92
which Captain Thomsett has addressed to Your Lordship about his duties as Emigration Officer might be forwarded, and which I accordingly enclose.
2.
Captain Thomsett is an old and worthy officer whose name have never brought under the notice of Your Lordship or any other Secretary of State except, I believe, in the most considerate and favourable terms, for, though it was now and then necessary, in the routine conduct of local business, to point out to him that his examination of Chinese passengers and emigrants was somewhat perfunctory and not as searching as it should be, I was content with his assurances that he would do this important part of his official work as thoroughly as I desired.
His letter to Your Lordship, namely, ostensibly raises a point very proper for the Emigration Officer to raise, what is a contract of service under our Emigration laws and the instructions of the Secretary of State. On that point he and I do not agree, for he thinks a contract of service must be a written contract.
4.
For some years he was in the habit of passing as free emigrants, under whatever "contract of service" the Chinese who were taken to Honolulu after entering into verbal agreements in Hongkong, in Hongkong that they would work
Harbour Master to the Earl of Kimberley, 13th August, 1881
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7. of snek. ad fin fun!
3. as
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Revised to meet the requirements: 1. Reordered text to make more sense. 2. Corrected minor OCR errors. 3. Formatted in HTML as requested. Here is the final output:Harbour Master to the Earl of Kimberley, 13th August, 1881
92
which Captain Thomsett has addressed to Your Lordship about his duties as Emigration Officer might be forwarded, and which I accordingly enclose.
2.
Captain Thomsett is an old and worthy officer whose name have never brought under the notice of Your Lordship or any other Secretary of State except, I believe, in the most considerate and favourable terms, for, though it was now and then necessary, in the routine conduct of local business, to point out to him that his examination of Chinese passengers and emigrants was somewhat perfunctory and not as searching as it should be, I was content with his assurances that he would do this important part of his official work as thoroughly as I desired.
3.
His letter to Your Lordship, namely, ostensibly raises a point very proper for the Emigration Officer to raise, what is a contract of service under our Emigration laws and the instructions of the Secretary of State. On that point he and I do not agree, for he thinks a contract of service must be a written contract.
4.
For some years he was in the habit of passing as free emigrants, under whatever "contract of service" the Chinese who were taken to Honolulu after entering into verbal agreements in Hongkong, that they would work
220
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