to the Board of Punishments. General Tung has been sent to the military post-
roads.
SHANGHAI, 19th June, 10.50 a.m. It is reported from Weihaiwei that H.M.S. Peacock yesterday took on board Captain W. M. Watson and one hundred men of the First Chinese Regiment for Taku. Admiral Seymour is reported to be en- tirely surrounded by the Chinese.
Weihaiwei to-day reports that the despatch of the First Chinese Regiment has been
cancelled.
SHANGHAI, 20th June, 11.50 am. A reliable Chinese report states that the Legations at Peking were all right on Sunday and that Admiral Seymour has reached Peking.
THE HONGKONG WEEKLY PRESS AND due under the building contract in question; that they thereupon, with the knowledge of the plaintiff Soo Sum, paid that sum into Court; and that such payment into Court was a good and valid payment of the sum and discharged them from further liability in respect thereof.
There was not much controversy at the hear ing about the facts of the case, and it is suffici- ent to state them briefly.
On the 25th March, 1898, the defendants entered into a contract with the plaintiffs Soo Sum and Pang Yam for the erection of seven houses on Kowloon Inland Lot No. 540. For the purposes of the contract Soo Sum and Pang Yam assumed and used the firm name of Sing Kee. The buildings were to be completed by the 1st February, 1899, and the price to be $18,500. Monthly payments were to be made paid by the defendants for their erection was by the defendants to the contractors upon the certificate of the architects for the defendants, Messrs. Palmer and Turner, at the rate of 80 per cent. ppon the value of the work done, etc. SHANGHAI, 20th June, 9.40 p.m.
It appeared that the plaintiff Soo Sum fin- The United States Consul at Chefoo tele-anced the contract, while Pang Yam Saw to the graphs that he has chartered a, steamer to
execution of the work under it, Soo Sum also rescue the American and British missionaries deposited with the defendants the sum of $2,000 in Western Shantung and Honan.
as security for the due performance of the con- tract. Work was carried on under the contract and certificates were from time to time issued by the architects. These certificates were in- dorsed by Soo Sum and Pang Yang jointly, and the receipts and cheques for the sums so certified for were signed by them.
The French Consul telegraphs that the British Mission at Tsangchou has been looted and the missionaries conveyed to some unknown place by the Chinese General. No authentic news has been yet received about Admiral Seymour and his column.
Shanghai, 21st June, 9.56 a.m. H. M. 8. Orlando takes Colonel Hamilton Bower and 200 of the First Chinese Regi- ment of Taku.
H. M. S. Whiting has gone to Nagasaki for repairs, an unburst shell having pene. trated her boiler.
[June 23, 1900. the Code of Civil Procedure. This enactmen is in the following terms: In every case in which a debtor shall be prohibited from making payment of his debt to his creditor, he may pay the amount into Court, and such payment shall have the same effect as payment to the party entitled to receive the debt." He further said that the case of Tse Lan v. The Hongkong and Kowloon Wharf and Godown Company, Limited, decided by Mr. Justice Wise in this Court in November, 1897, on the construc tion of this enactment, was in point and should govern the decision of this case. think it will be convenient in the first place to examine that decision and see whether it has the effect contended for. If this is so, I am of opinion that, sittting here for Mr. Justice Wise, I must follow his ruling.
to the plaintiff under a building contract, were In that case the defendants, being indebted served with a prohibitory order in respect of the sum of $390.36, being money alleged to be due by the defendants under the same contract to a building firm bearing a name similar to that of the plaintiff's firm. The plaintiff in- formed the defendants that the money was not owing to that firm but to himself, and he ob- jected to its being attached or paid into Court. However, the matter seems to have gone into Chambers, and the Acting Puisne Judge was stated to have made a verbal order that the money should be paid into Court, and it was paid in accordingly. Some months after-
It
wards the defendants were served with a simi- lar prohibitory order in respect of the sum of $391.40. The plaintiff again informed the defendants that the money was not owing to is true that Mr. Osborne, the secretary of the the defendant in that suit but to himself. defendant company, said that afterwards the plaintiff agreed that the money should be paid into Court, but the plaintiff denied this, and I can discover no finding of the Court on the
In the early part of the year 1899 Pang Yam got into financial difficulties, and on the 3rd February, 1899, Chan Yew Ting recovered the summary jurisdiction of this Court for the judgment against him in Suit No. 101 of 1899 in sum of $1000 with costs of suit. On the 5th February 1899, a writ of execution was issued on this judgment, and on the same day the defendants were served with a prohibitory order restraining them from paying to Pangpoint. Yam or any one else "the sum of $1,100 due by them to Pang Yam for the build- ing of seven houses on Kowloon Inland Canton, 21st June, 6 p.m.
Lot No. 540." On the following day Messrs. Palmer and Turner prepared a certificate-the Canton is quiet, although there is a fifth in the series-for $2,100, and two cheques general state of unrest among foreigners were signed by the defendants, one for 81,000 and natives alike over Li Hung-chang's to be paid to the contractors and the other for approaching departure. The Shameen De-$1,100 to be paid into Court under the pro- fence Corps has been reorganised and now consists of about 70 volunteers.
