CO129-211 - Governor Sir Bowen - 1883 [8-9] — Page 242

It is stated that the motive of his policy, in this respect was the obvious advantage of placing a body of this peculiar nature under the immediate control of the local Government. It is evidently necessary - necessary that the officers and men of a Fire Brigade should have strong bodies as well as clear heads; and it is argued that, whatever success may have attended the efforts of the Colonial Department in Downing Street to gauge the mental capacity of persons employed, or seeking to be employed, in the public service in remote Colonies, it is hardly possible for that Department to gauge also, at the distance of half the Globe, the physical capacity, from year to year, of individual Englishmen whose strength and constitutions have long been exposed to the deteriorating influences of a tropical climate. If however, it should be decided (as would appear to be probable from a recent despatch from the Colonial Office) that the Department in London is better qualified than the Governor and Executive Council on the spot to select ... This refers to paragraph 1:134 of the 14th June ultimo. It is my duty to point ...