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August 26, 1905. j
CHINA OVERLAND TRADE REPORT:
LIMEWASHING
Since last report 412 hous have been limewashed in the Easteru and 231 in the Central District.
RAT RETURN.
Daring the week ending August 12th, 522 rats were caught, of which 32, were found to be infected; of the 551 caught for the week ending 19th instant, 26, were infectel.
sewer, which is six inches in diameter: (0) | and 21.1 for the week ended the 29th ultimo | This six inch sewer, being laid at a fall of one as against 38.0 for the corresponding week of
last year. in forty, will carry off 360 gallons of sewer water per minute: (d, Taking as a basis for estimation that 2 feet 8 inches of rain may fall in an hour (this is the maximum re- corded for fifteen years) and that 120 gallons of water are drawn from the mains for each house per day, we find that the maximum amount of sewage and storm water, which the six inch sewer might have to deal with, equal 377 gallons per minute, or 71 gallons more than the sewer is designed to carry off. (a) This should be altered 8 that any access of storm water which the sewer is unable to carry off may overflow into the storm water drain which is being provided. (3) If piper, rags, etc., be thrown Tato the surface channel, the present six inch trap will fail to carry off water as rapidly as it is capable of doing. A certain amount of paper, etc, must be expected to find its way into the channel, and if nuisance recurs when (a) and
(b) beforementioned are carried out, we think that the owners of the property should be asked to halve the work of the trap by providing another que, and so draining each half of the block of houses by a trap of its own.
The PRESIDENT-Alteratious are in pro. gress in connection with this property, and I would ask that the construction of the new storm channel be hastened. This was agreed
bo.
MANURE AND MANURING.
In a letter from the M.O.H. to the President. he stated that he could find no definits instruc tions issued with reference to the practice of storing manure and manuring gardens with human excreta. From a letter from the U. S. O.¦ it is not clear what action was definitely decid on by the board to be taken in the matter.
SUPREME COURT.
Saturday, 19th August.
IN CRIMINAL JURISDICTION.
BEFORE SIR F. T. PIGGOTT (CHIEF JUSTICE).
WILFUL MURDER.
The hearing of the charge against Cheung Fat, of feloniously, wilfully anl with malice aforethought killing and murdering Shek Kau at Shankiwan on the 20th June, was continued. The Attorney-General prosecuted and Mr. H. G. Calthrop, instructed by Mr. P. W. Brutton. Halt and Goldring (of Messrs.
Goldring) defende l the prisoner.
The case for the Crown having closed. Mr. Calthrop addressed the jury on behalf of the accused. He said-May it please Your Lordship aud gentlemen of the Jury. In addressing you ouce more I feel it necessary to go throngh as shortly as possible the evidence allucel on behalf of the “Crown in order to couviel the prisoner. Daring last year the prisoner bieɩme acquainted with the deceased
He knew her
and her mother. In January of this year it is
said that he went to the houts on several occasions and askel th mother to let the The mother is daughter live with him. positively certain
The instructions placed before the mesting stated, that with reference to the custom of the storage of excretal mitter for purpose of manuring gardens, bye-law No. 3 of the Scaveng
that ch each occasion ing and Conservancy bye-laws requires the
when the girl refused accused threatened removal of such matter to the conservancy
her. Then she went on to say that on boats; the use of such matter in garde as is
acconut of the thrals her daughter cased therefore illegal in the Colouy, and if any hou39-
to carry on her occupation as a boatwoman from holders are fouad not obeying this bye-law, a notice should be applied for under Section 30 of January until the 17th June, thre days before the Public Health and Buildings Ordinance. she met her death! Now gentlemen, it is an Further, any accumulation of such matter within extraordinary thing that when the life of this woman's daughter was threatene, in the way if the city of Victoria, or within sufficient distance
was said to havben thr atsul, that as far a (50 yards) from any public road or dwe liug
we know she never mudo any communication to house must, if it give rise to evil smalls. be
She was living there with her anyone. regarded as a nuisance, and a legal notice appliehusband: you saw him in the box. He is a mau for, if necessary, under section 23 (8). With
who should esrtainly be able to deal with anyous regard to Kowloon; in farming districts so far
The with a physique like the prison »r's. removed from main roals that it cannot be said
mother never made a nuisance detrimental to the health of passers- by or dwellers in the neighbourhood (other than the farmers themselves) is caused by the above mentioned accumulation of manura, action need
not be taken. With regard to the use of hu nau excreta for minurial purposes in villages and districts unfrequented by the public, it is almost if not quite, impossible to prove that any given
householder has allowed excrata from his boase to be removed to the gardens instead of to the boats.
Bye-law 3, referred to above, there
If it be fore, cannot be strictly enforced. desired to prevent the use of fresh human excreta as manure by the farmers in gardens, this can only be done by proving a nuisance to exist which may be dangerous to health. The practice certainly may always be dangerous to health, and especially so in times of epidemics of cholera an typhoid.
Notices. therefore, under section 26 (13) should be served ou all gardeners and farmers in the Colony who use 29 manure for their vegetables any human excreta which has not bean subjected to the decomposition process which goes on in the usual Chinese manure pits.
