, internally and externally, the Club is worthy to rank with almost any similar institution in the Empire.
On Queen’s Road, facing the cricket‐ground, is a small, square open space below the cathedral, raised above the level of the street, as the ground slopes upward. It is known as the Garrison Brigade Parade Ground. During the recent campaign it was used as the store‐ground of the Indian Commissariat, where huge mat‐sheds covered enormous piles of supplies for the troops in China. Here the hard‐worked base commissariat officer, Major Williams, watched the vast stores arriving daily from India, and despatched the supplies for the army in the North and the Indian brigades at Shanghai and Kowloon. Beside the parade ground a road climbs the hill and passes the station for the cable tramway, which is but a short distance up.
Beyond this one gap in its continuous fencing of houses the Queen’s Road runs on past the Naval Dockyard—where Commodore Sir Francis Powell, K.C.M.G., had such heavy labour all through the troublous time in China—and the Provost Prison on the seaward side, and the barracks of the British troops and the arsenal on the other. Then the military hospital and the ordnance yards, crowded with guns, from the twelve‐inch naval monsters to the stubby howitzers or long six‐inch on field‐carriages. Then more barracks. Then it runs on again into Chinese shops, their upper stories used as boarding‐houses for Celestials; and, turning down to the harbour and following the shore line, it is bordered with coal‐yards, godowns, and warehouses. Near this end are the two open spaces of the island, where the hills, retreating from the sea, have left valleys which the sport‐loving Britisher has seized upon for recreation grounds. The first and larger one, known as the Happy Valley, is a lovely spot. All around the tree‐clad hills ring it in, rising precipitously from its level stretch on which is a racecourse, its centre portion being devoted to other games. A fine grand stand is flanked by a block of red‐brick buildings, the lower stories of which are used during race meetings as stables for the horses and ponies running. The upper, with open fronts looking out on the course, are used as luncheon rooms, where the regimental messes, the members of the clubs, and large hongs (or merchant firms) and private residents entertain their friends during the meetings. Surely no other racecourse in the world is set in such lovely scenery as this in its arena, surrounded by the mountains that tower above it on every side. And that a memento mori may not be wanting in the midst of gaiety, just behind the grand stand lie the cemeteries—Christian, Mussulman, Hindu, and Parsee. Up the sides of the steep hills the white crosses and tombstones gleam amongst the dark foliage of the trees; and the spirits of the dead can look down from their graves upon the scene of former pleasures.
A little farther on is another and smaller valley used as a polo ground. Previous to the advent of the Indian troops in 1900 the game was played here almost exclusively on Chinese ponies. But the Arabs used by the officers of the 22nd Bombay Infantry, by that excellent sportsman, H. H. Major, the Maharajah of Bikanir, and other members of the China expeditionary force, so completely outclassed the diminutive Chinese ponies that a revolution was caused in the class of animals required for the game. Small Walers from Australia and Arabs from India have been freely introduced, much to the benefit of polo in Hong Kong.
At the polo ground the city ends at present; though every day its limits are extending. From here the road runs along close to the sea, protected from the waves by a wall, and clinging to the flanks of the hills. It passes an occasional row of Chinese‐occupied houses, a lone hotel or two, the site of the immense new docks in process of construction, large sugar works, with a colony of houses for its employees, and an overhead wire tramway leading to their sanatorium on the high peak above, until it reaches the Lyeemoon Pass. Here the hills narrow in and press down to the sea, thrusting themselves forward to meet the hills of the mainland on the other side. A strait, only a quarter of a mile broad, separates them; and here on either hand, high above the water, stand modern and well‐armed forts, which, with a Brennan torpedo, effectually close the narrow entrance of the harbour to any hostile ships that venture to force a passage.
Thus ends the northern and more important side of the island. On the southern and ocean‐ward shore lie the ill‐fated and practically deserted towns of Stanley and Aberdeen, where many years ago the British troops garrisoning them were so decimated by fever and disease that this side of the island was abandoned, and Victoria has become practically Hong Kong.
