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nearly fourfold during that period - the number of Civil and Criminal Cases tried in 1850 being 7,352, against only 1,922 in the year 1851.
The Magisterial business further is still daily increasing on the increase in consequence of the rapid growth of the population and the recent acquisition of Kowloon; it has therefore become necessary either to appoint a third Police Magistrate or to devise some means for relieving the existing two magistrates from some of the cases which at present come before them. The Chief Justice also, in consequence mainly of the great increase in the number of cases sent for trial here from the Consular Ports in China and Japan, has more work on his hands than he can properly get through; and there being no one to take his place in his absence, when recently his health ...