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Q. How long had this man been in your service?
A. He was engaged by the former Compradore. He had been ten or twenty years, but he has been promoted to be office coolie.
Q. Do you engage coolies for your masters ?
A. Yes; it is part of my duty under the agreement.
Q.-Can you tell us whether, in German firms, it is usually part of the duty of the Compradore to provide coolies? Is it in his agreement to do so?
A.—I am not able to speak as to other agreements.
Q. How do you manage to get coolies for your masters?
A.-Well, I just send some of the old hands to go and Q.-The old coolies that left, you mean?
engage new coolies.
A.—No, there are two or three teams—one for the tripans and others for the clerks and so on. Supposing the taipan discharges his men then I send the coolies who are employed by the clerks out to get fresh men.
Q. And do you get them?
A. Sometimes I get them and sometimes I can't get them.
Q.-Sometimes you take longer to get them, but you always get them. That is what he means ?
The Interpreter.—Yes.
Witness. For the last few years I have always been successful in getting them. Q.--Supposing the coolies you sent out to get new coolies did not get them, would you dismiss them ?
A.-No; we don't dismiss the old coolies if they don't succeed in getting new coolies. There is always some difficulty in getting coolies during the plague time but the masters or taipans always give me time to get private coolies.
Q.-And do you, as a Chinese gentleman, think it good to have private coolies in Chinese employ registered or licensed?
A.--We leave it entirely to the Government to decide that.
Q.-But we want to know what your opinion is?
A.-I don't think it is right to force them to do so. Suppose you had a licensed ricksha coolie and he went out of your service, you might not be able to get another one. Mr. Wilcox. You say you send the remaining coolies out to look for new coolies. Do they go to their coolie kuns or lodging-houses for them?
would
A. I think they go to the coolie houses to get them. If I send them out, they
and get go
their own countrymen-a Chow-chau man-to come. Q.-Is there a coolie guild?
A. No.
Q-Nothing like a Pork Guild?
A.-I don't think so. You engage a coolie and have a spare room in the hong he sleeps in the hong: otherwise he has to go outside and sometimes pay a dollar a month. If you engage a coolie, the first thing you ask is: "Have you a place to live in?" If he says
"No" then you have to pay him extra to enable him to pay his rent or lodging. If you give him lodging, then you get him a dollar cheaper.
[This concluded the sitting. It was agreed to meet again on Thursday, 26th September, at 5 p.m., when the evidence of the headman of the Peak chair coolies and of the headman of the Kowloon Godown Company's coolies would be taken.]