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417
10. It must be borne in mind that in a community like Hong Kong the fortune left by a European is pretty well known by repute to the European officers of the staff, while the Chinese interpreter, translators and others would also be acquainted personally or by common repute with the approximate value of the estate of any Chinaman of position or standing. Besides the Registrar, as Registrar of Companies and Land Office has in his office the annual returns of the shareholders in all the limited liability Companies, and the Registers of the Land Office, and these, to which reference has been made in some doubtful cases, afford a check to some extent on the statements of interested parties. I know that Mr. Sangster paid great attention to this part of his duties. He constantly referred to the Registers of Land titles and mortgages, to the Banks enquiring as to the balances of the deceased and even when the deceased was a partner in a Chinese hong he has in some cases called for the books. In matters presented by Solicitors, he has carefully gone into them and all this, I repeat was done although we had no authority for doing it.
With respect to the application made through a Solicitor I beg to state that as there are only a few practitioners in Hong Kong, they are well known to the Judges and officers of the Court, and I have every reason to believe that before bringing in any petitions of the kind they would take every means to present a correct list of the estate of the deceased.
12. To show how baseless is this accusation of Mr. Kyshe's, I will state what further steps I took in respect of this question.
When first I took up the office of Registrar in 1882 I was not satisfied that the Colony derived from
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