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observed that he was not often late.
It would not be appropriate to the scale of this essay to give an account of his practice, cases or clients. For anyone who is interested the details are to be found in the local newspapers. I propose only to mention a few selected matters. His first reported case was in April 1877 when he appeared for a man charged with possessing and uttering counterfeit coins and made a successful submission of no case to go to the jury. In the following July he called E.J. Eitel, referred to above, to give evidence of local custom in a case relating to the false imprisonment of a woman. His first notable case was in January 1878 when he defended one of two ship's engineers charged with manslaughter following the explosion of a boiler on a ship in Victoria Harbour which caused the deaths of over seventy people. Later in 1878 he defended F.S. Huffham, the Deputy Registrar of the Supreme Court, on charges of fraud and misappropriation of fees. His clients included banks, shipping companies, and many other businesses, the Opium Farmer, the Emperor of China and other Chinese authorities and a host of individuals including the Baroness DoCercal and a member of the Korean Royal Family. He appeared in cases in which the Hong Kong Club and the Jockey Club were parties and many of the libel cases which were a feature of life in Hong Kong. His practice took him not only into the courts of Hong Kong but also before the Legislative Council and to Macao, Canton and Shanghai. In a case of his in 1884 two of the jurors gave evidence, which must be unusual. Also in that year he was in a case concerning a contract to supply Chinese emigrants to Jamaica. In 1886 he appeared for forty-two Chinese Police Constables charged with corruption. In 1893 he was involved in the first case in Hong Kong relating to Ancient Lights. In 1897 he acted for the Jewish Community which sued in respect of land alleged to be held in trust for it. Following the acquittal of Fraser Smith referred to above he joined others in offering to pay the plaintiff's costs, an uncommon gesture for a lawyer (the verdict of the jury was not guilty but the verdict of the colony was guilty). His persistence as an advocate lasted to the end. In June 1901 the trial Judge in his summing up referred to "his very able speech for the defence which occupied two hours and in which every point in the evidence was thoroughly gone into".