🚀 go-pugleaf

the
    grosser abuses arising out of it and incidental to it (kidnaping
    of women and children) can never be put an end to."

It was on May 20th, 1880, that the Secretary of State asked for the
first statement of Sir John Smale's views as to kidnaping and domestic
slavery. His reply is dated August 26th, and in it he refers to
reasons for his delay in replying, of which the Governor is "well
aware." His supplementary letter enclosing the Memorandum of slavery
by Mr. Francis, was dated Nov. 24th, 1880. On April 2nd, 1881, he
wrote a third time to the Colonial Secretary, from which we gather
that even up to that time his explanations had not been forwarded to
Lord Kimberley, Secretary of State. Said he:

    "I had hoped that these letters would have been forwarded
    last year, in the belief that they might have induced a less
    unfavorable view by Lord Kimberley of my judicial action as to
    these matters, and with the more important object of presenting
    what appears to me to be the great gravity of the evils I have
    denounced, as they affect the moral status of the Colony, in order
    that some remedy may be applied to them.... I am informed that His
    Excellency the Governor has been unable to obtain the opinion of
    the Attorney-General on the points raised." ...

It is impossible not to feel that this neglect on the part of someone
at Hong Kong to forward the Chief Justice's letters until the first of
these was a year old (for they were actually sent in August, 1881),
was a designed obstruction of his endeavors to set himself in the
correct light, and to enlighten the Christian public of Great Britain
as to the abuses existing at Hong Kong.

In this letter expressing regret at the delay of his letters, he
speaks of convictions of eight more cases of kidnaping, and "almost
unprecedented brutal assaults on bought c