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Children in England or by Government Inspectors, possibly women. This suggestion seemed to appeal strongly to the three Chinese members of the Legislative Council.
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7. Subsequently the Secretary for Chinese Affairs submitted the attached report on the working of the Female Domestic Servants Ordinance, 1923, with which I find myself in general agreement. I may say that in my earlier service under the Hong Kong Govern- ment I had personal experience of the mui-tsai system and formed the conclusion that on the whole it was humane and benevolent, having regard to conditions of life in China. Its origin is not any absence of love in Chinese parents for their female children, for I am persuaded that Chinese parents are as a rule very fond of their daughters, but rather excessive philoprogenitiveness among a people living habitually one jump ahead of starvation.' The Secretary for Chinese Affairs writes :- "Those who have had experience of famine relief work will realize that it is seldom the desire for money which induces parents in China to part with their children and that the alternative may quite well be starvation." I can corroborate this from my personal experience. From April to June, 1903, I was seconded by the Hong Kong Government for famine relief work in the province of Kwangsi. While engaged on this duty I repeatedly travelled by launch up and down the West River and I well re- member how at each township and village by the riverside, where my launch put in, Chinese women with babies in their arms and children at their sides were lined up begging the launch passengers, myself included, not to buy but to take from them as a gift the little ones who otherwise would starve and for whom the mothers were totally unable to provide. Mui-tsai, so acquired, are as a rule well treated and it is considered by Chinese public opinion to be obli- gatory on their employers to see that they are married or suitably provided for when they are about 18 years of age.
8. The recent repetition in Mr. J. H. Harris's letter of the charge of slavery seems to make it desirable to assert once more that, whatever may be said against the customs of employing mui-tsai, it cannot, as it exists in Hong Kong, be called slavery, except by a gross misuse of that term. A system of slavery implies that the law, written or customary, definitely recognises and enforces certain rights of ownership in favour of the master as against the slave. In Hong Kong the law recognises no rights of ownership whatsoever in favour of the employer as against the mui-tsai or as against her parents. The status of the mui-tsai is entirely a free status. If a mui-tsai wishes to leave her employer, there is no legal obstacle to her doing so at any moment.
9. It may be freely admitted that, human nature being what it is, there are possibilities of abuse in every system of employment in which the two parties to the relation are, by reason of the extreme youth or great poverty or ignorance of one of the parties, not on equal terms. Such a possibility does exist in the case of the mui-tsai, and because of this possibility, which in the vast majority of cases is, I believe, only a possibility and not an actual fact, the Government would like to see the mui-tsai system gradually converted into something less open to that possibility.
10. It has however, been found impracticable to proceed otherwise than very slowly. The reasons why more rapid progress is impossible are given above expressly or impliedly, but they are so important that it may be useful to recapitulate them shortly here. They are as follows:-
(a) The custom is deep rooted in Chinese family and economic conditions.
(b) Hong Kong with its very large Chinese population cannot break away too far or too fast from Chinese customs.
(c) The great majority of the Chinese live so close to starvation that the too numerous children must find work or die, and they cannot always find work in their own villages.
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