10
The Hongkong Government Gazette.
Chairman,-As you obtained the introduction into the Ordi- nonce of alterations so beneficial to the Monopolist, did it not eccur to you that he would be justified in thinking that he would be doing much better by retaining you as his Counsel, thon by employing any other Barrister? and do you not consi- der it probable that he-being a Chinaman-thinks, and has said, that you were a very elever man, could do what you liked with the Governor, and could make law and unmake it the next day?
Dr Bridges. It is a difficult question to answer, but in the course of my practice here I have had reason to believe that Chinese have thought that I looked much closer into the details of their cases than any other practitioner, being better acquainted with the people; and I believe that the sole reason which induced Chun-tai-kwong to retain me was the trouble which I appeared to take on behalf of the government, during the interview of the previous day, in perfecting the Opium Ordinance as much as possible.
Chairman.—Did it not occur to you at the time he retained you, that matters connected with the grant might come before you as a Member of the Executive Council, in which you would have great influence in determining the Executive Council to decide favorably or unfavorably to the Monopolist? I refer to such matters as the following: he might fail to pay the instalments of the consideration money at the proper times: the " Regulations" mentioned in Sections 2, 3, and 10, might require revision and alteration.
Dr Bridges-It did not occur to me; but if it had it would have made no difference. I am standing Counsel for the P.&O. Company who may have matters with the Government, for Dent & Co. who have had conflicts with the Government, for Lyall, Still & Co., who have been lately in litigation with | the Government, and for many other firms here who might have matters in which their interests might clash with that of the Government. I was for nearly three years Acting Attorney General, during the whole of which time similar cases of con- flicting interest between the Government and individual mem- bers of the community might have arisen, and never having had even a suspicion thrown upon me throughout the whole of that time, I should not have anticipated any difficulty in doing my duty both to the Crown and my client in the case of the Opium Monopoly also.
Mr Dent. Have you any recollection that you told the Attorney General on the 13th March, that the highest tender had been accepted.
Dr Bridges-That another of the many instances in which in this case partly true and partly erroneous statements have been mixed up. The Attorney General came to the Colonial Secretary's office, as I think I have already stated here, on Saturday 13th March, about 4 P.M., and I shewed him a list of the tenders that had come in up to that time, but I never said anything that could have led him to suppose that the tenders were closed, or that any one of them had been accepted.
Chairman.-Dr Bridges: you have read the evidence pro duced before the Committee. Do you wish to make any statement or call any witnesses ?
the act.
|
[JUNE 19, 1858.
vant and the Chinaman with regard to the amount of my fee was without my knowledge, nor was I aware of it until the sitting of this Committee.
Committee closed.
H. TUDOR DAVIES, Chairman.
PAPERS, &c., PUT IN. (4)
1
HONGKONO, April 23d, 1858. HONORABLE Sir,-Since seeing you I have considered over the matter of writing that letter you dictated, which I beg to decline doing on the following grounds, namely, any conversation which I may have had with you relitive to the Opium Farma I consider strictly privato between Counsel and Client,I remain, your obedient
ervant,"
(B)
H. E. HOEY.
HONGKONG, April 24th, 1858,
HONORABLE SIR,-On reading your Draft last evening, I wrote you that I declined writing it. Since then I have unfortunately mislaid it, and regret to say I cannot find it, or I would have returned it immediately you wrote for it.
I have written to Mr Hazeland to write to Mr Chun-tai-kwong, him,-I am, Sir, your obedient servant, or to call at your office for instructions, which you were to give
H. E. HOEY.
Honorable ATTORNEY GENERAL.
Copy No. 1.
(C)
ATTORNEY GENERAL'S OFFICE, VICTORIA, HONGKONG, 24th April, 1858. SIR, I have the honor to communicate officially the particulars of a very scandalous slander upon yourself and His Excellency's Government, in order that I may receive the Governor's directions as to the prosecution of the author.
