REPORTS EXHIBITING THE PAST AND PRESENT
Enclosure 6 in No.
RETURN of CRIMINAL CASES that have been Tried in the Supreme Court of Hong Kong, from 15th February to 15th December, 1848, inclusive.
No. Crime. No. of Cases. No. of Persons. Conviction. Acquittal. Death Sentence. Transportation. Hard labour over 1 Year. Hard labour under 1 Year. Charge Postponed. Charge abandoned. Remarks. Perjury 1 1 1 Robbery 20 Assault and battery. 1 1 1 Assaulting a police officer 1 3 1 1 tried twice. Assault on a constable in the execution of his duty. 1 2 1 1 tried twice. Administering poison with intent to kill 1 2 1 1 Affray. 11 17 11 2 2 Arson. 2 4 2 Aggravated assault 4 4 4 1 3 Assault 17 26 16 1 4 9 1 tried twice. Assault with intent to commit sodomy. 1 1 1 1 Assault with intent to rob 1 2 1 1 Breaking into a building and stealing therefrom 1 2 1 1 Burglary and larceny 1 2 1 1 Cutting and wounding with intent to do some grievous bodily harm 1 2 1 1 Demanding money with menaces 1 2 1 1 Demanding money with menaces and force, with intent to steal same 2 4 2 2 Forgery 2 2 2 1 1 Larceny 13 13 13 4 7 2* Larceny in a dwelling-house, over £5. 7 7 7 3 4 Manslaughter.. 1 1 1 1 Murder by stabbing.. 1 2 1 1 Obtaining goods by false pretences. 1 1 1 1 Receiving stolen goods 2 2 2 1 1 Robbery by a person armed. 1 2 1 1 Robbery by persons armed. 7 13 7 5 2 Robbery with arms 2 2 2 1 1 Robbery with arms, and receiving stolen goods 1 2 1 1 Robbery with violence 13 26 13 9 4 Stealing cattle 1 1 1 1 Stealing from the person 2 4 2 1 1 Stealing in a boat in port 1 1 1 1 Stealing in a boat within 100 miles of the coast of China 2 2 2 1 1 Sodomy 1 1 1 1 tried twice. Uttering a forged cheque 1 1 1 1 Total 94 157 91 1 2 1 46 41* Out on their own recognizances and failed to appear.
W. CAINE, Colonial Secretary.
#lac 130k of 18th se STATE OF HER MAJESTY'S COLONIAL POSSESSIONS.s
No.
REPORT of the COLONIAL SURGEON for 1848.
IN compiling a sanatory report upon this colony for the past year, attention is called to three important objects
1. To deduce from such materials as are attainable, the most concise and the best evidence of the actual state of the health of the community.
2. To trace out the various causes of endemic diseases, or those which are peculiar to the locality.
3. To point out the general or political and social measures which may or ought to be taken for the removal of such causes.
The defect in statistical records of population, disease, and death, a defect ascribable to the peculiar character of the people, and the limited and insular nature of the colony,-is a serious obstacle to the faithful prosecution of the first inquiry. Until the establishment of the civil hospital, which will assist in affording scrupulous exactness to the future records of sickness in the various Government departments, the system pursued in the treatment of the sick amongst the police force, was not only inefficient and unsatisfactory, but it was one by which was impossible to impart faithfulness to the records of disease.
All averages in the police force will be referred to fixed numbers; dis- missals and changes in the force, however, during the year, will bring into the computation of the averages nearly twice the number of individuals that compose the fixed standard to which the averages are referred.
Popular ideas are very apt to attribute to some apparent physical cause the epidemics which prevail; but those who are so ready with ex tempore explanations of the most recondite of all morbific phenomena, are little aware of the diversity, the complexity, and subtlety of the subject which they handle with so much facility. An insight into the varying influences of the atmo- sphere, the relation of such influences to vital tissues, and into the thousand changes which one familiar atmospherical phenomenon may, at a moment, work on the composition and constituents of the surrounding air, would demonstrate the presumption in endeavouring to trace causes with so little knowledge. The practical mischief of such rashness is every day apparent.
In pointing out the remedies for gencral evils, it is often discouraging to feel that we are frequently called upon to suggest measures which cannot be taken.
Europeans Indians and Chinese Number of Sick Days Sick Deaths Average duration of Disease Number of Sick Days Sick Deaths Average duration of Disease January 21 108 1 5.14 11 110 2 10 February 40 152 3.8 47 180 3.83 March 46 193 9 4.2 55 239 4.35 April 34 160 4.71 42 254 6.05 May 39 188 17 4.82 56 301 5.38 June 48 260 15 5.42 63 389 6.17 July 57 389 21 6.82 78 506 5 6.49 August 51 430 26 8.43 77 718 19 9.32 September 62 525 9 8.47 71 628 3 8.85 October 47 326 10 6.94 57 395 11 6.93 November 27 249 8 9.22 36 352 5 9.78 December 28 175 8 6.25 34 209 6.15 Total 124 45Total Number of Deaths amongst Europeans 124
Total Number of Deaths amongst Indians, &c. 45
Total Number of Deaths 169
In explanation of the foregoing table, it is necessary to distinguish the actual amount of mortality from endemic causes from that resulting from other causes.