The benighted traditionalism of the colony’s Chinese awoke the British administration to one of its most serious weaknesses; a half-century of British rule had failed to give to 99 percent of the colony’s residents any clear idea of the civilization they were expected to work and live under. The tardy lesson eventually took effect, and the British embarked on a long and intensive program of improving and enlarging their school system. In the Tung Wah Hospital, English and Chinese doctors learned to their surprise that therapies unlike their own were not necessarily sheer quackery, and that they could work together for the benefit of their patients. With the population of the colony exceeding 160,000 in the early 1880s, military and commercial leaders turned to the possibility of acquiring more land on the Chinese mainland. They pressed the British Foreign Office to seek the territory running north from the Kowloon Peninsula to the Sham Chun River, about 15 miles away. The suggestions were rejected as prejudicial to Sino-British relations until other foreign powers started to thrust into Chinese territory for commercial concessions and spheres of political influence. France, Russia and Japan were the spearheads of this infiltration of the Celestial Empire, which had been weakened by internal rebellion. Japan defeated China in the 1894-95 war and exerted ever-stronger commercial control over the mainland. Russia made its bid by advancing through Manchuria and occupying Port Arthur. Germany hastened to join the commercial invaders. Hacked at from four directions, the Chinese people attempted to close ranks in defense of their homeland. The United States, with no apparent desire to annex Chinese territory, nevertheless heightened both British and Chinese apprehension by launching its naval attack on Manila from Mirs Bay in May, 1898. The Chinese feared another land grab, and the British felt they could best protect Hong Kong if they were able to deal with a strong, unified China. Despite its earlier reluctance to disturb the status quo, Great Britain was now convinced that it had to acquire the territory between Kowloon and the Sham Chun River as a protective buffer for Hong Kong. On July 1, 1898, Britain obtained a 99-year lease to this mainland territory and 235 adjacent islands with a total land area of 365½ square miles.