THE HONGKONG GOVERNMENT GAZETTE, 19TH JANUARY, 1889.
seal, to be signed by the judge or if there be more than one judge, by any one of the judges of the said Court; and such judge shall attach to his signature a statement in writing on the said copy that the Court whereof he is a judge has no seal; but if any of the aforesaid authenticated copies shall purport to be sealed or signed as hereinbefore res- pectively directed, the same shall respectively be admitted in evidence in every case in which the original document could have been received in evidence, without any proof of the seal where a seal is necessary or of the signature, or of the truth of the statement attached thereto, where such signature and statement are necessary or of the judicial oharacter of the person appearing to have made such signature and statement.
26. All answers to interrogatories disclaimers, examina- tions, affidavits, declarations, affirmations, and attestations of honour and all other documents required to be sworn or declared in suits or matters depending in the Supreme Court, and also acknowledgments required for the purposes of enrolling any deed in the said Court, shall and may be sworn, declared and taken in England, Scotland or Ireland, or the Channel Islands, or in any other Colony, island, plantation, or place under the dominion of Her Majesty in Foreign parts, before any Court, judge, notary public, or person lawfully authorised to administer oaths in such country, colony, island, plantation, or place respectively, or before any of Her Majesty's Consuls or Vice-Consuls in any Foreign parts out of Her Majesty's dominions; and the judges and other officers of the Supreme Court shall take judicial notice of the seal or signature, as the case may be, of any such Court, judge, notary public, person, Consul, or Vice- Consul, attached, appended, or subscribed to any such pleas, answers, disclaimers, examinations, affidavits, affirmations, attestations of honour, declarations, acknowledgments, or other documents to be used in the said Court.
27. In Civil proceedings:
(1.) Entries in books of account kept in the course of business with such a reasonable degree of re- gularity as shall be satisfactory to the Court, shall be admissible in evidence, whenever they refer to a matter into which the Court has to inquire, but shall not alone be sufficient evidence to charge any person with liability. (2.) The Hongkong Gazette and any Government Gazette of any country. colony, or dependency under the dominion of the British Crown, may be proved by the bare production thereof before the Court.
(3.) All proclamations, acts of state, whether legis- lative or executive, nominations, appointments, and other official communications of the Govern- ment, appearing in any such Gazette, may be proved by the production of such Gazette, and shall be prima facie proof of any fact of a public nature which they were intended to notify. (4.) The Court may, on matters of public history, literature, science, or art, refer, for the purposes of evidence, to such published books, maps, or charts as the Court shall consider to be of autho- rity on the subject to which they relate. (5.) Books printed or published under the authority of the government of a foreign country, and purport- ing to contain the statutes, code, or other written law of such country, and also printed and published books of reports of decisions of the courts of such country, and books proved to be commonly ad- mitted in such courts as evidence of the law of such country, shall be admissible as evidence of the law of such foreign country.
(6.) All maps made under the authority of any govern- ment, or of any public municipal body, and not made for the purpose of any litigated question, shall primâ facie be deemed to be correct, and shall be admitted in evidence without further proof. 28. All affidavits, affirmations and notarial acts taken and made under the Act of the Sixth year of King. George the Fourth, Chapter Eighty-seven or under the Act of the Eighteenth and Nineteeth years of Her Present Majesty Chapter forty-two, shall and may be received, read and made use of in and before the Court and the judges and officers thereof, in or in relation to any suit, cause, matter, or proceeding in or before the Court in like manner,
Answers, &c. in Supreme Court. may
be sworn and taken in England, Scotland, Ireland, the Channel Islands, &c. (15 and 16 V.o. 86 8. 22. No. 7 of 1857 B. I.)
Entries in books of account. (Code s. 45.)
Government Gazettes.
Proclama- tions, acts of state, &c.
Books of science, maps, charts.
Foreign Law.
Public maps.
Affidavits, &c. under 26 Geo. 4 c. 87, and 18 and 19, V. c. 42
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