The Peak is altogether another world from the city that lies in the steamy atmosphere below. Let us ascend in one of the trams that are dragged up to the summit by the wire cables. Seated in the car, we are drawn up rapidly at a weird and uncomfortable angle; for the slope of the line is, in places, 1 in 2. Up the steep sides of the hill we go, feeling a curious sensation as we are tilted back on the benches and see the trees and houses on each side all leaning over at an absurd angle. Even such a respectable structure as a church seems to be lying back towards the hillside in a tipsy and undignified manner. This curious optical effect is caused by the inclined position of the roof and floor, as well as of the passengers, with the horizontal. We pass over a bridge across a pretty road lined with stone villas, by large and well‐built houses that grow fewer and fewer as we mount upward. Here and there we stop at a small platform representing a station, where passengers come on or leave the tram. The down car passes us with a rush. The long ridge of the Peak, crowned with houses, comes into view. Turning round in our slanting seats we look down on the rapidly diminishing city and the harbour, now a thousand feet below us. At last we reach the summit and step out on a platform with waiting‐rooms, the terminus of the line. Now we see how the wire cable runs on over pulleys into the engine‐house and is wound round the huge iron drums.
As we stand on the platform there towers above us, on the left, a large and many‐windowed hotel, the Mount Austin. Along the fronts of its three stories run verandahs with arched colonnades. This is a favourite place of resort for visitors; and many residents, unwilling to face the troubles of house‐keeping, take up their permanent abode here.
Outside the station is a line of waiting coolies, ready to convey passengers in their open cane sedan chairs with removable hoods. A Sikh policeman standing close by keeps them in order and cuts short their frequent squabbles. The road and paths, which are cemented and provided with well‐made drains running alongside to carry off the torrential rains of the summer and thus prevent the roadway from being washed away, are too steep in their ascents and descents to make the ricksha—Hong Kong’s favourite vehicle—useful up here.
Standing on the narrow ridge of the Peak, we can look down upon the sea on either hand. A wonderful view unfolds itself to our gaze. On the northern side the city of Victoria lies almost straight below us, its streets and roofs forming a chessboard‐pattern. We can easily trace the long, sinuous line of the Queen’s Road. From this height the largest battleships and mail steamers in the harbour look no bigger than walnuts. Beyond, the suburb of Kowloon lies in sharp lines and tiny squares; and behind it rise up the hills of the mainland, dwarfed in size. Now we can see plainly the interminable ranges of mountains—chain after chain—of the Kowloon Peninsula, with the lofty peaks of Tai‐mo‐shan and Tai‐u‐shan over 3,000 feet high. The coastline is straggling and indented with numerous bays, the shores rising up in steep, grassy slopes to the hills or presenting a line of rocky cliffs to the waves. Here and there pretty cultivated valleys run back from the sea to the never‐far‐distant mountains.
Turning round, we look down the grass‐clad slopes of the south side of the island to tiny, sandy bays and out over the broad expanse of the sea, in which lie many large and small islands. Over a hundred can be counted from the elevation of the Peak. Close by, to the west, is the largest of them all—the barren and treeless Lantau, which was once nearly chosen instead of Hong Kong as the site of the British settlement. Below us, on the southern shore of our island, lie the practically abandoned towns of Stanley and Aberdeen.
Along the ridge the road passes by large and well‐built villas, barracks, the Peak Club, a church, and many boarding‐houses. The European inhabitants of Hong Kong are rapidly abandoning the lower levels and taking up their residence here, where the climate, with its cool and refreshing breezes, is delightful in the long summer when Victoria swelters in tropical heat. During the rainy season, however, the Peak is continually shrouded in damp mists; and fires are required to keep rooms and spare garments dry. The saying in Hong Kong is: “If you live on the Peak your clothes rot; if in Victoria you do. Choose which you value more and take up your habitation accordingly.”
