CO129-222 - Acting Governor Cameron Governor Sir Bowen - 1885 [7-10] — Page 319

of the Executive

I have the honour to be

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Your most obedient, humble servant

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Vice Chairman

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9315

COLONIAL SECRETARY'S OFFICE,

HONGKONG, 9th April, 1885.

I am directed by Governor Sir GEORGE BOWEN to transmit to you copies of the enclosed correspondence with the Secretary of State, respecting the question of Quarantine, and to state that His Excellency will be obliged by an expression of the opinion of the Chamber of Commerce on this subject, with the view to early action by the Government and by the Colonial Legislature.

I have the honour to be,

(Signed),

Sir,

Your most obedient Servant,

J. H. STEWART LOCKHART,

Pro Colonial Secretary.

The Chairman,

HONGKONG GENERAL CHAMBER OF COMMERCE,

&'C.,

fr.,

fe.

MY LORD,

Governor Sir G. F. Bowen, G.C.M.G. to the Secretary of State.

GOVERNMENT HOUSE, HONGKONG, 19th December, 1884.

With reference to my despatch of the 9th August ultimo, and to previous correspondence respecting the question of quarantine, I have the honour to report that, Her Majesty's Minister at Peking (Sir HARRY l'ARKES), in a despatch dated on the 5th instant, has written to me as follows :--

"I should take this opportunity of stating to your Excellency that the instruc- tions I received last year from the Foreign Office on the subject of quarantine, and which I have been directed to communicate to the Chinese Government, show that I Her Majesty's Government are not in favour of the adoption of that measure. take from these instructions the following passage :-

"Much as scientific men may have differed upon the 'Contagion' of Cholera, there is a complete agreement among all who have a practical acquaintance with the subject either in India, or in the United Kingdom, that the generally received theory and practice of quarantine is not only useless, but also hurtful."

"The custom of imprisoning the healthy with the sick is calculated, for moral and physical reasons which are easily understood, to increase the number of the persons attacked, to intensify the virulence of the disease, and to convert the prison into a nidus of infection; while the unfounded belief by the security given by quarantine discourages the adoption of those sanitary measures which alone are proved to check the spread of the epidemic."

The Right Honourable

THE EARL OF DERBY, K.G.,

Se..

&.c..

3.c.

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Oct.