Newsgroup: it.scienza.ambiente
Titolo: Re: Make 1million in 6 weeks or less

at Hong Kong declared: "In England abuses
might have arisen under the recent law, but here it is impossible,"
and very much more of the same false nature. The new Ordinances are
excellent reading, and in the hands of the right sort of officials
would do incalculable good. _But laws were not needed in the Colonies
to put down slavery._ Mr. Francis' Memorandum, and Sir John Smale's
pronouncements have clearly demonstrated that fact, but the right sort
of men were needed to enforce the laws already in existence, in the
same disinterested manner in which Sir John Smale had wrought so
effectually. The new law was, however, put in each case under the
administration of the "Protector" and his staff of officials, and the
result has been, and could but be unsatisfactory, to the present day.
For instance, in 1893, Mr. H.E. Wodehouse, Police Magistrate at
Hong Kong, in reporting on a case of suicide of a slave girl to the
Colonial Secretary at Hong Kong, to be transmitted for the information
of Lord Ripon, Secretary of State for the Colonies, who had asked for
the information, goes quite fully into a description of conditions at
this time, three years after the passage of the Protective Ordinance.
He says:
    "The name of the deceased was Chan Ngan-Kin.... She was registered
    as a prostitute in this brothel on the 23rd of December, 1890.
    When registering her name she said she had no pocket-mother, that
    her parents were both dead, and that she became a prostitute
    of her own free will. The inspector said that that was the
    description of

put forward, who answered
    our questions in a loud, brazen manner. One of our party asking
    her if she could sing, she thought the statement was made that she
    was not 'sixteen' (the age under which girls are supposed to be
    'protected' from going into prostitution by British rule), and
    shouted, 'I am _seventeen_.' We stayed only a few minutes, but
    were informed that they provided opium and intoxicating liquors
    here."
We told our hostess one day that we desired jinrikshas that we might
be conveyed to the Protectorate to interview the Chief Inspector,
having heard that he desired an interview. As we were leaving the
house she detained us a moment to say, timidly: "Ladies, do pardon me,
but I feel I must caution you that that man has a very violent temper,
and it will not do in case you see anything, to criticise,--no matter
what you think. I don't wish to seem to intrude, but I know the man's
reputation as to temper, and I cannot bear to think of his having a
chance to treat you rudely." We thanked her heartily, and promised to
be doubly careful.
We knew the place. A very imposing Government building standing apart
by itself, upon which much money had been expended to give it a fine
appearance. We were soon ushered into the presence of the man who held
the same relation to the work at Singapore that John Lee holds, or at
least held the last we knew, at Hong Kong. Will you believe us, when
we tell you that to our amazement it was that same white-haired old
man to whom we had been introduced at the church gathering as such an
active Christian, "working along much the same lines as ourselves, and
at the head and front of every good work in the Colony?" To be sure we
had heard the name of this Inspector, but we had never in our remotest
conception connected it with the man the Doctor had introduced to us.
Concealing our surprise we sat down for a few moment's interview. The
man kne

Murray's Annual Report for the _Public_ for
    1867, was _actually put in evidence before the House of Lords'
    Committee_ on venereal diseases--1868, page 135. "Venereal disease
    here has now become of _comparatively rare occurrence_." Yet the
    _Army_ Report for the previous year (1866, page 115) states that
    "the admissions to hospital for venereal disease were 281 per 1000
    men;" i.e., more than one man in four of the whole soldiery had
    been in hospital for this "comparatively rare" disease.
    As regards the Navy, Dr. Murray says, "the evidence of Dr.
    Bernard, the Deputy Inspector-General of Hospitals and Fleets, is
    even more satisfactory. He writes (Jan. 27), 'I am enabled to say
    that true syphilis is now rarely contracted by our men in Hong
    Kong.'" Yet the "China station," in which Hong Kong occupies so
    important a position, had at the time 25 per cent. more _secondary
    (true) syphilis than any other naval station in the world, except
    one (the S.E. American_); it had 101 of _primary (true) against
    68 in the North American_, 31 in the S.E. American, and 22 in the
    Australian stations (_all unprotected_); and _gonorrhoea_ was
    _higher than in any other naval station in the world_. This
    _official_ misleading feature is to be found in other quarters