Sessional_Paper_1896 — Page 676

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31. Now there may have been some grounds for not interfering with the medical arrangements, but absolutely none for not supervising the sanitary arrangements. It was specially on sanitary grounds that the "I Ts'z" was done away with to make room for the Tung Wa. For the extremely unsatisfactory and the exceedingly backward condition of affairs at the Tung Wa the Registrar General's Department, by its sub- servience to Chinese ideas, and by its timidity in dealing with the Chinese, is largely, if not entirely, to blame. I submit it is a disgrace to the British Government and to our civilization at the end of the nineteenth century in this British Crown Colony, that positively no attempt has up to the present time been made by the Colonial Govern- ment to dissipate the cloud of ignorance that rests over the Chinese in regard to the undoubted advantages of modern medical science, and that the so-called "Doctors' of the Tung Wa Hospital, who have no medical qualifications whatever, are still permitted by the Colonial Government to continue to "treat" the many destitute poor and sick among the 240,000 Chinese in the Colony in accordance with the dictates of an antiquated and wholly discredited system.

寥寥

32. In spite of the enormous increase in the population during the years from 1872 to 1894, and the large accumulations of funds in the hands of the Institution, there had been no adequate enlargement of the establishment, or of the accommodation therein to meet the continuously growing needs of the Colony, and there had been no improvement and positively no effort to effect any improvement either in the medical treatment of the sick and destitute Chinese, or in the sanitary arrangements of the Hospital. If there had been "the continuous inspection, the frequent supervision, and that systematic control over it," that Sir RICHARD MACDONNELL contemplated, the Hospital would never have been allowed to drift into the state in which it was found in 1894. At a deputation of Chinese gentlemen connected with the Hospital, which waited on His Excellency the Governor on 28th December last, Sir WILLIAM ROBINSON is reported to have said—-- ..............I fully appreciate the Tung Wa Hospital's good work, which has been "done for many years; and I must insist on having it put into proper sanitary condition. ......Under the Ordinance, 3 of 1870, the Governor has power to appoint any- "body he thinks fit, besides the Registrar General and Colonial Surgeon, and I shall “act on that decidedly." See Dr. Lowson's report dated 1st March, 1895, and more parti- Evidence cularly

his remarks on the Tung Wa which were omitted from the official copies of that report, as Government considered that no useful purpose would be served by their publication; and also the medical and other evidence. Lord GRANVILLE's despatch of 7th October, 1869, sanctioned "the establishment of a new Hospital for sick and Appendix "moribund Chinese conditionally that its regulations and general superintendence be

subject to Government control."

P. 40-13.

p. 40.

Evidence p. 70.

P. 75.

(C

33. Had successive Registrars General and Colonial Surgeons exercised the continuous control intended, led the Chinese by gradual steps to understand and recognise the benefits of Western medicine and surgery, and employed a little quiet steady pressure-a pressure that could have been gradually and judiciously exercised without exciting any alarm or stirring up any prejudices in the minds of the Chinese-I believe the Tung Wa Hospital might now have been spacious enough to provide for all the needs of the rapidly growing Chinese population, and would have become what the Government of 1872 intended, viz., a "really good and well-conducted Hospital," availing itself of many of the advantages and of many of the curative appliances and methods of modern medical science.

L

34. The Registrar General has always acted as the intermediary between the Government and the Hospital Directorate, and in respect of the Tung Wa the Appendix Colonial Surgeon has, unfortunately since 1873, been under the instructions of the Registrar General's Department. I am of opinion it is mainly owing to the lack of intelligent firmness in dealing with the Chinese on the part of successive Registrars General, and to their failure to exercise any effective control over the working of the establishment, that instead of being a benefit to the Chinese