Canton Archives - Blacksmith Books

China Revisited is a series of extracted reprints of mid-nineteenth to early-twentieth century Western impressions of Hong Kong, Macao and China. The series comprises excerpts from travelogues or memoirs written by missionaries, diplomats, military personnel, journalists, tourists and temporary sojourners.

They came to China from Europe or the United States, some to work or to serve the interests of their country, others out of curiosity. Each excerpt is fully annotated by Paul French to best provide relevant explications of Hong Kong, Macao and China at the time, to illuminate encounters with historically interesting characters or notable events.

Save 20% by buying this bundle which includes the following items in the series. Please click on their titles below to read full details.

1 x Where Strange Gods Call: Harry Hervey's 1920s Hong Kong, Macao and Canton Sojourns

1 x Wanderings in China: Hong Kong and Canton, Christmas and New Year, 1878/1879

1 x LING-NAM: Hong Kong, Canton and Hainan Island in the 1880s

1 x Roving Through Southern China: An American’s Explorations of Hong Kong, Macao and Canton in the early 1920s

1 x The Mystic Flowery Land: A Curious Imperial Maritime Customs Officer’s Roamings in Hong Kong and Canton in Southern China’s Plague Year

By Charles JH Halcombe, introduced and annotated by Paul French

No. 5 in the China Revisited series

Charles Halcombe served for much of the 1880s and 1890s with China’s Imperial Maritime Customs Service. His career included sojourns in both Canton and Hong Kong. Halcombe long harboured dreams of becoming a journalist. Unusually he married a Chinese woman, Liang Ah Ghan, the daughter of a Chefoo merchant during his stay. His seven-year career in China, his writing ambitions and his marriage all strongly inform his impressions and the retelling of his experiences.

In these excerpts from The Mystic Flowery Land we join Halcombe arriving by sampan at Hong Kong’s old Pedder’s Wharf before accompanying him on an extended literary stroll along Queen’s Road. With him we enter the “rum-mills” and Chinese theatres, meet the Sing-Song girls, indigent Europeans, and inveterate gamblers of the colony. On Hollywood Road Halcombe explores the fascinating Man-Mo Temple.

In Canton Halcombe investigates the riverine life of the city - the infamous “flower boats”, the working river and coastal steamers, the numerous temples to the sea Gods.

But it is perhaps Halcombe’s description of the terrible bubonic plague that hit Hong Kong in 1894 that stands out to the reader today as both shocking in its tragedy and pertinent to our own times.

China Revisited: a series bundle

The Mystic Flowery Land: A Curious Imperial Maritime Customs Officer’s Roamings in Hong Kong and Canton in Southern China’s Plague Year

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