COLONIAL REPORTS—ANNUAL.
of the licentiates in the public service the senior students have frequently been made use of for various purposes during epidemics. A Government grant-in-aid of $2,500 is made to the college, to be used as honoraria to the lecturers.
The City Hall receives an annual grant of $1,200 from Government. It contains a reference library and a museum.
VIII-CRIMINAL AND POLICE.
The total of all cases reported to the Police was 11,251, as against 10,421 in 1902, being an increase of 830 or 7.96 per cent. In the division of these cases into serious and minor offences there appears an increase, as compared with 1902, of 863 cases or 21.58 per cent. in the former and a decrease of 33 cases or 0.51 per cent. in the latter. The increases in crime was principally in respect of larceny.
The Police Force is composed of a Captain Superintendent, a Deputy and two Assistant Superintendents, and three contingents of Europeans, Indians and Chinese. The European contingent consists of 133 men, the Chinese of 421 and the Indian of 367, making a grand total of 921 besides the superior officers already named and a staff of clerks and coolies. Of this force, one Assistant Superintendent (who also acts as Police Magistrate) and 14 Europeans, 96 Indians and 43 Chinese were stationed in the New Territory during the greater part of the year. After September the number of Indians was reduced to 80.
The number of prisoners admitted to Victoria Gaol under the sentences of the ordinary Courts was 7,144, besides 74 soldiers and sailors sentenced by Courts Martial. The daily average number of prisoners confined in the gaol was 653, the largest number on record. In 1902 the number was 576, and in 1901 it was 499. As a means of relieving the congested state of the gaol pending the erection of a convict prison the Belilios Reformatory was fitted up as a temporary prison, and short-sentence prisoners are now located in that building.
The remunerative labour carried on in the gaol consists of printing and book-binding, carpentry, boot-making, knitting, painting and whitewashing, mat-making, oakum-picking, &c. The value of the earnings during the year amounted to $31,489.