Crime and Government at Hong Kong/The Case of the Queen v. William Tarrant
THE CASE OF THE QUEEN v. WILLIAM TARRANT, FOR SEDITIOUS LIBEL; TRIED AT THE NOVEMBER SESSIONS OF THE HONG KONG SUPREME COURT, 1858.
Mah Chow Wong had been charged before the Police Court, in July, 1857, on two informations, for piracy, and confederating with pirates.
The sitting magistrate was, in the first instance, Mr. May, J.P., and afterwards Mr. Davies, the chief magistrate; an order to that effect having been obtained by Mr. Caldwell, J.P., through his influence with Dr. Bridges.
If the chief magistrate was selected, because—a new arrival in the colony—he was likely to know but little of the pirate's history, there was, in the two cases before him, more than enough to make him very conversant with the main incidents in that history, long before he found himself in a position to commit both cases for trial in the Supreme Court.
But Mr. Davies has publicly acknowledged, that, but for the skill, patience, and zeal displayed by Mr. May, from the outset of the case to the end, complete justice would not in all probability have been done.
For Mr. Caldwell, J.P., instead of lending his services, as a detective,[1] to the Government, did his best to defeat the prosecution. It was he who found bail for the prisoner—and his own servant, one Sze-Kai, but recently out of a debtor's prison, was recommended by him to be Mah Chow Wong's responsible bailsman, and on that recommendation, accepted—a fact found by the Commission.[2] It was by him that Mah Chow Wong's witnesses were marshalled. It was he who procured his own attorney to appear for the culprit, instructed him, and assisted him at consultations. It was by him, in fine, sitting on the bench as justice of the peace, that attempts were made, at an early stage of the first case, to prime the chief magistrate with thoughts favourable to the prisoner; until Mr. Davies found it necessary to remind him, that the alleged Chinese affinity with that prisoner, through his (Mr. Caldwell's) former concubine, Awoon, made it highly indelicate to be there sitting on the bench at all, whilst Chinamen were amongst the spectators, and, on the same ground, caused him to be warned to stay away from that bench during the subsequent examinations.
The books and papers of the pirate had been seized in his Hong. They contained numerous entries, of Mr. Caldwell's participation in the secret business and profits of the pirate. There were entries of moneys received from him—of moneys paid or payable to him —of arms, stinkpots, and munitions of piracy, supplied by, or through, him—of his connection, as agent or manager of the 'Sun-on-Wo,' or House of the Sun-on people at Hong Kong, (the gang of Mah Chow Wong)—of communications with the Chinese enemy on the opposite shore, at a time when rewards for Barbarian heads were the subject of every proclamation—of dealings with gambling-houses at Hong Kong—of administration of Mah Chow Wong's estate of Tsim-char-chew already mentioned, on the other shore, the rightful inheritance of the Tung family,—and of the transactions of the now confessed partnership in the lorchas. At a preliminary examination, some of these items were read out openly in a crowded police court. Mr. Caldwell knew—he could not but have known—the existence of these dishonouring entries. But he made no sign of knowledge. He continued, after as before, and even to the last, openly to befriend the pirate whose hand had recorded those entries to his discredit; he tried to prevent a committal, and he failed; he tried to prevent a conviction in the Supreme Court, and he failed; he tried to strip that conviction of all its fruit, and, but for Mr. May, the Superintendent of Police, and Mr. Dixson, the Government Printer, he would have succeeded. As it happened, however, even that hopeful attempt failed also; and it has since failed so often as renewed, the facts being too strong and notorious;—until at length, after more than a year's expectation, the confederates have been compelled to send forth Mah Chow Wong to his place of transportation. He was sentenced in the first week of September, 1857. He was not sent away from Hong Kong, until the end of November, 1858.
The pretext, on which both Dr. Bridges and Mr. Caldwell wished the Executive Council to grant the pardon and release of the miscreant, was, that the evidence, on which the conviction was, to their minds, and to those of Mr. Day (the prisoner's counsel, who was afterwards appointed to be my successor), and of Mr. Stace, the prisoner's and Mr. Caldwell's attorney, not satisfactory.
