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Rh Scotland Yard, reported in 1857 that the proportionate number and gravity of offences committed in Hongkong was considerably less than that of the British metropolis. The execution (in 1854) of two Europeans, who had murdered a Chinese boy on the ship Mastiff, greatly impressed the Chinese residents with the equality of justice dealt out by British tribunals. In 1854 and 1855, gangs of robbers, having their lairs on the hillside or on the Peak, engaged in occasional skirmishes with the police (April 24, 1855) and made a daring attack (November, 1855) on some shops in Aberdeen, when several constables were wounded while the robbers sailed away with their booty in a junk. The conviction (June, 1854) of a Chinese boatman and his wife of the murder of a Mr. Perkis, the attack made by an armed gang on the comprador's office of Wardley & Co. (December, 1855), a similar attack made on shops at Jardine's Bazaar (January 1, 1856), when several private policemen of Jardine, Matheson & Co. were wounded, and finally the murder (April 1, 1857) of Mr. Ch. Markwick by his Chinese servant, were the principal crimes, unconnected with the war, that attracted public attention during this period. In the latter case, the Registrar General (D. R. Caldwell) pursuing the murderer with the assistance of a gunboat to his native village, obtained his surrender by the threat of bombarding the village. The Secretary of State subsequently expressed his disapproval of this measure. Nevertheless the District city of Namtao was (March 19, 1859) actually bombarded by H.M.S. Cruiser (Captain Bythesea) to compel reparation for the sum of $4,500 which, as the comprador of the Registrar General's Office alleged, bad been stolen by Namtao braves from a Hongkong passage-boat in which he had an interest. These were high-handed measures inspired by the war-spirit of the time rather than by justice.

Sir J. Bowring believed that the spot where almost all crime was concocted in Hongkong was to be found in the unlicensed gambling houses of Taipingshan. In connection with this belief, and in view of the apparent impossibility of finding constables who would not wink at and profit by existing 22