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The question remains was the constable justified in
arresting the Acting Consul.
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There is no doubt that the constable did insist on all1
the parties going to the station. And in all the cirềumatances of the case it was not an unreasonable thing to do. I have ascertained from Watson's Dispensary which is opposite the Yes Sang Fat that there was a tremendous uproar in the shop when the constable arrived on the scene. The Chinese salesman had
received a severe blow on the face and property was broken. Both parties made counter charges, and the constable judged that it was beat to get all parties to the station and let some superior authority decide who was right and who wrong. The constable is instructed in his "London police Code" if the assault is evidently of a serious character, or on a female or boy under 14, a constable may in such case take into custody a person charged by another with having committed such offence oven without his having witnessed it. It would have in the circumstances been safer and more prudent if the constable
but in had taken the Consul's name and address, Inder all the circumstances I do not think that the Consul has just cause of complaint that he was arrested for on his own showing he used language to the shopman calculated to lead to a breach of the peace and there is no doubt whatever in my mind that he struck the first blow. People who behave like that must be prepared for unpleasant consequences. The Consul so far as I can make out claims an invédlability from arrest on the ground of his office, and that is at the root of his attitude of aggrieved dignity. I think if a letter is addressed to him to the effect that the Government regrets any unnecessary violence that may have been used by the Indian constable, and that the Furopean constable did not proceed by summons rather than by arrest, but pointing out that the Consul had apparently placed
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