The Tsangchou missionaries have arrived
at Weihaiwei.
Li Hung-chang has notified the Consuls that he will leave Hongkong on Wednesday, the 27th instant, by the Empress steamer.
The Chinese officials expect no serious trouble in Canton. Li Hung-chang is hold- ing them responsible during his absence for
maintenance of order.
The United States Don Juan de Austria has arrived at Canton, and the French gun- Boat Léon is expected.
SUPREME COURT.
15th June.
IN SUMMARY JURISDICTION.
(BEFORE HIS HONOUR SIR JOHN CARRING
TON, C.M.G., CHIEF JUSTICE.)
DISPUTE AS TO A BUILDING CONTRACT.
His Lordship gave his decision in suit No. 958 of 1899, Soo Sum and Brace Shepherd, Official Receiver of the Estate of Pang Yam v. The Humphreys Estate and Finance Company,
Limited. The decision is as follows
The plaintiffs in this suit claim from the de- fendants the sum of $1,000 under a contract for the erection of certain houses. The full claim in $1,1000, but there is a waiver of $100 in order to enable the Plaintiffs to bring the suit in the summary jurisdiction of the Court.
By their answer the defendants set up several defences, but the only one which was seriously pressed was that by a prohibitory order made by his Court in its summary jurisdiction in Suit No. 101 of 1899, wherein Chan Yew Ting was plaintiff and Pang Yam was defendant, they were restrained from making payment of the have-mentioned sum of $1,100 which was then
.
The money was paid into Court. Some months afterwards the plaintiff brought a suit against the defendants to recover the two sums thus paid away from him, amounting together to $781.76, but after argument the learned Judge held that the garnishee was absolved by section 76 (10) of the Code of Civil Procedure from all further liability by the payment into Court, and he gave judgment for the defendants. The plaintiff appealed to the Full Court against this decision, but the appeal went off on an objection taken by the defendants that it was out of time.
hibitory order. These cheques remained in the possession of Messrs. Palmer and Turner until the 24th April, 1899, because the plaintiff Soo and refused to indorse the certificate. On that examination differs from the present case in Sum was not satisfied with this arrangement It will be observed that the case under day the sixth certificate was issued, and the the fact that there one of the two payments in- fifth certificate also appears to have been in- to Court was made in pursuance of an order of dorsed, and the cheque for $1,000 was handed to the Court. But the learned Judge does not the contractors. On the same day the cheque seem to have rested his decision on that ground, for $1,100 was paid into Court under the pro-and that ground, at any rate, could only have hibitory order. I am satisfied by the evidence affected one of the two.payments but he laid this proposed arrangement, but that he was not being served with a prohibitory order, is before me that the plaintiff Soo Sum knew of down the broad proposition that a garnishee, on in any way a consenting party to it; on the ablved from further liability by paying into contrary, I find that he addressed protests both Court the money attached by the order. to the defendants and also to Messrs. Palmer and Turner against the payment of the $1,100 into Court. I also find that this payment was made by the defendants voluntarily and not under any direction or pressure from the Court or its officers. I cannot help thinking that the if the defendants had taken the obvions and whole of this trouble might have been avoided
sensible course of acquainting the Court with the fact that the debt in respect of which the debt of Pang Yam but was a debt due to him prohibitory order was issued was not the sole jointly with Soo Sum.
was made by the Supreme Court in bankruptoy On the 7th September, 1899, a receiving order
in respect of the estate of Pang Yam.
In view of this ruling it would not serve any useful purpose to discuss the question whether in the present case the prohibitory order was rightly issued or could properly affect the debt, because the same question was raised to no pur- pose in the case under examination. Indeed, Mines Company supra, which is now relied on the case of Macdonald v. The Tacquah Gold
for the plaintiff, was also cited for the then plaintiff in the course of the agument before Mr. Justice Wise,
I am of opinion that the ruling above men- tioned is in point in the present case, and that ment, I am concluded by its authority. The sitting in the capacity which I fill at the mo result is that there must be judgment for the defendants, with costs.
18th June.
CRIMINAL SESSIONS.
D'Almada for the plaintiffs that the whole of On these facts it was contended by Mr. the proceedings on the prohibitory order were invalid since a debt due to a judgment debtor and another person jointly cannot be attached alone, and in support of this contention he relied BEFORE SIR JOHN CARRINGTON, KT., C.M.G. to answer the debts of the judgment debtor on Macdonald v. The Tacquah Gold Mines Company, 13 Q. B. D. 535. On the other hand Mr. F. B. Deacon for the defendants argued that in paying the money in Court the defen- dants were, at any rate so far as the interest of Pang Yam was concerned, relieved from further Hability by the provisions of section 76 (10) of
(CHIEF JUSTICE).
DISCHARGED;
Goodman) said that in the case of Sun Yau Yee The Attorney-General (the Hon. W. Meigh he did not intend to file any information. He had considered the matter, and he did not think
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