The cable tramway is a comparatively recent institution; so that when the houses on the summit were being built all the materials had to be carried by coolies up a steep, zigzagging road from below. Even now most of the supplies for the dwellers on the heights are brought up in the same primitive and laborious fashion. In the morning the trams are crowded with European merchants, bankers, solicitors and their clerks, descending to their offices in the city. In the afternoon they are filled with the gay butterflies of society going up or down to pay calls, shop, or play tennis and croquet at the Ladies’ Recreation Ground, half‐way between the Peak and Victoria. The red coats of British soldiers are seen in the cars after parade hours or at night, when they are hurrying back to barracks before tattoo.
The harbour of Hong Kong is remarkable for the large “floating population” of Chinese, who live in sampans and seldom go ashore except to purchase provisions. Their boats are small, generally not twenty feet in length, with a single mast, decked, and provided with a small well, covered with a hood, where passengers sit. Under the planking of the deck, in a tiny space without ventilation, with only room to lie prone, the crew—consisting, perhaps, of a dozen men, women, and children—sleep. Their cooking is done with a brazier or wood fire placed on a flat stone in the bows. The children tumble about the deck unconcernedly in the roughest weather. The smaller ones are occasionally tied to the mast to prevent them from falling overboard. The babies are bound in a bundle behind the shoulders of the mothers, who pull their oars or hoist and lower the sail with their burdens fastened on to them. Thus they live, thus they die; never sleeping on land until their corpses are brought ashore to be buried amid much exploding of crackers and burning of joss‐sticks.
These sampans are freely used to convey passengers to and from ships or across the harbour. Formerly cases of robbery and murder were frequent on board them; and even now drunken sailors occasionally disappear in mysterious fashion. The hood over the passengers’ seats could be suddenly lowered on the occupants of the well; a few blows of a hatchet sufficed to end their efforts to free themselves; the bodies were then robbed and flung overboard, and their fate remained a secret to all but the murderers. But stringent police regulations now render these crimes almost impossible. At night all sampans must anchor at least thirty yards from the shore. If hailed by intending passengers they are allowed to come only to certain piers where European or Indian police officers take their numbers as well as the names and destinations of those about to embark on them. So that the Hong Kong sampan is now nearly as safe a conveyance as the London hansom.
Communication between Victoria and Kowloon is maintained by a line of large, two‐decked, double‐ended steam ferries, that cross the mile of water between them in ten minutes. The suburb on the mainland is of very recent growth. Ten years ago the Observatory, a signal station, and a few villas were almost the only buildings; and the pinewoods ran uninterruptedly down to the sea. Now Kowloon possesses large warehouses, two hotels, two fine barracks, long streets lined with shops chiefly for Chinese customers, and terraces of houses occupied by Europeans. These are generally employees in the dockyards or clerks, or the families of engineers and mates of the small steamers that have their headquarters in Hong Kong. New streets are continually springing up, connecting it with Yaumati, a large Chinese suburb, or spreading down towards Old Kowloon City, three miles off. Near the ferry pier long wharves run out into the harbour, alongside which the largest vessels of the P. and O. or Norddeutscher‐Lloyd can berth and discharge their cargo. Close by is a naval yard, with a small space of water enclosed by stone piers for torpedo craft. Beside it are huge stacks of coal for our warships. Just above rise the grass‐covered ramparts of a fort. Near this are the fine stone and brick barracks built for the Hong Kong Regiment—a corps raised and recruited in Northern India about ten years ago for permanent service in this Colony. It was recently disbanded when Hong Kong was added to the list of places over‐seas to be garrisoned by the Indian army. Its material was excellent; for the high rate of pay—eighteen rupees a month with free rations as compared with the nine rupees and no rations offered to the sepoy in India—gave its recruiting officers the pick of Mussulman Punjaub, for it was a completely Mohammedan regiment. But it suffered from the disadvantage of being permanently stationed in one cramped‐up garrison with much guard duty, and of being officered by men coming at random from various Indian regiments rarely of the Punjaub, or, worse still, by others from British regiments, who knew absolutely nothing of the sepoy and were attracted chiefly by the higher pay.
