The last Hongkong Goverament Gazette contains the Colonial Harbour Masters "to the progress of interesting to note This trade not onl} shows an improvement over 1868 but, enti mated by te exhibits a higher figure than any previous year of the colony's axis tence. The increase too is entirely in foreign shipping, while there has been falling of For, though there has n a decrease in junk arrival sels, equal to 113,252 to an increase in foreign shipping of 180 ships tons. British vessels, alone, figure for 41,615 tons more than during the provi-ons year. The Harbour Master attributes this Large increase of trade chiefly to the extended traffic between the Colony and Australasia, the United States, the Philippine Islinds, and Japan; the trade wit British India remaining nearly stationary.
The falling off in the Junk trade is attributed to the action of the Chinese Government, in establishing Customs stations in the vicinity of the Colony, which squeeze native vessels entering and leaving its harbours.
"Whether the result of this policy has been beneficial to the Chinese -Imperial Treasury, Captain Thomsett will not venture to say, but it is a fair assumption, unsatisfactory though it be, that if the Junk trade of Hongkong has' decreased, so, im proportion must that of the Ports with which the vessels traded. Although the close blockade kept up by these Cruisers appears to be producing a bad effect on the native shipping of the Colony, it may eventually reanlt in the super cession of Junks by European vessels as carriers, to the ultimate advantage of the foreign ship builder and trader.
Between the Cruisers and the rumored possible-appointment of a Chinese Consul at Hongkong the destruction of trade i native vessels and ruin of the sea-faring
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.