{
June 2, 1900.]
evidence as it stood, he could not do so, and as to the other part, on the ground that further details might come to light. The case is of no help, because it shows why a judge did not, not why he did, stay proceedings as frivolous. The next case of Metropolitan Bank v. Pooley, 10 A. C. 210, was decided with reference to Order xxv. T. 4, and not upon the inherent jurisdiction of the Court at Common law. It was an at- tempt to maintain an action the foundation of which was the annulment of an adjudication in bankruptcy which the Courts had confirmed, and the decision of the House of Lords dismis- sing the action as frivolous and vexatious was an extended exercise under O. xxv. T. 4 of its common law jurisdiction.
The next case of A. G. for Trinidad and Tobyd v. Ericht (1893) A. C. 518 was cited to show that parties were allowed to raise afresh questions of law already argued and decided; but that was because the questions of law had been decided by a Court without jurisdiction,
1
CHINA OVERLAND TRADE REPORT.
kong Sanitary Board was hold. The President On the 28th ult. a meeting of the Hong (the Hon. R. D. Ormsby, Director of Public Works) occupied the chair, and there were also present the Vice-president (Dr. Lowson, Acting Principal Civil Medical Officer), Lieut. Col. Ryan, Mr. J. McKie, Dr. Hartigan, Mr. E. Osborne, Dr. F. Clark (Medical Officer of Health), Mr. Fung Wa Chuen, Mr. Chan A Fook, and Mr. G. A. Woodcock (Secretary).
389
HONGKONG SANITARY BOARD. | Onko Nakomara, landlady of No. 11, Gage- street. In this case the patient, while moving washing and with a view to discovering the various articles of furniture preparatory to lime-
under which she discovered two dead rats. cause of a bad smell, came across two boxes Three days after the woman exhibited symptoms of plague, the initial bubo being in the left. femoral region, which strongly predisposes to the fact that inoculation occurred somewhere on the left foot or leg. The woman subsequent. ly died of the disease. The date of my visit was June 21st, 1899. The other case I had in May 31st, 1899, at the St. Francis Home, Wan- mind was that of Maria Lee, whom I visited on : chai. It has since come to my knowledge that
that there were no cases of plague previous to quite recently the houses in Holy Infant lane were limewashed." I am given to understand limewashing. Since then I learn there have been several in this lane. Wherein is the bone- I enclose a fit of limewashing during an epidemic of plague? notification of plague which occurred to-day in the same lane.”
DR. CLARK'S REPLY TO DE. HARSTON. relative to lime-washing. The letter has already A letter was submitted from Dr. Harston appeared in our columns. The following from
Dr. Clark was read:-
might be saved if I discuss Dr. Harston's letter "I think that much of the Board's time in a minute now instead of awaiting our next meeting,
which this theory is based by its advocate we find “To consider, therefore, the premises upon in the first instance that two cases of plague are cited, both occurring 12 months ago, although there have been some 180 cases to date.
of rats
"In one of these the discovery of a couple dead of plague is admitted to Where then is the connection between the have been the existing cause of the disease. lime-washing and the disease? Are we to 88- domestic premises as the result of the bi-annual sume that dead rats are only discovered upon
this is dispensed with during epidemics, are cleansing and lime-washing? Granting that such dead rats to be allowed to remain upon of decomposition lest their removal may excite the premises to pollute the air with the vapours
them carelessly? an attack of plague in a person who handles Surely this case does not
greatly strengthen the theory?
背展
In a further case of Junior Canon of St.
In the first place it behoves the Board to Pauls v. Crickett reported in Wightwick 30, merely, and that any such theory must be ex consider that the said letter enunciates a theory date 1810, the plea that a decree of 1795 disamined by the light of facts and not accepted missed plaintiff's will, praying a discovery and amount in respect of tithes, was held not to be cleared demonstrated its authenticity.
as a working hypothesis until the facts have a bar to a subsequent bill raising a different point, viz., whether defendant was liable to pay tithes at 2/9 in the pound upon the reserved rent or upon the real value of the premises. Here the points raised by the two bills were not identical. As another illustration of the grounds on which a Court will exercise its inherent jurisdic- tion to stay proceedings I may mention the case of Lawrance v. Norreys 15 A.D. 210 not cited in the argument, in which the Court, in exercise of its inherent powers, dismissed on action as an abuse of procedure where the claim was in- capable of proof and without any solid basis.
Again in Reichel v. Mograth 14 A.C. 669, the Court exercised its inherent jurisdiction and held it to an abuse of process for a party to attempt to retry the same issues which had already been conclusively decided against him or to defend a case in which he had not a shadow of defence. The opposite cases cited show then that there are many grounds upon which a Court will exercise its inherent jurisdiction and stay proceedings or dismiss an action. One of these grounds is that the indentical question has al- ready been decided between the two parties. In opposition to Stephenson v. Garnett counsel for Ho Tung cited and relied on N. E. R. T. D. Dalton Overseers (1898) 2 Q. G. 66. That case when looked into was a decision to the effect that a certain order of quarter sessions did not operate as an estoppel because the proper elements of an estoppel were not present, for the construction of the statute in question in that case was only a matter inci- dentally cognisable: the decision did not touch the point of the inherent jurisdiction of the Court to stay proceedings where a question already decided is sought to be retried. In assisting its inherent jurisdiction a Court does not of necessity base its action on an estoppel nor a res judicata, but on a variety of grounds, amongst which is the ground that a question once decided between the parties, whether or not it constitutes an estoppel or res judicata, shall not be relitigated, because such relitiga- tion is vexatious, and an abuse of the process of the Court. This is the ground upon which I think the Court ought to exercise its inherent powers in the present case.
