CO882-(1-2) — Page 224

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Av XIII

CONFIDENTIAL.

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Hong Kong Registration Ordinances.

PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE

Reference :-

TILIC.O. 882

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1

PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE, LONDON

ALLY WITHOUT PERMISSION OF THE BE REPRODUCED PHOTOGRAPHIC COPYRIGHT PHOTOGRAPH-NOT TO

WHETHER the "Arrow" had, or had not, the right to carry the British flag in the Canton river, in October 1856, is a question on which the first only of these two Ordinances bears. If we rely, for the lawfulness of carrying the flag, on any Ordi~ nance, it must be simply on the first. The second, (p. 11), though passed in May 1856, was not to come into operation "until Her Majesty's confirma- tion thereof was proclaimed by the Governor." That confirmation was only given on August 27, and sent out by the first mail of September; it could not, in all probability, have reached the Colony till November. Indeed, we have not yet heard of its arrival there.

I shall, therefore, confine these remarks, in the first instance, to the reasons which may be adduced to show that the first Ordinance entitled the "Arrow" to the British protection and flag.

The Ordinance in question passed the Hong Kong Legislature in March 1855, and had immediate operation. The British Merchant Shipping Act of 1854, though passed by Parliament in August that year, came into effect only in May 1855.

At that time (March 1855), the Imperial Law in force on this head was contained, I believe, in 8 & 9 Vict., cap. 89, and the 12 & 13 Vict., cap. 29. The last-mentioned Act provides (sect. 17) that all persons naturalised by or under any Act of Parliament, or by or under any Act or Ordinance of the Legislature, or proper Legislative Authority of of the British Possessions in Asia, Africa, ur

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