"continued confidence of this
community
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which
Annex
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in the address of
Jendlose a
copy."
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a printed copy of this
address, with the signatures of un most of the principal residents
in this Colony; together with a
é
copy of Mr. Price & reply:
ADDRESS TO THE HON. J. M. PRICE.
The following copy of a letter to the Hon.
J. M. Price, Surveyor-General, has been handed
to us for publication:-
Hongkong, 1st December, 1883. The Honourable J. M. Price, Surveyor General.
SIR,—We the undersigned residents in the Colony desire to express our sympathy with you in reference to certain articles recently published in the columns of a local newspaper and containing reflections upon you which, in our opinion, cannot be too strongly condemned.
In doing so we beg to assure you, not only of our respect for your personal character, but of our complete confidence in your administration of the Department of the Public Services over which you have, for
30
o many years, presided with such admirable efficiency.
To evidence our appreciation of the position
took up with regard to the late prosecution of Regina
v. Robert Fraser-Smith, and of the manner in which
you discharged the onerous public duty which we unanimously consider was thrown upon you, we beg you will permit us to arrange with your solicitors as to the costs of those legal proceedings.—We have the honour to be, Sir, your most obedient servants,
F. Bulkeley Johnson
Wm. H. Forbes
C. Vincent Smith
F. D. Sassoon
M. E. Sassoon
T. Jackson
A. P. McEwen
A. Gültzow
N. A. Siebs
C. Stiebel
E. E. Dear
H. Z. Just
Henry R. Coomb
A. McIver
E. L. Woodin
W. Parfitt
L. Poesnecker
P. B. C. Ayres
Jno. S. Capraik
H. J. H. Tripp
H. L. Dalrymple
C. P. Chater
* Frod. Rickards
H. N. Mody
John Tharburn
R. D. Tata
D. M. Mabta
H. M. Mehta
H. C. Setna
Dorabjee Nowrojee
E. R. Reliios
B. Byramjee
William Hartigan
J. Rose Anton
G. S. Coxon
G. R. Johnston
J. H. Slagbok
Kenneth McK. Ross
A. G. Romano
A. MacClymont
F. Henderson
J. G. T. Haskell
Wm. N. Cruickshank
W. M. Morgan
E. Mackintosh
D. Rattanjee
Framjee H. Arjánes
William H. F. Darby
Sam. Hughes
Sidney Hancock
G. Stewart
H. M. Thomsett
R. Layton
J. Erdmann
Dox Paquin
E. Re Mackean
Chas. C. Cohen
F. George
M. Blumi
William Aitchison
L. Fleming
C. A. Miller
VA H. T. Siessen
D. W. Schwemann
A. P. Stokan
A. G. Stokes
J. Melville Matson
A. Wemyss
C. S. Goodwyn
C. D. Bottomley
M. B. Polishwalla
T. E. Davies
J. T. Chater
S. B. Bhabha
Jno. S. Cox
Thos. I. Rose
S. Godfrey Bird
Clement Palmer
Fredk. T. P. Foster
Frederick Stewart
Fred. Esser
H. Matchitt
Wm. N. Bain
G. Allen
Gen. Ferguson
R. Chatterton Wilcox
James Balgin
Paul Brewist
C. Brodersen
A. Krans
Jno. J. Francis
A. G. Morris
Alfred Lister
J. A. Carvalho
A. F. Alves
A. K. Travers
B. K. Leigh
James H. Cox
Fredk. Dodwell
MR. PRICE'S REPLY TO THE ADDRESS.
The following is the reply of the Hon. J. M. Price, Surveyor-General, to the public letter addressed to him in reference to the recent libel case and published in our columns on Tuesday. The reply is addressed to the Hon. F. B. Johnson, who sent in the public letter :-
Public Works Department, Hongkong, 18th December, 1883. My dear Sir,—I desire to tender my grateful acknowledgments to you, and through yourself to the large number of gentlemen who have been good enough to address me in the terms of the letter which you forwarded to me yesterday.
Conscious that I have never been actuated except by a strict sense of duty in all my official acts during the ten years that I have devoted to the public service of the colony, and that in the administration of the Department with which I have the honour to be connected, I have always endeavoured to do the best for the interests of the public, according to
17 F abilities, whatever these may be worth, it has been very gratifying to me to find that
so important a portion of my fellow colonists should have given no credence to the imputations of unworthy motives so persistently made
by private malice in connection with nearly every act of my official life, and that their confidence in my personal character and in my ability to continue usefully serving the colony, should have remained unshaken. It is a great honour to a Government servant to be the recipient of a public testimonial couched in the language of the one you have been good enough to transmit to me, I am very sensible of that honour, and find it difficult to express adequately my appreciation of the kindly feeling that has prompted this manifestation of good will on the part of so many whose opinions I estimate so highly. I need scarcely add that the document will be valued by me as the pleasantest memorial of my life in China.
Although it is true that in the position I was recently called upon to take I was
discharging
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