ABSTRACT
A sort of hallucination seems to have seized those who built houses here; they thought that Hong Kong would rapidly out-rival Singapore, and become the Tyre or Carthage of the eastern hemisphere. Three years’ residence, and the experience thence derived, have materially sobered their views. Unfortunately the Government of the colony fostered the delusion respecting the colony. The leading Government officers bought land, built houses or bazaars, which they rented out at high rates, and the public money was lavished in the most extraordinary manner, building up, and pulling down temporary structures, making zig-zag bridle-paths over the hills and mountains, and forming the ‘Queen’s Road’ of about three to four miles long, on which about 180,000 dollars have been expended, but which is not passable for half the year. The straggling settlement called Victoria, built along the ‘Queen’s Road,’ was dignified with the name of ‘city;’ and it was declared on the highest authority, that Hong Kong would contain a population ‘equal to that of ancient Rome.’
