Page:Europe in China.djvu/582

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CHAPTER XXI.

1878), a banquet and presentation of an address in honour of Professor Nordenskjold (November 3, 1879), the starting of jinrikshas in the Colony (April 22, 1880), the establishment of a Polo Club (April 27, 1880), the presentation of an address and testimonial to the Hon. W. Keswick (May 14, 1881), the arrest of Messrs. Rapp and Schmidt by a Customs cruiser while on a shooting expedition (November 20, 1881), and the appointment of Mr. C. P. Chater as Masonic District Grand Master of South China (February 2, 1882).

The charity of the Hongkong community was, during this period, called forth and exercised to an extraordinary degree. To the relief of the famine in North China the Hongkong community contributed (from April, 1877, until August, 1878,) an aggregate sum of $132,000. Floods in Canton necessitated (in May, 1877) a separate appeal which in a day or two produced $5,000. The Freemasons raised separately funds (October, 1877) for the relief of sufferers from famine in India, and in January, 1878, a subscription was started for the sufferers from the Yesso explosion, when Messrs. Douglas Lapraik & Co. headed the list with a subscription of $10,000. An Amateur Concert was given (December 12, 1878) on behalf of sufferers by the failure of the City of Glasgow Bank. An Irish Famine Relief Committee was started (March 8, 1880) and collected $36,000. The Hon. E. R. Belilios having (October 15, 1878) placed in the Governor's hands the sum of £1,000 for the erection of a statue of Lord Beaconsfield, used this sum, when Disraeli deprecated the honour,, to establish a Medical Scholarship Fund (October 7, 1879), subsequently changed (November 29, 1883) into the Belilios Scholarship Fund, and gave to a row of houses opposite the City Hall, which he erected at the time, the name Beaconsfield Arcade. A Medical Mission Committee (J. C. Edge, Dr. Young, and H. W. Davis), having, since October 1871, established a public dispensary in Taipingshan, made (January 13, 1872) an appeal to the community and commenced taking steps which ultimately resulted in the establishment of Alice Memorial Hospital.