Bulletin Number Four 1984

interviews in various districts o f the New Territories and the most systematic data was gathered at Shatin and Sheung Shui. The New Territories used to be part o f Xin'an, a small district in southeastern Guangdong. According to the Xin'an Gazetteer ， there were three academies (shuyuan) in the prefecture, all situated in the district city Nantou. It is generally believed that education in the New Territories was not popular, that gentry alone were literate and ordinary farmers did not pay much attention to education and were barred from study by poverty. Moreover, it was stated in the early reports o f the Hong Kong Government that the quality o f traditional education was very poor and the village teachers were too pedantic. However, our research findings prove quite the contrary. In our field work study o f the New Territories, we have located many old village study halls. Although some o f these halls have been destroyed or rebuilt ， and some are lying in ruins, we were still able to trace the history o f some. The size o f these study halls varies from a single room structure holding only ten to fifteen students to a two-storeyed building w ith over ten rooms accommodating more than a hundred students. Altogether we have found fo rty or so study halls o f notable size. Most o f these were bu ilt by the larger or wealthy clans to serve also as sub-ancestral halls, such as the Kun-ting shue-sut ( 覲 廷 書 室 ） at Ping Shan and Yau-sin shue-sut ( 友 善 書 室 ) at Ha Tsuen, which, by the Chinese village standard, are very fine and spacious buildings w ith elaborate decorations and sophisticated carvings. Some o f the large halls were bu ilt solely for teaching purposes, such as the Ching-koon ka-shuk (靜觀 家塾 ) and Kang-yung shue-uk ( 鏡 蓉 書 屋 ) o f Sha Tau Kok. According to our study in Sheung Shui, towards the end o f the 19th century, school-going children accounted for 75% o f boys between seven and fourteen years old (girls were then s till excluded from formal schooling) in the village. For the whole region, the average may be lower, but there is evidence showing that even poor families were able to send their sons to school, but the average length o f schooling was about four years; only the very brilliant pupils completed the six years o f study or proceeded beyond the completion o f this village education. Many who attended schools were not for obtaining examination titles or for making a better living. 'Profound reference' for learning was an important factor for the high percentage o f school attendance. Having his son sent to learn the words o f the sages and to read their books was a matter o f 'face'. The availability o f schooling at very low cost yet constituted even a more important reason. The use o f ancestral halls as classrooms and the existence o f different types o f study halls bu ilt by villagers and clans provided almost completely free accommoda tions for teachers to set up their classes. There was no cost for furniture as the students had to bring along their own stools and desks. The system o f teaching by rotation also helped to keep the fees low. Whatever the size o f the class and varying standard o f the students, it was taught by only one teacher. Each class was usually divided into three groups o f activities: one was to practice writing, that is, calligraphy, the other was to recite repeatedly by themselves passages which had been taught by the teachers, then the teacher would take care o f the third group, who would be taught new passages from the books or took turn to recite in front o f the teachers the passages which had been taught earlier. In the early 20th century, the school fees were still three to six dollars per annum, and payment could also be in kind such as rice or other kinds o f staple food. Teachers on the whole could not rely solely on the meagre tuition fees to support their living and had to find other sources o f income by taking up side-line jobs such as writing letters, invitations and door couplets for the villagers. As for the wealthy families and clans, their great concern towards education was shown by the building o f study halls o f notable size in the villages and by their efforts in preparing their children for the civil examinations. In these areas, the development o f education corresponded w ith the increasing wealth and rising position o f the lineage. It can be seen from our studies that the greatest number o f study halls and the biggest ones belonged to the more prominent clans such as the Tangs o f Kam Tin, Lung Yuek Tau, Ping Shan and Ha Tsuen, the Lius o f Sheung Shui, the Mans o f Tai Hang and the Haus o f Kam Chin Village, and these were exactly the clans which possessed the largest number o f titles won in the civil examinations. Indeed, education in this respect did go w ith honour, position, wealth and power. The quality o f village education in the New Territories was not bad in the 19th century and it was only at the beginning o f the 20th century that it began to decline. The Hong Kong Government complained about the traditional village education during its early school inspections and Sung Hok-pang drew people's attention to the poor quality o f village education in his report o f 1913. The decline in village education was the result o f political changes and the introduction o f a new educational system in China. With the abolition o f the civil examination 18 ACADEMIC/CULTURAL EVENTS