· 4-
63
He
have nevertheless returned to his house.
maintains, with much reason, that these girls are
no longer his mui-tsai; but nevertheless under the
Hong Kong law, as it stands, he will have to
register them. He is unwilling to do this; and
one of the girls has already left his household and
has not been heard of since.
4. The plain facts are these.
mui-tsai in this Colony.
There are
There are deeds under
which they have been bought. There are persons
who have sold them and there are persons who have
bought them.
Moreover, there is no doubt that
the mui-tsai themselves, as well as those who
bought and those who sold them, all three parties in
fact, consider that there is a status of mui-tsai
and that it is a status from which it is possible
that a girl should be released. I understand it,
however, to be the policy of His Majesty's Government
that, wherever the status of mui-tsai exists in this
Colony, Government supervision and control are
necessary; and, according to the view of the
Attorney General, no "manumission" by an employer can remove the necessity for supervision and control, because no manumission can alter the relationship between a mui-tsai and her employer, unless such employer actually ceases to employ the girl as a domestic servant.
5.
It seems to me that this is an intolerable
position, and that, if we maintain it, registration is bound to fail. The Chinese members of
Legislative Council are unanimously and strongly of
opinion