But, even assuming their pretended doubts to be well founded, there was still another information against him for a fresh piracy, and on much stronger evidence, outstanding against him. Sir John Bowring, in the Legislative Council, on the 10th May, 1858, indeed, hastily declared, that he had ordered a nolle prosequi upon the latter information;[3] an arbitrary and illegal interference with justice, which it would be hard to charge against His Excellency, upon such slender ground as his own unsupported assertion;—opposed, as that assertion is, to the evidence of his Acting Attorney General and his Acting Colonial Secretary, and to the probabilities of the case.
That it was determined, however, to release Mah Chow Wong, even pending that second information, because of the pretended want of evidence against him to support the first, there can be no doubt whatever. For it is now admitted by Dr. Bridges himself, and upon oath.
And I will now narrate the steps by which that result was to be arrived at.
The pirate's books and papers had been considered, by the Supreme Court, the principal evidence against him.
It was now resolved to rest his claim of pardon upon the bold denial, of their containing any evidence whatever of his guilt; and the "scientific" evidence of Mr. Caldwell—competent enough in the colloquial dialect, but hardly able to read the Chinese character—was vouched in proof of that assertion.
Access had been allowed him to all the books and papers at the Police Office, and, apparently, at the Supreme Court;—and, by a more criminal indulgence an order was made for the delivery to the "convict's friends," of the residue, which had been left at the Central Police Station; and this order was presented by Mr. Caldwell himself, as the "friend" of the convict; and it was executed in his favour.
But a very simple circumstance had occurred, which seriously hindered the working of the scheme. Mr. Dixson, the Government printer—from of old steady and vigilant in his distrust of the "connection" between Mr. Caldwell and Mah Chow Wong[4]—had heard with surprise of the intention to pardon the convict, and let him loose again upon the community.
To defeat this design, he printed in his newspaper[5] an analysis of so much of the contents of the books and papers as convicted Mah Chow Wong and also, but with hesitation, some of those which did the same for Mr. Caldwell.
Mr. Dixson was invited to attend the Executive Council, and give in the authority for his version. Mr. Dixson did attend; and, after being browbeaten by the Government, he says, as if–not Mah Chow Wong, but—"he himself was on his trial," did, with Mr. May's permission, vouch Mr. May and the "Two Memoranda," which, with Tong Akii's help, he had compiled from those documents. Mr. May, who was also present, produced and verified those "Memoranda," and they were read aloud by the clerk.
Their contents being to the effect above stated, the reading excited the greatest sensation in the minds of all present. Nor was this sensation diminished, when, at the Governor's instance, a private report, negativing the existence of any suspicious entries, or of any entries whatever, except a few unimportant ones, was also produced and read.[6]
It is now admitted, that this report had been prepared and presented by Mr. Caldwell himself—the party under suspicion of practising deceit upon the Government;—that the books and papers had actually been referred to him for that purpose;—that, although the Acting Chinese Secretary, Mr. Mongan, had been directed to "help" him, the chief part in the examination had fallen the accused, and that the labour of his assistant ad been "very cursory";—that all these documents had meanwhile remained in the custody of the Chinese clerks of the Plenipotentiary, Sir John Bowring, with whom they had been lodged by Dr. Bridges, on his obtaining the loan of them from the magistracy, for the purposes of this pretended examination;—and that there is no doubt that, even before they reached Mr. Mongan's hands, already an abstraction of documentary evidence—and this for the express purpose of enabling Mah Chow Wong to make out his fiction of a lack of evidence and so entitle himself to a pardon,—had taken place.
"The council," says Mr. Dixson, an eye-witness, "was very suddenly broken up." Under all the circumstances, and the more especially because strangers were present, I can very well imagine it.
These facts becoming public, a show of zeal was needed to quench the scandal,
A new reference was directed, but to Mr. Wade, this time, the chief Chinese Secretary. Dr. Bridges caused the papers—including Mr. May's "Two Memoranda"—to be submitted to that gentleman for his opinion and report. Only he forgot to inform him, that Mr. Mongan was of opinion that some of the documents had been abstracted by the friends of Mah Chow Wong, subsequently to the preparation of those "Memoranda" by Mr. May.
