363
Company Limited, to the Eng. Hok Fong Company, or to the Japanese owners, have been treated in exactly the same way.
There is another matter upon which much stress has been laid in complaints from the Chinese, which is as follows:-
Amongst the 550 immigrants brought by the Steamship "Landrat Schieff" the Delegates found 287 persons who were unmistakably affected with trachoma, and 136 suspicious cases, and with the object of affording to the latter a salutary change in their surroundings (for the vessels which arrive with immigrants are in a deplorable sanitary state that favours the spread of infection from trachoma) they were lodged in the barracks and the Delegates, for their part, were particularly careful to reject as few of the immigrants as possible in view of the losses resulting to the Company from their rejection. These 136 immigrants, in whom the characteristic symptoms of trachoma were not so clearly marked as in the other cases, were accordingly disembarked, in the hope that if the disease from which they were seen to be suffering should prove to be merely follicular conjunctivitis, or some other analogous affection, which was not actually trachoma, the change of quarters might produce a beneficial effect. They were therefore placed under observation, but as it was eventually proved that they were actually suffering from trachoma, it became necessary to return them to the vessel, as is constantly done with immigrants, for the very object of thus placing them under observation is for the purpose of ascertaining which of them are in a healthy state and which are not, and as the existence of trachoma was confirmed in every case the 136 persons were returned on board.
The employment of armed forces to superintend the transfer of the immigrants from the barracks to the tug which was to take them out to the ship was rendered necessary because we had learnt from experience that if some of those actually on board the vessel had managed to escape, it would be still easier for those housed in the barracks and who had a long distance to traverse before reaching the tug, to do so likewise, and if they
broke
363
Company Limited, to the Eng. Hok Fong Company, or to
the Japanese owners, have been treated in exactly the
same way.
There is another matter upon which much stress has
been laid in complaints from the Chinese, which is as
follows:-
Amongst the 550 immigrants brought by the Steamship
"Landrat Schieff" the Delegates found 287 persons who
were unmistakeably affected with trachoma, and 136 sus-
picious cases, and with the object of affording to the
latter a salutary change in their surroundings (for
the vessels which arrive with immigrants are in a de-
plorable sanitary state that favours the spread of in-
fection from trachoma) they were lodged in the barracks
and the Delegates, for their part, were particularly
careful to reject as few of the immigrants as possible
in view of the losses resulting to the Company from
their rejection. These 136 immigrants, in whom the
characteristic symptoms of trachoma were not so clear-
ly marked as in the other cases, were accordingly dis-
embarked
disembarked, in the hope that if the disease from which
they were seen to be suffering should prove to be mere-
ly follicular conjunctivitis, or some other analogous
affection, which was not actually trachoma, the change
of quarters might produce a beneficial effect. They
were therefore placed under observation, but as it was
eventually proved that they were actually suffering
from trachoma, it became necessary to return them to
the vessel, as is constantly done with immigrants, for
the very object of thus placing them under observation
is for the purpose of ascertaining which of them are in
a healthy state and which are not, and as the existence
of trachoma was confirmed in every case the 136 per-
sons were returned on board.
>
The employment of armed forces to superintend the
transfer of the immigrants from the barracks to the tug
which was to take them out to the ship was rendered
necessary because we had learnt from experience that if
some of those actually on board the vessel had managed
to escape, it would be still easier for those housed in
the barracks and who had a long distance to traverse
before reaching the tug, to do so likewise, and if they
broke
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