(xiii)
community had first shewn its interest in the Society by subscribing freely, and that moneys now subscribed have been raised very largely in consequence of the personal solicitations of the Registrar General.
4. On this point I repeat what I said in my letter to the Government dated the 7th May, 1892. I believe the Registrar General to have been animated by the very highest and best motives. It was a good thing in itself that the Chinese should subscribe freely for the useful and charitable purposes of the Pó Léung Kuk; it was well that they should be urged to do so, and persuaded out of their objections and prejudices. It was natural that the Registrar General should take an interest in the Society and do all he could to further its objects. I am sure that he made use of nothing but the most legitimate argument in his efforts to gain subscribers, and that no man who refused to subscribe would find any difference in the dealings with him as the Registrar General afterwards. But I am equally confident that in the minds of the Chinese there was the dread that refusal would influence the action of the Registrar General and of the Government. I do not believe that the Chinese are capable of separating Mr. LOCKHART from the Registrar General, and I quote here in support of my opinion from a speech of the Honourable HO KAI, delivered in the Legislative Council on the 25th March, 1891, during the discussion on the Gambling Ordinance.
"It is very easy to get Chinese to come to one's office, especially the Registrar "General's Office, and get them to say what one wants, for on asking them certain "questions they, observing the same deference they pay to officials of their own nation, "will simply say 'Aye, Aye' to every question addressed to them, although at the "same time they do not agree with the opinion expressed. It is a matter of notoriety "that they will not contradict official remarks. I wish when the Registrar General "wishes information he would get it in a fair and just manner, allow the Chinese to come together in open meeting and then give the result arrived at, instead of taking "opinions given under I will not say the terror but the peculiar feeling with which "they come before a high official." I must say that I regret that the subscriptions for the Pó Léung Kuk were not obtained from the Chinese in public meeting or on the solicitation of their fellows, instead of being, as very many of them were obtained as the result of personal interviews with the Registrar General at his Office and under "the peculiar feeling" with which Chinese come before a high official.
5. My conclusion on this point is that in the past there has been no general interest taken by the Chinese in the Pó Léung Kuk or in its operations, no subscribers, no subscriptions, no annual meetings, and no elections in due form. The so-called Pó Léung Kuk has been merely a Committee of the Tung Wah Hospital supported by the Tung Wah Hospital and Man Mo Temple, and by contributions from the Directors only. To say that because the Tung Wah Hospital, a corporate body, defrayed all the expenses out of its corporate funds, therefore all the members of the Tung Wah Hospital may be looked on as members of the Pó Léung Kuk, is simply to play with words. It might just as well be said that because the Government once subscribed a $1,000 therefore the members of the Government were members of the Pó Léung Kuk.
WORK DONE BY THE PÓ LÉung Kuk.
6. However irregularly constituted, it must be admitted that the members of the so-called Pó Léung Kuk Committee and the Tung Wah Hospital have done good service in the suppression and detection of kidnapping, in finding food and shelter for women and children, and in assisting the Registrar General in the investigation of cases referred to them.) The somewhat wild expressions in the second paragraph, of page vii, of the Report drafted by the Chairman, about thousands of women and girls rescued, thousands of destitutes cared for, thousands of persons restored to their relatives, are in my opinion simply words and nothing more. There is no evidence of the number of persons passing through the hands of the Society from 1878 to 1888. The accounts shew but a small