In Mr. Wade's possession these documents remained, down to his departure with Lord Elgin's mission to the North of China. He left behind him, in the Chinese Secretary's Office, the books and papers of the pirate's Hong, but not Mr. May's "Memoranda." These, by some accident, were confused with the papers of the mission, stowed in his despatch box, and so carried to the north. No communication having been made to him on the subject, from Hong Kong, it was not until his return to Shanghae, to wards the beginning of this year, that he learned that they had been inquired after by Mr. May, and their very existence ignored, or even denied, by Dr. Bridges and Sir John Bowring, and the grossest aspersions cast on the veracity of those who asserted them to have been in his custody. When I left Hong Kong for England, the arrival of those important documents from Shanghae was hourly expected.
During the proceedings in this case of Mah Chow Wong, from his third or fourth appearance in the Police Court, down to about six weeks after the sifted books and papers of his Hong, and the "Two Memoranda" of Mr. May, thus got into Mr. Wade's hands, I had been absent in India upon sick leave. I never heard a syllable of what had occurred, until after my return.
But I now endeavoured to recall the attention of Government, to the scandalous connection between Mah Chow Wong and Mr. Caldwell; on which I had, on the 4th July, 1857, already officialised His Excellency, begging a reference to the heads of the Police and Jail Departments; and on which the gentlemen in question, Mr. May, J.P., and Mr. Inglis, J.P., being so referred to, had expressed sentiments in unison with mine, and had moreover submitted, in illustration and support of those opinions, facts previously unknown to me.
In the presence of these endeavours, on my part, of the general distrust of Mr. Caldwell amongst the public departments, and of the conviction, which every one, conversant with the proceedings in Executive Council, must have entertained, of the dishonest purpose, with which he had composed his false compilation of the entries relating to the convict and himself, it cannot but have occurred to the minds of Sir John Bowring and Dr. Bridges, that, as well the originals, as Mr. May's "memoranda" from them, were now of as much importance as ever, if, indeed, they had not become—(regard being had to the use I was like to make of them)—of still greater importance, than when the question they were used to solve, was merely one of the guilt or innocence of a Hong Kong Chinese convict.
Therefore their destruction, at such a juncture, 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.'
In the latter, it was "about six weeks before the fact, of their having been burned, was made known by Government to the Commission;" which appears by their minutes to have not been made known to them until the 17th June then following.
In either hypothesis, the spoliation of evidence was perpetrated, long after my conclusions and intentions were fully apprehended.
Only, if the latter hypothesis be the true one—and, since it is the latest, and also given in upon oath, and, therefore, the more mature of the twain, I am bound to assume that it is the least untrue—it will follow, that the said spoliation did not take place until about five days, at least, after the debate of the 10th May last,[7] in the Legislative Council upon the case of Mr. Caldwell's connection with Mah Chow Wong—in which debate, the Government and Dr. Bridges both admitted that the documents were, at that time, in existence and producible—about two days after my own resignation of the Justiceship of the Peace,[8] on the express ground of Mr. Caldwell's being still retained in the commission of the peace— about a day after the second debate (14th May, 1858), in the Legislative Council on the same subject, when the former admission of their existence was reiterated —about two days before the date of my appeal to the Secretary of State,[9]—and about the same number of days before the first official announcement[10] of any intention, on the part of the Bowring and Bridges' Government, to institute any inquiry whatever into any matters which the production of those documents—if not destroyed—could, by any possibility, have elucidated.
In either hypothesis, therefore, I am prepared to adopt the language of the libel, which formed the subject-matter of prosecution, in the Queen v. Tarrant, and to say of this spoliation of evidence,— in its connection with the absurd findings of the Caldwell Commission with respect to it, that, if "the principal charge broke down"—it was solely "through a contemptible and damnable trick, on the part of the Government—a trick, which should certainly be punished in some way or other: for it is farcical to suppose, that it was not performed after deep meditation, and with reference to consequences."[11]
For these words, which, in the judgment of those spoliators of evidence, amounted to seditious libel against the Queen, Mr. Tarrant, the proprietor of the newspaper in which they appeared, was put upon his trial for that misdemeanor. It is true, that he had merited prosecution, for daring to give evidence, before the Caldwell Commission, of the early life and conversation of the Protector of Chinese and Brothels' Licenser.
