March 2, 1908.]
CHINA OVERLAND TRADE REPORT.
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Chinese, it is true, and we have been unable us as being analogous to a case of
there was no complaint from the Judges the Bar the Solicitors or the litigants. to find any acknowledgment of it in Foreigu tempt of court." Worse still, it strikes us as
It may be Office publications.
said that in England there is a Long Vacation We understand that being less judicially effective than we had a f
lasting from the 1st August to the 12th Octo- Sir CLAUDE MACDONALD'S confirmation of right to expect. Why should His Lordship her besides Christmas and Easter Vacations. it is in the Waiwupu to-day, however; write, concerning a decision of the Law
This is perfectly true but it mast b↔ re- and that the Waiwupu has not forgotten Society's committee, that there is no other membered that the Judges in England do it, even if others have. It is distasteful side, after the question has been decided by ; not get one year's leave in every 3 or 4 and to us to find ourselves, where we certainly the whole committer," and then procved to that during the sittings they are influitely harder worked than the Judges here, never expected to be, arguing a Chinese suggest that a decision of another commni'tce
The claim as against our own country's should be less final ? Looking at the dates The game remark applies to the Bar.
as solicitors as far supposed interest, but fair is fair; and we of the correspondence, we note that perhaps saestion is useless to us
as regarls taking advantage of it by going find consolation in the thought that all is His Lordship was merely combatting the i away. There is a ways a certain amount of not patriotism that professes to be. The personal views of the Hon. Mr. HeWETT. | offea work, Police Court, Summary Court and attack on Sir ROBERT BREDON WAS un- Even 90, we cannot allow His Lordship's ¦ Conveyancing work to be done and we must English and unfair; in the light of what we extraordinary view of the finality of com- ; remain here to do it, We therefore hope that have just written, may we not also say that|mittee decisions to pass unremarked. It the Chamber will express an adverse opioi ›n to it was unpatriotic as well It has, w may be "difficult enough to get people in the L'e propised extension.
With any dissensions in the legal frater. believe (though of this we prefer to speak | Colong to undertake work on committees," reservedly) led the British Minister into a but surely not that nor any other cousi lora.¦nity it self, the public should not be troubled, dilemma whence we would be pleased to tion whatever should allow the establish. r could they affect the decision of the As they see him honourably extracted. The pledge ment, as a principle, of His Lordship's | Chamber of Commerce, except of his official predecessor was the pledge theory that all decisions by representative showed a want of unanimity, and so made of the British nation, and a time committees ought to be accepted unques the issue itself, there are not really so many } their own decision easier. With regard ti when (with ample cause) we have been tioningly and regarded like Persian or ¡
It is a matter of complaining of "China's breaches of faith, | Medcan laws. Representatives
decisionally points to consider. we do not want to find our country laid misrepresent their constituenta.
All met
public knowledge that in this Colony as ole where, holidays and adjournments have open to a tu quoque with such a dishonour- are liable to err. We may go further, and able implication, We cannot sufficiently | say (referring only to committees in general) always interfered largely with business, and express our regret that a bare half dozen that the number of committeemen outitle1 men of Shanghai should have been able so to regard themselves as like Caesar's wife, to discredit a holy with such a worthy above suspicion, canut in the nature of record as has the China As-ociation, or so to | things be very large, We have lately seen imperil the good name of our ustion. Inhow a smalleimmittee at Shanghai, or rather,
at
the meantime, we learn from Chinese sources. that some of the Peking officia's are main- taining that Sir JOHN JORDAN's interference constitutes a cancellation of the under standing, and that his persistence in it absolves China from her half of the com- plementary assurance made by, and with, Sir CLAUDE MACDONALD. These hot heads, therefore, want the Government to appoint a man of another nationality, more as an
assertion of China's integrity than because they object to au Englishman. But for the Shanghai conspiracy, as we feel obliged to call it, this foolish and untenable position would not have been dreamt of. If both sides keep their promises of 1898, the matter
will settle itself, in the most natural and suitable way. The pity of it is that the first disposition toward departure from the bond should have been shown by a British association.
LONG VACATIONS-
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a section of a small committee there, has committed the members of the China Association to a policy from which many of them dissent, and how it has even succeeded in putting the British Government into a position that looks wrong.
