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Q.-And you served twelve months?
A. Yes.
Q.-Will you tell us the working of the Pó Léung Kuk during that year—what were your duties, and how were they performed?
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A. As I said before we confined ourselves to the rules and regulations, and what we did was simply this. We exercised no police or judicial functions. If a case was brought before a Magistrate and disposed of, the party who was kidnapped would have been sent to the Pó Leung Kuk for final disposal. Our duties would be to find out the native country of the kidnapped person, whether he or she would like to return to their native country or whether he or she would like to remain in Hongkong and get married. We did according to the parties' wishes.
Q.--Will you give us an example of a case? How were you apprised of a case sent to you? Was it by the Registrar General? How was the case brought before you?
A. While a case was pending, the party who was kidnapped would be sent to the Pó Léung Kuk for temporary shelter. In that case we simply kept the person until the case was disposed of by the Magistrate.
Q.--Didn't you have any investigation?
A.-No, nothing of the sort. We did not exercise judicial functions in connection with the case. We left the whole thing to the Magistrate.
Q. After the man had been acquitted or punished, you had the charge of the girl -supposing it was a girl-in the Pó Léung Kuk?
A. Yes.
Q. How did you go about the case? What did you do? Did you have a meeting? A.-Sometimes we had a meeting, or sometimes the Chairman or Vice-Chairman took upon himself the responsibility of finding out from the parties.
Q.-Investigating?
A. Yes, by himself.
Q.-By himself?
A. Yes.
Q.-You didn't call a meeting of the members of the Committee? A.-No.
Q.-Simply the Chairman or Vice-Chairman made enquiries and dealt with the case
himself?
A.--Yes.
Q.-Were any records kept of this investigation?
A. Yes.
Q.-By whom?
A. We had minutes kept at every meeting held on Sunday showing what we had been doing.
Q-During the week?
A. Yes.
Q.-These meetings on Sundays were for the general management of the Society? A. Yes, I will tell you. Suppose I was Vice-President. I find out the native place of the girl and every thing about her, and, at the meeting on the Sunday following, I laid before the members of the Committee the facts of the case, and then we decide what to do, in strict accordance with the wishes of the girls. If the girl expresses a wish to go home we did our best to send her back.
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