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.
THE KOWLOON HINTERLAND.
The island of Hong Kong was ceded to England in 1841. Later on a strip of the adjacent mainland, from two to three miles deep, running back to a line of steep hills from 1,300 to 2,000 feet high, was added. Then for many years the colony rested content under the frowning shadow of these dangerous neighbours; until it dawned at last upon our statesmen that the Power who possessed this range of hills had Hong Kong at its mercy. For heavy guns planted on their summits could lay the city of Victoria in ruins at the easy range of two or three miles; and no answering fire from the island forts so far below them could save it. So in 1898, by a master‐stroke of diplomacy, China was induced to lease to England the Kowloon Peninsula, about 200 miles square; and our frontier was removed farther back to the safer distance of about twenty miles from Hong Kong.