I subjoin a concise, but on the whole, accurate report of the proceedings and evidence, which I find in the Daily Press.[12] INFORMATION.
IN THE SUPREME COURT OF HONG KONG.
The Eighteenth day of November, One thousand eighth hundred and fifty-eight.
Hong Kong to wit.—The Acting Attorney-General charges William Tarrant, of the Colony of Hong Kong aforesaid, Editor of the Newspaper called the Friend of China, with having, with intent to move the Queen's subjects to hatred and contempt of the Queen's Government in the said Colony, and to cause it to be believed that a certain grave and scandalous charge having been preferred, with others to the said Government, against Daniel Richard Caldwell, Esquire, Registrar-General of the said Colony, and submitted to the investigation of a Commission appointed for that purpose by Sir John Bowring, the Governor of the said Colony, and which said charge might have been satisfactorily proved before the said Commission, but for the interference of the said Government to prevent it, the said Government had perpetrated some wicked and contemptible manoeuvre for the purpose of preventing, and in effect had thereby prevented, the establishment of the said charge to the satisfaction of the said Commission, heretofore, to wit on the twenty-eighth day of July in this present year, one thousand eight hundred and fifty-eight, in the Colony aforesaid, falsely and maliciously printed and published a certain scandalous, false, and malicious libel of and concerning the said Government according to the tenor and effect following (that is to say), "the principal charge" (meaning the said charge against the said Daniel Richard Caldwell) "broke down," (meaning that the said charge was not established to the satisfaction of the said Commission) "through a contemptible, damnable trick on the part of Government" (meaning the said Government), "a trick which should certainly be punished in some way or other, for it is farcical to suppose that it was not performed after deep mediation and with reference to consequences."
William Tarrant, take notice that you will be tried on this Information at the Criminal Sessions at the Supreme Conrt, to be holden at Victoria, in and for the Colony of Hong Hong, on the eighteenth day of November, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and fifty-eight, and following days.
PLEA.
IN THE SUPREME COURT OF HONG KONG.
The Queen against William Tarrant.
And now the said William Tarrant in his own proper person comes into Court here, and having heard the said information read, says that he is not guilty of the premises charged in the said information or any part thereof.
And for a further plea to the said Information, the said defendant protesting that he is not guilty as aforesaid, nevertheless, according to the form of the statute in such case provided, says that the said alleged libel in the said Information mentioned was printed and published by him, the said defendant, after the passing of the Act of Parliament of the seventh year of the Queen, chapter ninety-six, to wit on the day and year in the said Information mentioned, and not otherwise; and that, before the composing, printing, and publishing of the same alleged libel, to wit on the 26th day of January, in the 21st year of the said Queen, one William Thomas Bridges did, by connivance with Sir John Bowring, in the said Information mentioned, unlawfully, contemptuously, and against the express declaration of the said Queen and of the Government of the Queen, accroach, assume and usurp unto himself the Government of the said Colony, and the powers, authorities, and duties thereof within the same, and in particular, the authority to bind the obedience of the several departments of and subordinate to the said Government of the said Colony, and to require command and compel the several officers thereof, in all cases, to consider, respect, and render obedience, to all instructions given by him, the said W. T. Bridges, as though the same instructions had emanated, or should emanate, from a Governor lawfully appointed by the said Queen, in and for the said Colony; and such his unlawful accroachments, assumptions, and usurpations did—on the day and year last aforesaid—publish and notify unto the several proper officers of all the said departments respectively, for the information and guidance of them, and of all other officers of the Colonial Government, to wit, the said Government of the said Queen in the said Colony, and with intent to cause and compel them respectively to submit to his pretended authority, and to obey him, the said W. T. Bridges, and his said accroached, assumed, and usurped Government, and other his accroachments, assumptions, and usurpations aforesaid. And the said defendant further says, that the said William Thomas Bridges did afterwards, to wit, on the day and year last aforesaid, act in and exercise his said pretended authority and other the functions, powers, and authorities of his said accroached, assumed, and usurped Government, and did, from the day and year last aforesaid, for a consider able time, to wit, down to the composing, printing, and publishing of the alleged libel, continue so to accroach, assume, and usurp as aforesaid, and so to act in and exercise the same pretended authority, and