🚀 go-pugleaf

that she and a young man were mutually attached to
    each other, and he was anxious to redeem her, and that she was
    desirous of being redeemed, but that the price asked, two thousand
    three hundred dollars, was more than he was willing to give,
    though he was willing to give two thousand dollars.... There is
    little doubt that his inability to redeem her caused her to commit
    suicide.... The pocket-mother was not produced [at the inquest],
    and there was a general disposition on the part of the Chinese
    witnesses to withhold information."

Lord Ripon said in his letter of inquiry: "If the facts were as stated
in the above-mentioned paper, it would seem to prove that it is not
generally understood in the Colony that a brothel keeper has no legal
right to demand any redemption money for the release of one of the
inmates." To this the Magistrate replies, in explanation:

    "It is not quite correct to speak of the brothel-keeper as
    demanding redemption money. The person whose property the
    prostitute is is the pocket-mother, that is to say, the purchaser
    of the girl. Nearly every prostitute has her own pocket-mother,
    and she it is who has sole control over the