81
a
view to this becoming prostitutes. The terms, purchase and sale of the child were applied to these transactions which were frequently evidenced by documents the form at page 99 of the accompanping print, in which it would be observed, it was stated that the child was willing to be sold, and the question had arisen whether, upon the occurrence of such a Hansaction in Hong Kong,
which
was
British soil governed by the Common- Law of England, the child became the
Slave or
passed in
any,
and if so in what, degree, under the control of the
so called purchaser.
That the question had also arisen as to the effect of a transaction in all respects similar except that instead of the form of sale the form was employed!
an inderture of apprenticeship with of a the child as a
party to it.
That the question was complicated by the fact that children of both sexes were
}
also kid-napped,
or bought in the Empe
of China, and brought is to the Colony where they became the subject of these transactions of sale the so called seller not
being the parent of the child. Statute Saw
of the bolony
contained.
The
stringent and sufficient provisions for repressing kidnapping and the forcible. detention of persons whether children or adults and the abduction or detention of women or girls for the purposes of prostitution
:;
That the late Chief Justice of Hong Hong, Iis John male; had made declarations from the Bench indicating his opinion that the children who were the objects of such transactions did thereby become slaves, a view which
was not disposed to accept.
advised
your Lordship as at present
That Mr. Bramston was
电
accordingly to tranomit to us the draft
Lordship proposed
MOU
of a despatch which to address to the Governor of the Colony with
ASURY
OREIGN
also
a