other the said functions, powers, and authorities as aforesaid. And the said defendant further says, that, during the said continuance of the said W. T. Bridges so to accroach, assume, and usurp, and so to act and exercise as aforesaid, and before the composing, printing, and publishing of the said alleged libel, to wit, on or about the month of May, in the twenty-first year of the said Queen, he, the said W. T. Bridges, did unlawfully, contemptuously, and against the express declaration of the said Queen, cause certain public papers and records of the said Queen, of great value and importance to the peace and good order of the said Colony, and to the honour and reputation of the Queen and her Government, and whereby, if preserved and produced, the truth or falsehood of certain criminal charges and accusations, theretofore made and then pending before the Queen against the said Daniel Richard Caldwell, would appear, and which were then in the said accroached, assumed, and usurped power of the said W. T. Bridges, to be burned and destroyed, to wit, in the said Colony, by the hands of certain persons, unto the said defendant unknown, then having the custody or possession of the said papers and records respectively, and did thereby defeat, avoid, and make impossible whatever inquiry the said Queen or her said Government might, and otherwise would have directed to be made, into the truth or falsehood of the said charges, and the contents of the said papers and records respectively, to wit, in the said Colony; and the said W. T. Bridges did thereupon, to wit, in or about the month of June in the said 21st year of the said Queen, publicly, to wit, in the said Colony, avow and acknowlege his having so caused the said papers and records to be burned and destroyed as aforesaid. Wherefore the said defendant, at the said time and place, in the said Information mentioned, did print and publish, of and concerning the said W. T. Bridges and of his said accroached, assumed, and usurped Government as aforesaid, the said alleged libel in the said Information mentioned, with intent and in order that the said W. T. Bridges, and the said certain other persons unknown, might be lawfully punished for their several and respective actings in the premises. And the said defendant does aver, that it was for the public benefit, that the matters, charged in the said alleged libel in the said Information mentioned, should be printed and published as aforesaid, and that the particular fact by reason whereof it was for the public benefit that the said matter so charged should be so printed and published as aforesaid, was and is that the said alleged libel was so printed and published by the said defendant in order to the lawful punishment of the said W. T. Bridges, and of the said other persons unknown, who then and there were guilty of the lawful and contemptuous actings aforesaid. Without this, that he the said defendant did, at the time in the said Information in that behalf alleged or ever print or publish the said alleged libel, with the intents or with the meanings in the said Information respectively alleged, or with any or either of the same respectively. And this the said defendant is ready to verify. Wherefore he prays Judgment of the Court here, and that he may be dismissed and dis charged of the premises in the Information above specified
(Signed) T. Chisholm Anstey.
REPLICATION,
On the part of the prosecution;—
De Injuria sua propria, absque tali causa;—
On which issue wasjoined. The evidence of the first-named witness (Dr. Bridges, the ex-Colonial Secretary), was to the effect, that he had been Acting Attorney-General in 1854 and 1855, and Acting Colonial Secretary in 1853 and 1858—that by Government he understood the Governor and himself, and no other person or Council—that by a Circular Memorandum of the 26th January, 1858 (which was produced), the Governor had required all departments to attend to every instruction of his (Dr. B.'s), whether it had emanated from the Government or not; and the Governor had also empowered him to intercept and reject official letters on their way to His Excellency, if he thought fit—that the Attorney-General (Mr. Anstey), the Colonial Treasurer (Mr. Forth), the Chlef Magistrate (Mr. Davies), and the Super intendent of Police (Mr. May), had refused to obey this Circular as illegal—that Mr. Anstey had written to the Secretary of State about it—that Mr. Davies had demanded in Legislative Council that the Secretary of State should be consulted—that Mr. May had officially requested in his own case that such a reference might be made—that Dr. Bridges did not know that, from first to last, the Secretary of State had ever been consulted or informed by the Government on the subject—that Mr. May's letter had not been referred home, but the writer had been threatened with suspension or censure for "insubordination"—that the other public departments had submitted to the arrangements made by the Circular—that he (Dr. Bridges) had, whilst Acting Attorney-General, libelled Sir John Bowring, the Governor, in the same newspaper (the Friend of China), by inserting therein an extract from Legare's book, with intent to ridicule him [which libel was read in open court], but that he did not consider it a "seditious" libel—that