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by the hands of those officials themselves, must be regarded, not merely as a wanton waste of public records belonging to another and an independent department of the service,—but, much more, as a deliberate spoliation of evidence, the production whereof was known to be, at the period of such spoliation, most necessary to the due determination of imputations of the gravest magnitude, on the character and conduct of that officer, whom the Hong Kong Govern ment had made the sole representative of the Queen of England, before the eyes of Her Majesty's Chinese subjects, the sole medium through which they were to receive and learn their lesson, of allegiance and loyalty, to the still higher Majesty of English Law.
Nevertheless, that spoliation of evidence was committed;—by the hand of Mr. Mongan, in obedience to the orders of Dr. Bridges, and with the assent—so the latter asserts—most certainly with the tacit connivance—of Sir John Bowring.
The guilty mind can rarely, with safety to its scheme of defence, condescend upon particulars, and least of all upon dates.
In the present instance, it is to me nearly indifferent, whether I take, as the true date of spoliation, the unsworn and more favourable computation, with which the Caldwell Commissioners suffered themselves to be amused, or that computation—probably much less untrue—which, under the pressure of a cross-examination upon oath, was wrung from the Acting Colonial Secretary, Dr. Bridges, at the trial in the Supreme Court.
In the first hypothesis, the burning of the documents took place 'between the 20th and the 30th March, 1858.'
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