IZ PORT ECONOMICS
closing chapter with a final example, taken for contrast
from the remote East.

Hong-Kong, or Hongkong, is situated at the mouth of

the Canton River and consists of an island, on which lies
Victoria, the capital of the colony, and a peninsula con-
nected with the mainland. Ceded to Britain in 1841,
the place, which enjoys a valuable strategical position
from a commercial point of view, has developed into a
vigorous and prosperous community with important
industrial and financial interests. The Canton River,
with its three main branches, is navigable by river steam
craft for over 600 miles; there are numerous tributaries
and a well developed system of waterways. This has
caused Hong-Kong to become a great transhipment port.
It is equally an entrepdt port, and, in fact, the principal
European-Chinese financial centre for the markets of South
East Asia.
- Hong-Kong is, therefore, to the trade of the remote
Orient what London is in the West—a great clearing house
for commercial produce. Its principal trade is in rice,
which is sold for distribution inland and for re-exportation
abroad. After rice, come sugar, cotton, tea, coal, flour,
oil, with opium and other drugs.

The harbour consists of an extensive tract of water
comprising Victoria Bay, Kowloon Bay, and the narrow
strait between the island and the mainland. Admirable
in many respects with fine natural features, it is unfor-
tunately exposed to the influx of heavy seas from the west
during the prevalence of typhoons. It has, however,
excellent and well-sheltered anchorage in 6 or 7 fathoms
of water, and there are a number of wharves with
go-downs (sheds) for the reception of goods.

Conditions in the East are well known to be primitive,
and the mechanical labour-saving devices of the West do
not make their use so imperative where manual labour is
cheap and plentiful. Consequently, a great deal of loading
and unloading is done by hand with the aid of the ships’

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