it did not follow from Sir John and himself being the "Government," that a personal libel against either or both of them would be necessarily "seditious"—that his own libel against Sir John was "personal," not "seditious"—that he could not say what was a seditious libel without seeing it—that he could not say whether the libellous History of the Greek Loan, if published here from the Annual Register for 1826, would be a "seditious" libel or not—that Mah-Chow Wong was a notorious pirate and confederate of pirates, to use the Doctor's own words, and had been a bad character for years—that Mr. Caldwell's alleged intimacy with him was equally notorious—that Mr. Caldwell had made strong efforts to obtain the pirate's pardon, but had been foiled by the production before the Executive Council of certain papers found on a pirate named Beaver, during an inquiry into the items of Mr. May's memo. taken from the papers previously seized in the hong of Mah-Chow Wong the pirate—that, but for Mr. May's memoranda having been produced, the Governor would have pardoned Mah-Chow Wong long before the production of Beaver's papers—Mr. Caldwell was accordingly directed to examine the papers themselves, and compare them with the newspaper report—that Mr. Mongan was merely to assist him—that Mr. Caldwell reported that the papers did not implicate even Mah-Chow Wong, much less himself—that Mr. May's memoranda being then produced in Council, and Mr. Mongan being unable to say more than that his own examination of the papers had been very "cursory," a new inquiry was ordered to be made by his official superior, Mr. Wade—that Mr. Wade's report was either never made, or never produced—that he (Dr. Bridges) had been asked what was to be done with Mah-Chow Wong's papers—that he had ordered them to be burned; and that, as to Mr. May's memoranda, he never knew what had become of them from the time Mr. May put them into his hands. He admitted that, notwithstanding the finding of the Caldwell Committee, his notorious connection with the pirate, and all the reports of the various departments—especially from the Chief Magistrate, of a date subsequent to the Caldwell Commission inquiry, and which were read in Court to him—Mr. Caldwell had not been called to account by Government, because he had done nothing worthy of being called to account for.
The evidence of the second witness (Mr. Mongan, the Assistant Chinese Secretary), proved that Mr. Caldwell examined part of the papers without their having first gone through his hands—that when the papers were received, one of the packages containing them had been opened—that it was his conviction that the papers had been tampered with, and some abstracted, before they came under his charge—that his impression was, that the motive for so tampering with them was the removal of the evidences of guilt against Mah-Chow Wong, whose release it was Mr. Caldwell's object to effect—that he had applied to the Governor as to what was to be done with the papers—that the Governor referred him to Dr. Bridges—that Dr. Bridges had told him to burn them—and that the libel was true thus far at least, that a contemptible, damnable trick had been practised in suppressing those papers.
The evidence of the third and last Government witness (Mr. Cleverly, the Surveyor-General) proved that he had been the Chairman of the Commission of Five appointed by the Governor to investigate Mr. Caldwell's conduct—that two were against Caldwell, and two for him, of whom one (Mr. Lyall) had been named as a friend of Dr. Bridges, and to protect his interests. That he was very much surprised when he learnt that the Mah-Chow Wong papers were burnt—that he had heard them referred to in the Legislative Council in Dr. Bridges' presence on the 10th and 14th May, which was long after the period when it is stated that they were burnt, and they were spoken of as if then in existence—that the demeanour of the Governor and Dr. Bridges on those occasions was such as to lead him and everybody to suppose them still in existence—that the Caldwell Commission had been left to trace the papers, and that it was not until late on the 16th June, when concealment of the fact was impossible, that the destruction had been confessed—that the Governor had repudiated the act in toto—that, during the Caldwell investigation, the evidence of at least twenty witnesses had been rejected, which should have been taken, This was done by a mistake, into which they had been led by the erroneous advice of Mr. Day, the counsel appointed by Dr. Bridges to assist them—that the Government has refused to allow the Attorney-General's protest against Mr. Day's conduct to be printed—that Mr. Caldwell used to interrupt and make gestures to the witnesses deponing against him, which he, as chairman, on the Attorney-General's remonstrance, had stopped—that since the report of the committee had been handed in, further evidence against Mr. Caldwell had come to his knowledge—that the evidence of Dr. Bridges and Mr. Mongan was so different from what had been given by them before the Commission, as to amount to "new evidence"—and that Dr. Bridges had openly declared before the Commission, that he felt himself bound as a brother Freemason to stand by Caldwell, a statement suppressed in the minutes.
