CO129-516-5 Policy of Hong Kong government on the purchase and supply of opium 25-2-1929 - 10-5-1929 — Page 36

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rsonal and Private

Dear Mr. Amery,

Government House, Hong Kong.

23rd February 1929.

May I invite your special attention to two despatches,

which I am sending home by even mail? One concerns the mui tsai

question, and the other the opium question.

As regards mui tsai, please allow me to thank you very

sincerely for the stand which you made on our behalfin the House of Commons, when questions and supplementary questions were asked upon the subject. I should hate you to think that either I or any of my officers are prepared to countenance female slavery in

this Colony; but the mui tsai is not a female slave. One might

as well call Chinese wives, concubines and daughters "slaves".

It is the custom of the country for wives and concubines to be acquired by purchase; so much so that the polite phrase for a

daughter is "the thousand of gold". meaning that she is

expected to fetch a thousand pieces of old on marriage. This

phrase has become conventional to such an extent that my

Chinese friends, speaking to me in Cantonese, use it when asking

after my own daughters. No remedy for the mui tsai system has yet been suggested, which is not worse than the disease. Any

drastic step taken by this Government would almost certainly

raise