480
A copy of the China Mail,
of the 27th April last was also
laid upon the
table.
This Excellency adjourned
the Council sine die.
Rear and
(signed) J. Pope Hennessy
Governor.
Confirmed
this 25th day of July 1881. (signed) Arathoon Seth
Acting Clerk of Council.
True Copy
Arathoon Seth
Acting Clerk of Council
The China Mail.
HONGKONG, WEDNESDAY, APRIL 27, 1881.
THE question of Chinese Emigration to the Australian Colonies seems destined to follow the fate of that to Honolulu; but if the predilections of the Governor were only definitely notified one way or other, much dissatisfaction would thereby be avoided. For some eight or ten months back, difficulties of a more or less irregular and spasmodic nature have been thrown in the way of obtaining a license for shipping Chinese emigrants to Australian ports; and it would seem now that a fresh departure is likely to take place. The victims (if we may say so) in the present case are the agents of the steamer Glamis Castle (Messrs Gibb, Livingston & Co.), which vessel was ready yesterday morning to take her departure with some 800 Chinese passengers. We believe that another telegram was received by the Government here, representing that an unusually large number of Celestials were coming to Sydney, and asking what sort of people they were; and His Excellency the Governor seems to have thereupon hit upon the large shipment per Glamis Castle upon which to prosecute enquiries. It may here be mentioned that the old blunder regarding the interpretation of the phrase "contract of service" is at the bottom of all Sir John Pope Hennessy's action in this matter, and the tactics or investigations adopted in the present case bear a very strong similarity with those employed in the famous Peruvian case at Canton. It is generally believed that Mr Phillippo, formerly Attorney General here, gave it as his opinion that the common custom of borrowing a sum of money, or hypothecating one's household goods, in order to raise the amount of one's passage-money, did not constitute a contract of service within the meaning of the Chinese Passengers' Acts or of our local Ordinances. Possibly His Excellency has obtained a different opinion from the present Legal Adviser to the Crown, otherwise the present action of the Governor is incomprehensible. It may or it may not be considered a good thing by the Australians that Chinese passengers be admitted into the Colonies in large numbers; but it seems to us that a telegram announcing any opinion upon this subject is not sufficient to justify any irregular or vexatious action towards steamer agents on this side of the line.
In
The facts appear to be these: According to present regulations, all Chinese passengers have to be examined and passed by the Emigration Officer (Captain Thomsett) before the license is granted by the Governor; and although the exercise of this rule has frequently been found to press very unfairly upon ship-agents, it certainly gives the Executive a strong hold upon the passenger business. In this way the Honolulu trade was snuffed out, even when the Pacific Mail and the Occidental & Oriental Companies were desirous of entering into that legitimate business. In response to the telegram from Australia already referred to, the Governor took steps to increase the strictness of the examination of the passengers; but with that unfortunate fatality which seems to haunt the Head of the Government here, the manner of the thing has turned out to be anything but wise or happy. The Acting Colonial Secretary, Dr. Eitel (Private Secretary), and Mr Gerrard (Acting Registrar General), were deputed as a sort of quasi-Board, to perform the functions of the Queen's Emigration Officer. Had the arrangement been made in order to assist Captain Thomsett, or even to oversee and report upon the mode of examination, the thing would have been comparatively unobjectionable. As it was, the Queen's Emigration Officer was quietly superseded, and a needless insult was thus cast upon an officer whose experience and standing deserved more consideration.
The performance of the delicate duty thus indelicately imposed upon the three officials named might have been more successful had it not been that His Excellency's Private Secretary, whose unfortunate position, as a kind of ever-present mouthpiece of the Governor, seems lately to have given him a dash of overbearing bluntness that tends to an excess of friction whenever it becomes apparent. We understand that the interests of the mercantile community were well supported by Captain Thomsett in this matter, and that unnecessary delay was