CODE OF ORDINANCES.
FOR
THE GOVERNMENT OF HER MAJESTY'S SUBJECTS IN CHINA.
Diplomatic Department.
GOVERNMENT NOTIFICATION.
Whereas Instructions from The Right Honorable The Earl of Clarendon. K G., Her Majesty's Principal Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, have been received at this office, directing the Publicity of an Order of Her Most Gracious Majesty in Council, dated at the Court at Buckingham Palace, the 13th day of June, 1853, for the Government of Her Majesty's Subjects, being within the dominions of the Em- peror of China, or being within any ship or vessel at a distance of not more than one hundred miles from the coast of China; His Excellency Her Majesty's Plenipo- tentiary and Chief Superintendent of the Trade of British Subjects in China, &c., &c., hereby publishes the said Order accordingly; and His Excellency at the same time notifies the commands of Her Majesty in Council, that the same do take effect and come into force from and after the 1st day of November next ensuing.
His Excellency is further pleased to give publicity to the subjoined Extract of a despatch from the Earl of Clarendon, explanatory of the subjects with which the above Order has been framed and passed by Her Majesty in Council.
By Order,
FREDERICK HARVEY.
Secretary to H, B. M's Plenipotentiary in China &c. &c.
Superintendency of Trade, Victoria, Hongkong, 5th August, 1853.
Extract of Despatch No. 32, dated 24th June 1853, from the Itight Honourable the Earl of Clarendon, K. G. to the address of His Excellency Sir George Bonham,
Bart., K. C. B.
The law Officers of the Crown having stated to the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, in the month of August 1851, that, owing to the various Ordinances which had been passed under the Act of the 6 & 7 Victoria, c. 80, for the Government of Her Majesty's Subjects resorting to China, the respective jurisdiction of the several Courts was in a state of uncertainty, and that it was advisable that a general Ordin- ance should be passed to define more precisely the limits of Jurisdiction of the Su- preme Court of the Colony of Hongkong, and of Consular Courts, respectively, your attention was drawn to that statement by Viscount Palmerston in his despatch No