The PRESIDENT-I move that the officers of
the Board be instructed to use their best endea. vours to prevent the use of human nightsoil in vegetable gardens, and to prevent storage of urine for manuring purposes within 50 yards of
ublic highways.
Mr. RUMJAIN seconded the motion which
carried.
MORTALITY STATISTICS.
The death rate per 1,000 per annum of the British, Foreign and Chinese community, excluding the Navy and Army, shows a per- osntage of 22,5 for the week ended the 22nd ult,
any
communication whatever to him about this man threatening she is positively her daughter, although
Not certain he threatenel hoe these times.
only did she make us communication to the husband, but she did not even take the tronble to find out what the man's occupation
where he lived, or who was his master.
WAG.
Gentle
Is it possible? Is it probable? Can min! you believe that the woman would not have taken the trouble to find out what the man was, where he lived, wao his master was, and would nst have made s ›me communication, at any rate, to her husband about the matter? Sh says that from January to 7th June she did not see the min so often Slisals is quite certain that during that period her daughter dil not go ou! to ply her boat either in the day time or at night. It is clear that this is not true. next witness who was called ku w this wɔmin
The
perfectly well. and a's the daughter. She tells several you that she saw the diughter on occasions in this Chinese year, that is after the 4th February, earrying on her business as a boatwoman in the day time and als) at night. We can only infer from that, that after all this threat was not made at all. The woman had. however, to bring some evidence to substantiate the theory she hid put up, and which was put forward by the prosecution, that the prisoner murdered the decased out of jealousy. We know it is absolutely untrue. As to the woman called next, Yan Ts, she knew the dece used girl quite well, and was quite sure she had ssen her carrying on her business on the Water: she says she saw the prisoner with the girl in the same boat, sometimes in time and sometimes at night, the day
133
it Was
although it is just as probable somebody else who resembled him. After the death of the girl she came to the conclusion that the man she had seen on previous occasions with the deceased was the prisoner, although it was admitted by the mother that the girl had never gone out with him in the boat after January, and this fact is corroborated by the statement of the prisoner. On the night of the murder there were a good many people down at the wharf, and of the three men she saw. she identified the prisoner as one. I submit she made a mistake, and that the persoa she did see get into the boat was the person who on previous occasions she had mistaken for the prisoner. The witness who found the body said a piece of tape was tied round the mouth, which he did not touch. When Inspector Robertson was called, he said this tape wai nsed as a gag.
If a person was going to use it as a gag he would require to tie it very tightly to have any effect whatever. In the water the tape would increase in tightness, and some mark would have been made on the girl's features. Is there any evidenc at all to show that the woman did mest her death by violence. Inspector Robertson. who has had very considerable experience in finding bodies drowned in the harbour, says there was absolutely no mark on the girl. Is it to be believed that this young woman would not have struggled, and that there would not have been some marks on her to prove the theory put forth? On the night the boat was found a witness said there Was a considerable quantity of blood on the hatch. but the priest who gave evidence said he did not see any. It was a bright moonlight night, and if there had been any blood he must live seen it. That evidence alone proves that thì k at th womia saw was not the one in which decased mat. her death. I think on the evidenes of the prosecution I am entitled to ask you to come to a verdict of not guilty. How en anybody's life safe if a man is to be found guilty on such steader evidenca as this? What the prisoner set up in defence on the very day of his arrest he has consistently adhered to, and his master corroborates his statement that he was lying ill in a shed. The proseca. tion knew this alibi was going to be set up, and now it is asum that they were taken by surprise. The police never took the trouble to find out whether the man was ill or not, as stated. And now, gantlemen, it will be your responsibility to consider the facts fairly. You will have to consider whether you are going to believe in the speculative theories and extremely doubtful identifications of the pro- secution, and whether you are going to believe that ties are to be believed rather than the plain straightforward, and as I submit to you, conclusive evidence which I have brought home to you on behalf of the prisoner.
or
His Lordship then addressed the jurors at length on the salient facts and discrepancies in the statements mile by different witnesses, remarking that human nature was rather difficult to pleas on the subject of truth. If they presumed that there were three people in the boat together, the mere fact that one of the parties was found dead and drowned sometime afterwards would not be sufficient proof of homicide. It would not shift the burlen of guilt from the prisoner, but would be con- sistent with accidental death, suici le homicide. Speaking of the piece of tap, found round the girl's mouth. His Lordship thought tli juy would have no difficulty in taking that to be conclusiva evid me that there was bomicide. He regretted that a more searching of the scientific examination of the body deceased had not been made, and in conclusion said the gentlemen of the jury had first to decide whether there was homicide, and secondly whether the prisoner was one of the three mon
If they believed he was one of the> in the boat. three, then they must find him guilty.
The jury retired for about 20 minutes, and on re-entering their box return a ananimons not guilty," and the prisoner was verdict of discharged.
་་
An American theory of earthquake; may interest trembling Maca. It is that the Standard Oil Company has extracted so much oil from the earth that the axis on which the earth revolves has got hot and sticks at times.
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