That person is Chun-tai-kwong, as I am informed by Mr Hoey, who volunteered the communication, and persisted in declaring, after being repeatedly admonished of the consequences, that “be is willing to swear to the truth of it."
very
official" letter to yourself, (written last night but withheld until I should premise that it was my intention, as explained in a "semi-
now in the hope of getting from Mr Hoey the note of the expressions used by Chun-tai-kwong, which I took from Mr Hoey's own lips yesterday afternoon,) to bave reported the matter to you at the moment I received it yesterday from my informant; but that, at his request, and on his undertaking to write to you forthwith, I left that duty to him, contenting myself with leaving in his hands the note i had drawn up, and at his request adding a few words of
explanation in official form.
Mr Hoey however, who appeared to labour under an absurd dread of Chun-tai-kwong's personal favour with the Governor, (insomuch that I had again and again to explain to him that His Excellency favour must necessarily depend upon the good credit of the person supposed to enjoy it.) after leaving my office yesterday wrote to my private residence, declining, as he said, after considering over the matter, to write to you on the subject.
And this morning, on my sending to him a third time for the beforementioned draught, containing his verbal account of the exact has been unfortunately "mislaid, and that he regrets to say he cannot words of Chun-tai-kwong, he has written to say that the document find it, or he would have returned it to me immediately I wrote for
it."
I am thereforo obliged to give as careful a report of the words as memory and consideration enable me:-And the following may be taken to be not only very accurate but quite complete.
Mir Hooy stated to me :--
asked him was it for a retaining fee as counsel?' Mr Chun replied, No; Dr Bridges said on receiving it, "of course this is as a cumshaw." I asked Mr Chun, what retaining fee then do you mean to give him?' He said, 'Oh! Dr Bridges is a very clever man, who can do what he likes with the Governor, can make any law be pleases, can tear it to pieces, and can put it together again and (Chun-tai-kwong) also told me that, whilst I was out of the room, I suppose I must give him One Thousand Dollars retainer. He Dr Bridges called in Mr D'Almada as a witness about something. I do not know whether it was about this payment."
Dr Bridges. I do not wish to call any witnesses. I wish to state, that I understand the first charge against me to have been that I corruptly procured the Opium Monopoly for Chun- tai-kwong. I subroit that not one tittle of evidence has been adduced in support of that. As to my having procured the
"On my way up with Mr Chun to the Colonial Secretary's Office Ordinance to be altered to suit the views of the Monopolist, if to sign my recognisances as his surety, on his getting the grant of I did so, the Legislative Council are accomplices with me in the Opium Farm, he told me that he had brought money with him, As to the means I took for inquiry into the defama-know he had none when he came back) and after I withdrew from the room by Dr Bridges's desire, after signing my name, Mr tory language, which the Attorney General says was reported Chun stayed behind; and when he came out, he said that he had to him by Mr Hoey, I wish to point out that when I received | given Dr Bridges, after I left the room, four hundred dollars. I the official and semi-official communications from the Attorney General, the view I took of them was this, and all subsequent occurrences have confirmed the correctness of that view. Hoey, the Attorney General's client, is in litigation with Chun- tai-kwong, my client. Now the Attorney General by sending up this communication, fancies he has put me on the horn of a dilemma: either I must institute proceedings against my own client Chun-tai-kwong upon the evidence of his opponent | Hoey-and which prosecution must be fruitless, for the com- munication made by Hoey was made in professional confidence -or I must decline to take notice altogether of the matter, and then the Attorney General will be able to say, that I have shirked an inquiry. I also had very little confidence in the exact state of facts reported by the Attorney General, as he is constantly in the habit of making accusations against every- body. I therefore adopted a course, which would prevent it being supposed that I wished to stifle the matter, and I am satisfied that that course is the best one to be pursued by a straightforward man, who wished merely to elicit the truth. wish also to state, that whatever took place between my ser-
I need noti enlarge on the danger to the Government, of allowing a Chinaman, or indeed any one, to utter these monstrous stories with impunity. Their gross improbability may shock an educated European, but all other persons who hear them will be less impressed by that, than by the safety and audacity with which they are asserted and circulated,---I lave, &c.
(Signed,)
T, CHISHOLM ANSTEY. The Honorable W. T. BRIDGES, Esquire, D.C.L., Acting Colonial Secretary. True Copy,
W. T. BRIDGES, Acting Colonial Secretary.