CO129-451 - Public Offices - 1918 — Page 570

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I have carefully considered the Governor of Hongkong's

despatch, in consultation with Fr R. W. Black, the Marine

Surveyor for this port.

It must be remembered that vessels which carry

emigrant coolies from this port carry them direct to the

Straits Settlements. Isolated cases may occur in which

the vessel oalls at Hongkong en route; but such cases are

very rare, and for all practical purposes emigration to

the Straits Settlements from Amoy ignores Hongkong entirely.

It is therefore difficult to see why Hongkong should conoern

itself at all with this route of emigration. The regulating

ordinance 19 of the Straits Settlements Government, which is

solely concerned. No complaint has been made by that

Government regarding the working of emigration under the

ordinance; and it may be noted that no instance has occurred

in which the measurement of vessels under that ordinance has

sated prejudicially to the safety of the ship or to the health

of the emigrants.

Measurement at Hongkong is under Board of Trade

regulations for migrant ships, ships, be it understood, which carry European emigrants. It will, I venture to think, be generally admitted that such regulations are not of necessity

applicable to ships carrying Chinese goolie emigrants.

I have looked into the reasons for the differences

in the numbers allowed by the Hongkong and Amoy certificates,

and I find that the reasons are as follows --

(1) Amoy measurments are rade from the skin of the ship on

one side to the skin on the other; while Hongkong measurements

are made from the inside of the waterways on each side. This

causes the Amoy certificate to give a considerably larger

deck area, for a correspondingly larger number of passengers,

The

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