3
THE
HONG KONG TIMES.
HONG KONG, WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 30, 1871.
WHOSE THE DUTY?
As ir our sufferings had not been sufficiently great already, we are threatened with a pesti- lence that is to destroy the residents of the Colony as rapidly as the typhoon tore the houses to pieces. At least this is what we are told in the columns of our contemporaries, and we suppose we must believe the assertion, out of common courtesy if for no other reason. However, there are grave causes for dreading serious sickness if the horrible stenches from decomposing animal and vegetable matter are not removed, and every nerve should be strained, and any cost undertaken to purify the atmosphere breathed by the residents of this place.
The police have been blamed, and so have the soldiers, and it has been considered that both these corps of men have been neglecting their duties in not handling dead bodies. We must treat this matter with the utmost gravity, and we therefore call likewise upon Mr. Price to state why it is that the accumulation of filth upon the Praya has not been removed long are this. We do not know whom to call upon to state why it is that their Excellencies, Sir Arthur Kennedy and Major-General Colborne, have not been seen with a bearer containing a corpse between them, but we should like to ask these gentlemen, bow they are going to exonerate themselves for the neglect they have shewn in respect to the demands of the Colony. A local heal-all, would "compel every man Jack" to work with a view to avoid any terrible visitation of sick- ness, and as-we mean nothing disrespectful— both the Governor and the General come under the denomination of man Jack," how is it, we repeat, these magnates are not re- moving corpses from the field of battle? Let as feast our eyes upon their Excellencies at the head, one of the Police and the other of the soldiers, doing their utmost to cart away the frightful stinks that have, perhaps, already laid low several people. Let us see energy of the most unmistakeable description on the part of two of the greatest authorities on the Island, and then we will-sit down and write about it. We have been writing in a very of the serious mood;-the importance subject demanded that we should do so, and we have complied to the necessary extent; but now we will get into a lighter, more flippant vein, and try to discover how much reason we have for pointing out that the disagreeable duty that has been laid upon the Colony, should be performed by either the Police or by the fraction of the British Army stationed here. We will consider the soldiers before we do the Police. In the first place, soldiers do not enlist to do the work of scavengers; in the next, their duties are not too light here as it is. The number of men put upon guard every day is not amali; and though soldiering may be a lazy life, it is not inarduous; and we have no right to call upon them to do work that is entirely out of their province, when labour can be bought.
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In regard to the Police, we are forced to admit that all the unpleasantness attached to compelling the purification of the atmosphere of the Colony belongs to them. Of this there can be no doubt; but where are the men to carry on all that they would be had to do. Those suited to the task required of them, are but few in number, and they must have rest like the balance of humanity. We think the Police have done very well during the last few trying days, and we would have those dissatisfied with what has been performed, take into consideration, for a moment, the amount that has had to be done. We have heard that on the day following the storm, members of the Police Force were hard at work taking bodies -alive and dead-out of the different ruins, and this after a sleepless night. We do not intend to spare the Force when we consider it deserves animadversion, but we fail to see the utility of abusing them when there is very little, if any, provocation so to do.
We are bound to concede that there was not so much activity on the part of the authorities immediately after the storm as there should have been, but within the last few days, everything of a reasonable nature that could suggest itself for adoption to relieve the city of the offensiveness about it, has received atten- tion. There is some excuse for the slight dilatoriness displayed at first, in the fact that the typhoon of last week was unprecedentedly severe, and that it was not until after some days had elapsed, that any correct idea could be formed of the extent of its destructiveness; and when this knowledge was obtained, doad bodies and other graveolent matter, accumn- latod in terrifying quantities. The corpses will continue to turn up, we suppose, for some time to come, but at present we are, we think, tolerably clear of everything but such stenches as the native colonists wish to retain. Last Sunday we spent over an hour in walking over the remains of the Praya, and though we kept a bright look-out, we saw neither corpses nor- except in one place where there was a filthy, reeking, putrescent mound of everything almost that could be conceived-anything worse than is usually to be smelt on the seaside thoroughfare. We except the stinks set aside by our Chinese friends for retention. They were something fearful, and it would have been better if the hundred and one articles set out to dry, had been piled up in a heap, covered with tar, and set on fire.
The idea of employing convicts and men from the Sailors' Home was a good one, and, so far as we know, the results have been decidedly gratifying.
In our yesterday's impression, we penned a few remarks in defence of Captain Deane's conduct when requested to detail some of his men for the purpose of assisting in the saving of life on board the ill-fated steamers Leonor and Albay; to these we have very little to add. Wide-spread though the feeling seems to be against Captain Deane's inaction at the time complained of, we think it is scarcely justified. The more consideration we give to the matter, the more we feel convinced that the Captain Superintendent not only acted for the best, but actually shewed wisdom is refusing to allow the men under his command to risk their lives in a most hazardous task. As the chief of the Police, he had not the slightest right to put his men in peril like that which would have
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