On the Kowloon side two companies have built large and ample docks, which can take the finest battleships we have in the China seas. H.M.S. Goliath, Ocean, Albion, Glory; U.S.S. Brooklyn and Kentucky have all been accommodated there. As they are the only docks in the Far East, with the exception of those at Nagasaki in Japan, they are used by all foreign as well as British warships and merchantmen; and the dividends they pay are very large. Small steamers and a yacht for the King of Siam have been constructed in them. In Yaumati and Kowloon many Chinese boat‐building yards have sprung up, where numbers of large junks and sampans are turned out every year.
Past the Kowloon Docks, above which tower a couple of forts, the open country is reached. The road runs down through patches of market‐gardens to Old Kowloon City, a quaint walled Chinese town, with antique iron guns rusting on its bastions. This was the last spot of territory in the peninsula handed over to the British by the Chinese. “Handed over” is, perhaps, hardly an accurate description. Although ordered by their Government to surrender it, the officials refused to do so. A show of force was necessary; and a body of regular troops, accompanied by the Hong Kong Volunteers, marched upon the place. The Chinese, locking the gates and throwing away the keys, disappeared over the walls and bolted into the country. It was necessary to effect an entry by burglary. High hills tower above the city; and just beyond it they close in to the Lyeemoon Pass.
To one unused to the East, Hong Kong is intensely interesting. The streets, lined with European‐looking shops, are crowded with a strange medley of races—white, black, or yellow. Daintily garbed English ladies step from their rickshas and enter millinery establishments, the windows of which display the latest fashions of Paris and London. Straight‐limbed British soldiers, clad in the familiar scarlet of the Line and blue of the Royal Artillery or in the now as well‐known khaki, stroll along the pavement, bringing their hands to their helmets in a smart salute to a passing officer. Sturdy bluejackets of our Royal Navy walk arm‐in‐arm with sailors from the numerous American warships in the harbour. A group of spectacled Chinese students move by, chattering volubly. Long, lithe Bengal Lancers, in khaki blouses reaching to the knee, blue putties, and spurred ankle‐boots, gaudy pugris and bright shoulder‐chains, stop to chat with sepoys of a Bombay infantry regiment or tall Sikhs of the Asiatic Artillery. Neat, glazed‐hatted Parsis, long‐haired Coreans, trousered Chinese women, and wild, unkempt Punjaubi mule‐drivers go by. German man‐o’‐war’s men, with flat caps and short jackets covered with gilt or silver buttons, turn to look back at a couple of small but sturdy Japanese bluejackets. Pig‐tailed Chinese coolies push their way roughly along the side‐walk, earning a well‐deserved cut from the swagger‐cane of a soldier against whose red coat they have rubbed their loads. Even the weird figure of a half‐naked Hindu fakir, his emaciated body coated with white ashes, the trident of Vishnu marked in scarlet on his ghastly forehead, carrying his begging‐bowl and long‐handled tongs, is seen. Europeans, in white linen coats and trousers or smartly‐cut flannel suits, rush across the road and plunge hurriedly into offices. These are probably brokers, busily engaged in floating some of the numerous companies that spring up daily in Hong Kong like mushrooms. Globe‐trotters, in weird pith hats, pause before the windows of curio‐shops which display the artistic efforts of Japan or Canton. The street is crowded with rickshas bearing ladies, soldiers, civilians, or fat Chinamen in bowler hats and long, blue silk coats. Carriages are seldom seen, for horses are of little use in the colony, owing to its hilly character. Queen’s Road is almost the only thoroughfare where they could be employed. Tall Sikh and Mussulman policemen in blue or red pugris direct the traffic or salute a white‐helmeted European inspector as he passes.
