16th May. Once a Chinaman always a Chinaman is true to about the same extent as @ similar statement would be of an Englishman or any other man. In other words the Chinaman, go where he will is a Chinaman still, but he is like the rest of the world liable to change with his environment. And change he does in the Straits. In the first place he becomes after due probation a British subject. A rose by any other name will smell as sweet says love-sick Romeo. But once let a son of Han attain to the rank of a subject of the King and ina little while a change comes over him. As regards Englishmen he stands on another, and, with respect to other foreigners, on higher plane. Golf an hour spent in the Police Court in Singapore will open any one's eyes as to the privileges which the Straits Chinaman acquires when he puts British nationality. But be does not halt when his legal status is thus assured. As we know full well he has ever an eye to the main chance, ever a common-sense view of material things, and a ready adaptability. He is prepared both to adopt and to discard. Evolution of the simplest and most natural kind becomes him. He is, in the animal world what the helianthus is in the botanical, a being ever following the progress of the sun of success. In the Straits, for example, he finds that a modification of the attire worn by his forefathers in Fokien or Kuangtung is more to his comfort and his dignity than a servile sticking to precedent. He changes accordingly, and to one fresh from his native haunts his new appearance is striking to say the least. He particularly affects certain styles of foreign head-gear, sun-hats, straw hats, felt hats and soon. He has even gone so far as to adopt foreign food, and at least one respectable hotel has met him half way in this respect by admitting him to its tiffin rooms where a portion of the space is screened off for his especial benefit.
But after all these are small matters—straws which show the way the wind blows, There are other things of far greater importance than mere sumptuary or sartorial changes. The prevailing language in the Babel which is heard in the Straits is Malay. Everybody scams to speak it, even the foreigner. The business language is Malay, servants speak Malay, gharry-men speak Malay, in short Malay is the lingua franco by means of which Madrasi talks to Kling, Kling to Javanese, Javanese to Chinaman, and Chinaman to them all, including the foreigner. Malay therefore is, to speak as an examiner might, a highly important " subject" in Straits education. The Chinaman has recognised this, and as usual has taken no half measures. Heart and soul he has gone in for the necessary preparation under which the "meek shall inherit the earth." His own tongue has become so to speak useless to him. He drops it. There is no clinging to an effete old language when dollars are to be gained by learning a new one. Consequently he has absolutely given up the speech of his forefathers, and has taken to that of the people about him, and this to such an extent that a very considerable proportion of Chinamen in Singapore and the Straits generally are abso-Intely incap: ble of speaking Chinese or of understanding it when it is spoken. We know of a case the other day when this was put to the test, and of some forty or more Chinese present only about half a dozen were able to talk in their own tongue. They all learn English if possible, and the Government and other schools are so worked as to give every possible facility in this respect.
There are perhaps 200,000 people all told in Singapore, and of these a rough guess would put the Chinese at more than half. Street after street is given up almost exclusively to them. They monopolise many branches of trade, and are daily extending their influence. The houses built for them are all of non-Asiatic pattern, to call them European would be hardly correct, but it would be a closer approximation to the truth than to say they were Chinese, for that they are not. Some are very handsome buildings such as become possibly the richest people of the community. As in Hongkong and Shanghai they are great purchasers of real estate, and nota little anxiety is felt by some sections of the community as to what is likely to be the upshot of this earth hunger.
We have said that the schools give facilities to the Chinese for the acquisition of English. The Raffles Institution has at its disposal scholarships which provide for the fortunate winners free education in England for a stated period. Two of these have at different times been held by Chinese, one of whom is now an AM. D. in practice and the other a man of the inw who may on frequent occasions be heard before the Singapore Courts.
But business—trading—money-making isthe Chinaman's strong point in the South as elsewhere. Things that were done for him ten or twenty' years ago he now docs himself direct, and thus is steadily getting a larger and larger share of the local trade into his own hands, a fact which, when superadded to the cutting in of the German, makes the future of British commerce in this British colony a more and more doubtful factor. It is matter that requires consideration and something more. We have made Singapore a free port as we made Hongkong. Of the wisdom of this step we have no doubt, because we have no doubt as to the strength and stability of British commerce. Were that faith once shaken, were we to be compelled to humiliate ourselves as our rivals mostly do and acknowledge that we are incapable of meeting on equal terms a world in arms—commercially, then there would be nothing for it but to adopt the system of our competitors, throw free trade to the winds and clap on protective duties. It is as certain that this step would be popu-
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.