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tenced two soldiers to seven years penal servitude for robbing a man of ten dollars. However in a report to the Governor (Hennessy) he wrote "if after the cricumstances shall be forgotten, say a year after the Regiment shall have left the Colony, you should think it fit to remit any portion of the sentence it might be done”. In another case of robbery in which two defendants were convicted by a majority of the jury of four to three he wrote “I know the Chief Justice has expressed dissatisfaction at verdicts by majorities but the judges have found themselves bound to accept them as conclusive and the practice has been to act on such ver- dicts. I felt myself obliged to follow such precedents". He recom- mended that they be pardoned because a co-defendant who plead- ed guilty asserted that they were innocent. In September 1881 the Governor discharged them, and the two soldiers, from prison and was abused by the press for his "capricious leniency”. (In 1894 an Ordinance provided that a majority of five to two was required in criminal cases). When criticised for hearing proceedings in camera he said "I mean as long as I sit on this bench to continue to exercise the discretion vested in me by law to hear a case in camera when the ends of justice appear to me to require it, in entire disregard of all obloquy to which it may expose me”. When he ceased to act as Puisne Judge the Chief Justice wrote to the Governor to say that he entirely agreed with the Daily Press that Francis had earned for himself a high reputation for ability and clear-headeness. In addi- tion he was appointed to the Commission of the Peace in 1878, and a member of the Commission to Revise the Laws and Ordi- nances of Hong Kong in 1887. He was also an examiner of candi- dates for admission as attorneys both when he was a solicitor and after his call to the Bar. He was never appointed acting Attorney General or Chief Justice, which appointments carried a seat in the Legislative Council (the latter until 1889) and that according to his obituary in the China Mail was a matter of regret to him. The system of acting appointments could have disadvantages as Fran- cis pointed out. In 1885 there was a rumour that the Puisne Judge was going on leave for twelve months and that E.J. Ackroyd the Registrar of the Supreme Court would be appointed to act in his place. Francis wrote to the government expressing the view that officers of the Supreme Court should not be appointed to the bench and that the Registrar was a far more important official than the Puisne Judge. He pointed out that Ackroyd had been

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