78
Towards the cost of these works, this Colony is expected to contribute the sum of £56,000. The payment of this contribution will be spread over two years; and you will probably agree that it should be ultimately charged against the moderate loan, not exceeding one year's revenue, which you have already sanctioned in principle for the construction of urgently required public works. I recommend this question to your early and favourable consideration..
4. You are already aware, from papers presented during the last Session, that I have strongly pressed the expediency, on sanitary and other grounds, of the junction of the Eastern and Western divisions of this City by means of a continuous Marine Embankment along the sea-frontage of the Military canton- ments and of the Royal Naval Yard. The Colonial Office in England supports my recommendation; but I regret to announce that its negotiations with the War Office and Admiralty have not as yet been brought to a successful issue.
5. During the course of the Session, reports and other papers will be laid before you showing the condition of the several Departments of the Public Service; which is generally satisfactory.
6. With regard to Legislation, there will be submitted to you, among other measures, Bills to make certain amendments in the Bankruptcy Law; to regulate Weights and Measures; to codify the law of Bills of Exchange; to amend certain Provisions of the Merchant Shipping Act; to appropriate certain unclaimed balances of Bankrupt and Intestate Estates; and to amend the Building Ordinance.
7. It is hoped, moreover, that the progress in its important work of the Commission appointed to consolidate the laws now in force in this Colony will enable several revised Ordinances to be proposed during the present Session.
8. You will further be requested to consider the propriety of enacting in a permanent form certain provisions of the temporary Peace Preservation Ordinance. On a recent occasion, the precautionary measures promptly adopted by the Civil Government with the support of the Military, speedily repressed the tendency to disorder which for a short period seemed to be threatening among the lower section of the Chinese population. Perfect tranquillity was at once restored. It must always be remembered that the position of the Chinese in Hongkong is essentially different from that of the natives in India, and in other possessions of the Crown acquired by conquest, where British rule has been imposed on peoples with long established insti- tutions of their own. Hongkong, on the other hand, when ceded to the British Crown in 1843, was little more than a barren rock, inhabited only by a few fishermen and pirates. Since the first establishment of our rule here, a Chinese immigration, now amounting to above 150,000, has settled in this British territory of its own free will, and for the sake of its own convenience and profit. It is obvious that this new population, while entitled to the full protection of the English laws, is bound to obey those laws. Moreover, the Government of Hongkong, while expecting the loyal support of all the nationalities dwelling here together under the British flag, has ample strength of itself to enforce obedience, and to brook no interference