Society in Hong Kong is less official than in India, where almost every male is to be found in either the Army or the Civil Service List. The Governor and the General are, of course, the leaders, and in a small way represent Royalty in the colony. The merchant class is supreme, and their wives rule society; naval and military people being regarded as mere birds of passage in a city where Europeans practically settle for life and England seems a very far‐off country indeed. Altogether life in Hong Kong is of a more provincially English character than it is in India. The warm‐hearted hospitality of the Anglo‐Indian has but a faint echo in this very British colony. One is not brought into such daily contact with friends and acquaintances. In every station, large and small, throughout the length and breadth of Hindustan there is always a club which acts as the rallying‐place of European society. Ladies as well as men assemble there in the afternoons when the sun is setting, and polo, tennis, and cricket are over for the day. The fair inhabitants of the station sit on the lawn, dispense tea to their friends, talk scandal or flirt; while their husbands play whist, bridge, and billiards, or gather in jovial groups round the bar and discuss the events of the day.
But in Hong Kong, despite the large European population, there is no similar institution or gathering‐place. The clubs are sternly reserved for men. Save at an occasional race meeting or gymkhana, one never sees all the white inhabitants assembled together. In the summer the climate is far too hot for indoor social functions. Even tennis parties are too exhausting. So hospitable hostesses substitute for their “At Homes” weekly mixed bathing parties; and in the comparative cool of the afternoons gay groups gather on the piers near the club and embark on the trim steam launches that lie in shoals alongside. Then out they go to some sandy bay along the coast, where mat‐sheds have been erected to serve as bathing‐boxes for the ladies, who go ashore and attire themselves for the water. The gentlemen of the party don their swimming costume in the cabin of the launch, and, plunging overboard, make their way to the beach to join their fair companions. When tired of bathing, the ladies retire to the mat‐sheds, the men to the launch. Then, dressed again and reunited, all steam back to Hong Kong, refreshing themselves with tea and drinks on the way. This is the favourite form of amusement in Hong Kong society during the summer.
In the cold weather dances at Government House, Headquarter House (the General’s residence), and in the City Hall are frequent; and theatrical companies from England and Australia occupy the theatre. Picnics, walking or by launch, to the many charming spots to be found on the island or the mainland are given. Polo, racing, cricket, tennis, and golf are in full swing; and, as the climate during winter is cold and bracing, life is very pleasant in the colony then.
To the newly arrived naval or military officer society in Hong Kong is full of pitfalls and surprises. The English merchant or lawyer over seas is usually a very good fellow, though occasionally puffed up by the thought of his bloated money‐bags; but his wife is often a sad example of British snobbery, the spirit of which has entered into her soul in the small country town or London suburb from which she came. Society in the boarding‐houses of West Kensington is a bad preparation for the rôle of grande dame in the hospitable East. And so the naval or military officer, accustomed to broader lines of social demarcation in England, is puzzled and amused at the minute shades of difference in Hong Kong society. He fails to see why Mrs. A., whose spouse exports tea, is to be considered quite of the haut ton of the colony; while Mrs. B., whose husband imports cigars, and who is by birth and breeding a better man than A., is not to be called on.
“Big fleas have little fleas upon their backs to bite ’em,
And little fleas have lesser fleas, and so, ad infinitum.”
And Hong Kong looks down on Kowloon with all the well‐bred contempt of Belgravia for Brixton. And even in the despised suburb on the mainland these social differences are not wanting. The wives of the superior dock employees are the leaders of Kowloon society; and the better half of a ship captain or marine engineer is only admitted on sufferance to their exclusive circle. When the first Indian troops to strengthen the garrison of Hong Kong in 1900 arrived, they were quartered in Kowloon; where the presence of a number of strange young officers, who dashed about their quiet suburb on fiery Arabs and completely eclipsed the local dandies, caused a flutter in the hearts of anxious mothers and indignant husbands. The fires of civilian prejudice against the military burned fiercely; and I verily believe that many of the inhabitants of Kowloon would have preferred an invasion of ferocious Chinese.