Hainan

Hainan, an island of China, the southernmost land of the empire, lying between the Gulf of Tongking and the China Sea, and 15 miles S. from the mainland. It forms part of the province of Kwangtung, and measures about 150 miles (from southwest to north-east) by 100. The centre and south of the island are mountainous; on the north the mountains are fringed with fertile plains, well watered by rivers. The island, which is purely agricultural, produces rice, sesamum-seeds, ground-nuts, sugar, sweet potatoes, taro, cocoa-nuts, indigo, beans, turnips, millet, pine-apples, and various kinds of vegetables. Exports—pigs, sugar, sesamum-seeds, ground-nut cakes, betel-nuts, and eggs; annual value, £316,450. Imports—opium, cotton and woolen goods, and rice; annual value, £410,000. The capital is Kiung-chow (pop. 40,000), the port of which, Hoi-how (15,000), 3 miles distant, has been open to foreign trade since 1876. The inhabitants number altogether about two and a half millions, the plains being inhabited by Chinese (1½ millions), the mountainous and unknown interior by the aboriginal Les. Eight to ten thousand Chinese emigrants leave Kiung-chow every year for Singapore and Bangkok. Plants and animals, especially birds and fishes, are numerous. Gold exists. The island is subject to frequent earthquakes, and in summer to typhoons. See B. C. Henry's Ling-Nam (1886).