Directory_and_Chronicle_1850 — Page 75

52

Journal of Occurrences.

JAN.

presumptions to such a height that they can not but be accepted as proofs of their complicity in the atrocious crime, the responsibility of which, far from attempting to remove by the efforts they should have employed to throw it off from themselves, they have progressively aggravated to such a point that at present the whole of it attaches to them exclusively." Taking this ground, the Council proceed to recapitulate the principal facts of the case in order to fortify their position, going over with a brief analysis of the papers which have proceeded from the governor-general, and his acts in relation to the criminals apprehended and executed for the murder. The paper doubtless carries conviction to the minds of those who joined in "the public voice," which "unanimously accused the Chinese authorities of having connived at this horrible outrage," but to those who dissent from that public voice, it adds no new proof of Sü's connivance, much less of his previous authorization of the outrage. On this matter, we have already given such an opinion as the facts then brought to light led us to adopt, and need not here repeat, since we see no grounds for altering it. The Manifesto concludes with the remark that "The necessity of occupying theinselves with the present task has been ex- tremely disagreeable to this Council, but they feel it to be imperative on thein not to leave unproclaimed manifest, although pungent and bitter, truths, which had been unjustly provoked, in order to establish and fix by unques- tionable facts the responsibility of that iniquitous outrage on the head of him to whom it belongs; the expositions and documents brought forward in this Manifesto appearing to them sufficiently to prove,—

1st. That the treacherous and barbarous assassination of the councillor Joað Maria Ferreira do Amaral, governor of this province, was nothing else than the consequence of a premeditated plan of aggression, for the development of which this act was the first step agreed upon. 2dly. That if this plan was not concocted with the concurrence of the Chinese authorities, its execution was countenanced by them. 3dly. That the same authorities, by refusing to satisfy the just demands made on them, and with which they were bound to comply, and by committing other acts in violation of the law of nations, constituted themselves participators in the crime which by the same law they were bound to punish. 4thly. That, in conclusion, all the responsibility of this atrocions crime, and of all its consequences, attaches to the saine authorities, for which responsibility this Council again protest, renewing all their former protests, which they hereby ratify, in the hope that this respon- sibility will one day be made effective for the satisfaction and redress of out- raged justice, of violated laws, and of so many and so sacred rights trampled under foot."

When sending a translation of this Manifesto to Sii, the Council expressed the following disclaimer, which called forth a reply, and an inclosure throw- ing some additional light upon the subject.

The Council of Government &c., to Su, Governor-general of Canton. This Council have the honor to forward herewith to your Excellency a copy of the Manifesto, which, as they informed you in their dispatch of the 7th ultimo, they made public on the 26th of the same month.

This Council avail themselves of the present opportunity to acknowledge the receipt of your Excellency's dispatch of the 23d November last; and as they have already stated in their former dispatches all that it behoved them to say on the subject to which it refers, they confine themselves at prezent to declaring to your Excellency, that whatever may be your proceedings relative to the restitution of the mutilated inembers of the most ex- cellent the deceased governor of this province, they will on no account influence those of this Council with regard to the three Chinese detained here, in relation to whom this Council will act as they have acquainted your Excellency in their dispatch of the 3d October last. Macao, 3d December, 1819.

Jeronimo, Bishop of Macao -Carneiro.-Neves.-Simoens.—Goularte.-Pereira.

Dispatch from Su to the Council of Government of Mucao.

Su. governor-general of Kwangtung and Kwangsi, &c In order to satisfy the question relative to the murder of governor Amaral. I proceed to state as follows · Shin

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