The Odd Volumes of Hong Kong

I am currently amused by the peculiar name of a gentleman's society in Colonial Hong Kong, Odd Volumes (Literary, Scientific, and Debating Society of Hongkong, 叙談文社 in Chinese), which was established in 1893. Odd Volumes, adopted from the Victorian usage of "odd" meaning matchless, dates back to the London-based literary society the Sette of the Odd Volumes in 1878.

From the Year-boke of the Odd Volumes, 1889-90, the legend of the Odd Volumes is given into verse by W. Mort Thompson, the histogriographers, as follows:

Long ago, when such ventures but few undertook,

Some one printed and published a capital book,

But when all the copies were suitably bound,

One copy was missed and could nowhere be found,

Whether stolen or lost was a point never cleared,

But the twenty-one volumes had all disappeared.

Odd volumes turned up here and there now and then,

But the once perfect sette never turned up again.

Yet every odd volume, on stall or on shelf, Seemed somehow or other to speak for itself, — "As a single Odd Volume I'm matchless, but yet The whole twenty-one of us perfect a sette!"

The founder of the Hong Kong Odd Volumes was the Scottish physician Sir James Cantlie (康德黎 in Chinese). Before coming to Hong Kong, Cantlie spent more than 15 years studying, teaching and practising medicine at Charing Cross Hospital in Central London and had published a both critical and contentious lecture on public health entitled Degeneration among Londoners (London: Field & Tuer, The Leadenhall Press, E.C.) delievered at the Parkes Museum of Hygiene in South Kensington in 1885, which "attributed the poor physique of Londoners to overcrowding and industrial pollution." Despite no evidence is shown that he had ever been invited to the Sette of the Odd Volumes, Cantlie might have been well aware of such a learned literary club in London provided that he had lived in Central London for such a long period and later formed the Hong Kong Odd Volumes.

Cantlie came to Hong Kong in 1887 and became Dean of the College of Medicine for Chinese in 1889. He played a key role in drawing the attention of the learned community and addressed at the inaugural meeting held at the famous Hongkong hotel on 2nd March, 1893, being himself the founding President, explaining the aims objects and aims of the society, which was by no means a subsidiary of the London Odd Volumes. Located in Wyndham Street, alias the literary street, the club was also regarded as Literary, Scientific, and Debating Society of Hongkong Odd Volumes. Cantlie later became President of the Royal Society of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene in London.

In the following years, the society was recognized by the support of the Governor Sir William Robinson and Colonial Secretary Sir James H. Stewart Lockhart being President and Vice-President respectively (Cantlie being Vice-President until his return to London in 1896). While it was common for the Governor and Colonial Secretary being respective President and Vice-President of any gentleman's society, one distinguished member of the community also served as one of the three Vice-Presidents (Cantlie himself being one) in 1896. It was John Joseph Francis. Francis was one of the leading counsels of the community and an outspoken Irish. He was also an active member of many learned societies and clubs, and was instrumental for the formation of the Odd Volumes and the Jockey Club.

The other important early committee member was less known but absolutely not negligible. William Harris Purcell served the society for almost two decades as Honourary Secretary between 1896-7 and Honourary Treasurer for many years since 1898 until 1914 (replaced by a prominent figure Henry Edward Pollock, 普羅 in Chinese, Barrister-at-law and Attorney General, the original Honourary Treasurer). He joined Kelly & Walsh in Shanghai in as early as 1885 and later moved to the Hong Kong branch in 1893 when the Odd Volumes was inaugurated. In 1896, He was invited to take up the post of Honourary Secretary whereas he was bookkeeper of Kelly & Walsh. During his office in the society, he had overseen its persistent growth as "a representative body of the best men" of Hong Kong thoroughout the years of various popular public lectures by distinguished guests, such as the HK-based sinologist James Dyer Ball and United States Minister to Siam, John Barrett. Purcell worked for the society until he returned to Kelly & Walsh in Shanghai in 1914 and was elected Director until around 1928. 

According to the papers of Cantlie (MS 7923), deposited in the Wellcome Library, London, the society published the journal The Book Plate, Vol. 1 No. 2 being issued on 27 Feb 1895.

to be continued...