¿
It was urged on behalf of the plaintiff that the present proceedings are not frivolous or vexatious or an abuse of the process because they have been taken bona fide with a view of enabling either party to appeal from the deci- sion of this Court to Her Majesty in Council, the right of appeal being clear in the present case because the shares now in question are of the appealable value, whereas the shares in the former case, were below that value. But the answer to this contention is that the Company ought not to be harassed by a second proceeding because the applicant did not take care to pur- chase shares of sufficient value in the first pro- ceeding, the foundation of the two proceedings being substantially the same.
In the result, therefore, I am of opinion that the order of the 26th April last should be set aside with costs and the proceedings in the plaintiff's notice of motion be stayed till the further order of the Court. Chief Justice concurred.
similar nature, but the facts given are
The other case may perhaps have been of a bald that it seems to me impossible to make so any deduction from them.
theory seems
However, the main plank upon which this to rest is that the cleausing and lime-washing of the Wanchai Health District took place during January and Febru- ary of this year, and that immediately following this we had an outbreak of plague in that dis- trict.
|
they carried on during regular periods of the The VICE-PRESIDENT said the lime-washing
disinfection were perfect or anything near it, year was meant entirely as a cleansing process. He did not say that their present methods of
supervision. Possibly then disinfecting ar- because it was so very difficult to get efficient
the whole of this correspondence had arisen rangements might be improved, but he thought from a mistaken idea of the routine which was carried out. He thought the best thing was to thank Dr. Harston for bringing this ing over the matter he did not see how they matter before them, but after think- were going to improve matters unless by getting a few more men to look after the indivi they were going to have to stop limewashing dual disinfection of infected houses. But if simply because they could not afford to pay for the disinfection by antiseptics it would be a cáse of God help the colony.
Mr. OSBORNE thought the matter would be best dealt with by asking Dr. Harston to come to their next meeting and have this misunder⚫ he understood in conversation with Dr. Hars. standing cleared
up, because from what
tom he did not object to the limewashing in any shape, except that in times of plague the cleansing process disturbed the dust, and that coolies who walked about the room bare-footed were upt to germs in the process of cleansing. If that become inoculated by plague was so-and in this matter they had to be guided
cleansing and lime-washing of that district took thought it would be better if they asked him to "In the first place let me point out that the great deal in what Dr. Harston said, and he antirely by professional opinion-there was a place in precisely the same months last year. and yet only 13 cases of plague occurred in that ly what he did meau.
attend their next meeting and to explain exact- district during the months of January-April, Dr. Harston's theory that the disturbance of If there was any truth in 1899, out of a total of 129 cases, while no less dust spread the plague, perhaps it would be bet- than 68 of these cases occurred in No. 9 Healthter to re-consider their methods. He moved that District, where the lime-washing is not done until May and June.
much more closely into this matter, and I attach "So much for generalities, but I have looked
occurred to date in the Wanchai district, and in hereto a list of all the cases of plague which have the same table will be found the dates of the cleansing and lime-washing of these houses. These dates are the ones on which notice of intention to do the work was given by the con- within three to four days of these dates, but tractors, and the great majority were done
and another ten days for the incubation of the even if we allow ten days as the extreme limit, disease, we have an interval of (say) three weeks cleansing and the occurrence of cases of plague. as the maximum interval between the work of
out of the 90 cases detailed therein there is such An examination of the table will show that an interval only in one case. In all the others limewashing or at such a long interval after- the cases of plague either occurred before the wards that no medical man would contend that the cleansing bore any actual relationship to the outbreak of the disease.
"
"In the face of these facts I fail to see how such a theory can be maintained." Harston wrote as follows:-
Replying to an enquiry of the Secretary. Dr.
washing which I had in my mind when writing "The cases of plague occurring during lime- His Lordship themy letter of May 7th are two in number, the more striking of the two being the case of
Dr. Harston be asked to attend the meeting of the Board that day fortnight.
The VICE-PRESIDENT, in seconding, suggested that Dr. Harston should be invited to attend the meeting the Board had in committee.. carried.
Mr. Osborne agreed and the motion was
M
ม
DR. CLARK AND OVERCROWDING. crowding said:-
A preliminary report by Dr. Clark on over-
"I have the honour to report that on 31st March last there were only 75 vacant houses in the city of Victoria. A night inspection has greatest number of vacant houses were to be been made in No. 7 Health District, where the
the hours of 11 p.m. and 5 a.m. found, and 286 floors have been visited between
..
legally occupy these floors is found to be 3,724-
The total number of persons that may and the actual number of persons sleeping there individual floors was detected'; thus in one com- was 2,430. A small amount of overcrowding of mon lodging-house there was an excess of ten parsons over the legal limit; in one other floor three other floors an excess of eight persona, there was an excess of nine parsons; and in
*
instances to abate the overcrowding. It is Legal notices have been served in these interesting to note that the figures almost exactly with the tabular report drawn up
coincid
by me last year, and which was based on the This table gives 86 persons per occupied floor, estimate of population of the city of Victoria.
No comments yet.
Private notes are available after approval.