Page:Wrong and Right Methods of Dealing with Social Evil - Elizabeth Blackwell (1883).djvu/88

78 exposing the wrong-doing of the Hong-Kong agents; blame for the publication of intolerable evils; blame for referring to the sale of children; and there is refusal to believe the evidence of residents or natives, if it tells against the Government regulations.

As the Hong-Kong Acts were established for the physical benefit of "Her Majesty's naval and military forces stationed at, or visiting Hong-Kong," Sir Michael Hicks Beach (Colonial), on learning the infamies perpetrated under these Acts, writes, in 1879, to the Lords Commissioners of the Admiralty for advice. He tells them of such evils as employing paid informers to discover prostitutes; seizing marked money in unlicensed houses; illegal practice of arresting, instead of issuing summonses to, inmates of bad houses; the medical examination of women not prostitutes, etc. To this appeal the Lords of the Admiralty reply that "they decline to criticise the Hong-Kong ordinances, but trust the Act will be continued in that Colony, where it has proved of much benefit to Her Majesty's Navy."

The Admiralty being again urged to act, throw the whole matter into the hands of an official working the Acts.

The correspondence continues during 1881. Through the whole of it, not a word is said about restraining men, not a hint of appeal to the manliness of British seamen to show pity, or an English