Sir FRANCIS Pragorr's point that, after a committee has once made a decision, the principle of audi allevant patelem loses all its value, reminds us in some way of the
disgust of another gentleman who deplored our temerity in letting our disapproval of the acts of a section of a Shanghat con-
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mit ce outweigh our undoubtedly respectful sentiment toward the established institution they ostensibly represented. In the present case, fortunately, there are two sides entitled a respectful hearing, and though wo would not undervalue the decision of the committee of the local Law Society, which His Lordship considers should have settled the matter, we cannot help regarding the case of the minority as being exceedingly well put.
We understand that it has been propas,
that the Long Vacation establised by Ord.
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that the more of them there are, the more will be the public loss and inconvenience, We also can admit that in the matter of work and holidays all of us fin l it easy to be work woda, and the amount of rest we think cloquent, easy to dilate on the amount of
we redly need. Individual employers are no easier to persuade than has been the Chamber of Commerce, and as we trust the Government will prove to be in this instance. It is to be hoped that the application will be dealt with as the Chamber advised, and that it will not too hurriedly be made again, espcially if there is to be any soreness or heat displayed over it. The vast majority of workers in this Colony have not the slightest doubt that in the matter of holidays and remuneration the legal fraternity is to e envie, and we really do not see that they have anything to complain of, whereas if the suggested change had been made, the public
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would.
THE KING'S SPEECH.
(Daily Press, February 27th.) Yesterday we printed the full text of the King's Speech, to which the old-fashionel importance is still supposed to cling. Last year's speech from the Throne contained a
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reference to the relations of Lords and nince No. of 1898 shall be extended for a further period of ons month. By that Ordin Commons. Nothing has been done, though ance it was enacted that the following vacations much has been said, during the months should be observed, viz.: the Long Vacation intervening, and the absence of any similar from 2 th September to 17th October (27 days) reference this time suggests that the Christmas Vacation 24th December to 14t C reform of the Upper Chamber is no January (days) Chinese New Year Vacation
longer included in the list of what the (5 days) and Easter Vacation (7 days) in all 17
is pleased to call todays in the year. To this 47 days must be present fiovernment
Its inclusion last year, alded 2 Saturdays and 52 Sunday, three rase praencal politics. days, Whi'm day and the Angust Bank and its umission this, gerves to show what a Holiday, Empire Day and King's Birthday. hollow form dity the King's Speech has That is to say that on 15 days out of 365 the i became, under Governments that promise Courts are not sitting and another days what they connot perform. One is tempted fare proposed to
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be added making to wonder what His Majesty, who is, after 183 days or over half the year. We would submit that the proposed extension of the Long all, a man of blood and brains, privately
make
Daily Press. February 26th. In taking up the subject of legal holidays in this Colony, as they affect the facilitation or otherwise of public business, we do not believe there is any real necessity to offer approval and support to the protest of the Hongkong Chamber of Commerce against extension of the Long Vacation. It would, we presume to think, be "detrimental to the commercial interests of the Colony encourage the Bench and Bar to holiday oftener or for longer periods thun it already does, but we also believe that the statement does not require to be proved. The Government, when it submitted the proposal for the consideration of the Chim- ber of Commerce, did not do so, we take it, as a matter of form. We hope that it recoguised the considerable probability of commercial detriment, and it 18 important, perhaps, to note that the Chamber gave no off-hand decision, but deferred expression of opinion until after it had mide full enquiry and careful consideration. Yet in the correspondence published, we are sur- prised to see that the CHIEF JUSTICE Wrote to the Chairman almost as if sufficient con- sideration had not been bestowel on the, subject. His Lordship's letter of February 8th to the Chairman of the Chamber strikes
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Vacation or indeed a long vacation at all is a f needed in Hongkong and further that it is harmful.
rast majority of cases in our Courts are between It must be borne in mind that the
Chinese who do not understand and never can be made to understand why lengthy vacations are neo-ssary. They have been accus'omel in the past to prompt se tlements of their cases and if such prompt settlements are delayed as they must be if the proposed extension of the vacation is carried through they will lose coufd-nce in our Courts. Sme of a4 can
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thanks as he reuls out the cut-and-dried references to My Government "aud My People," and the colourless catalogue of the pipedreams of those who now, to all intents and purposes, usurp the really ruling func'i 'ns. What a change, what a humulating chang, from the monarchical point of view at lens', has come about in Mrri Englan1 in less than a hundred years! What a startling contrast there is between the statue of the mass at the close
remember the time before the Vacation, of the struggle with NAPOLEON, and at the Ordinance of 1999 was passed At that tim: | else of the struggle with Oom Part, though the Courts worked year in and year cut and
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