So closed the evidence for the Government.
The result was an immediate verdict for the defendant, without calling on his counsel for the defence.
That there might be no doubt of the jury's meaning, I, as counsel for the defendant, reminded them, that he had not only traversed the entire information by the ordinary plea of "Not Guilty," but had also pleaded, in justification of the libel, certain facts, viz., that the government libelled was not the Queen's lawful Government, but the "accroached and usurped" government of one Dr. Bridges; that the libellous matter was true; and that the publication thereof was for the common good.
I then asked them—
"Gentlemen, do you find for the defendant on both these issues?"
And their foreman answered—
"We do!"
They were a special jury of merchants and bankers. I was afterwards assured by one of them, M. Vaucher, the French Consul, that,—far from being prejudiced in the defendant's favour, his bias, if he had one, was to spare so great a reproach to Her Majesty's Government, as such a verdict on such an issue could not fail to cast; but that the facts were too much for him.
To my application for costs against the Crown, the Chief Justice answered most readily—
"You shall certainly have them!"
Nor was this the only disgrace sustained by the Government that day.
On the face of the voluminous and conflicting depositions of the crown witnesses, in the court of the magistrate who had committed the case for trial, wholesale perjury was manifest; insomuch that my friend, Mr. Green, the acting attorney-general, in preference to abiding my threat of exposure, found it prudent not to endorse the names of the greater number of them on his information.
Of the three whom he did call, nevertheless, the first and principal witness, Dr. Bridges, was materially contradicted, not only by the other two, but also by himself, and this on matters of fact within his own knowledge.
Laying hold of these startling contradictions, the defendant, in publishing to his readers the victory he had gained over his prosecutor, distinctly charged the late acting Colonial Secretary with deliberate perjury in the witness-box; assigned the particulars of his charge; and invited a new prosecution of himself for preferring it.
So pointed was the accusation, that Dr. Bridges found himself compelled, by the pressure of public opinion, to notice it.
But, to the wonder and derision of every one, the only notice he did take of it was, by circulating, through another of the newspapers, a letter, informing the world that he meant to take none at all.
This affectation of indifference did not serve. It came too late. Within the past twelve months, he had twice personally prosecuted the same newspaper—in the absence of a material witness—for alleged libels of a much less serious character; and the very perjury, now charged against him, had respect to evidence, given by him in support of a third prosecution, instituted against the same, in the name of his own Government.
Consequently, his present determination not to prosecute, when considered in its natural connection with the solemn contradictions given on oath, by the Chief Magistrate, the Surveyor-General, and another witness, to his own sworn depositions in the police court, upon matters where an honest mistake, on either side, was impossible—not to speak of the intrinsic incoherencies of his own testimony—made the worst possible impression on every one in the community:—
Except only on Sir John Bowring. For so I interpret the astounding fact, communicated to me by the last mail, that, since my departure from the colony, his Excellency has dared to confide into his hands the responsible duty of locum tenens—for fee and reward—to the acting Attorney-General in the Supreme Court;[13]—to the renewed terror of the peaceable Chinese, and to the indignation of the British;-albeit, to the wonder perhaps of none, Chinese or British.
Hong Kong Government, at the best, is an expensive occupation—exceeding the local revenue—and demanding a yearly Parliamentary grant.
It may be doubted whether the new House of Commons will approve the extra allowances, required to defray the cost of these ever-recurring instances of corruption and misgovernment.
- ↑ Ordinance of 1857.
- ↑ Report, p. 2.
- ↑ Minutes, etc., pp. 49, 88.
- ↑ Minutes, pp. 6—9.
- ↑ The China Mail, 17th Sept., 1857.
- ↑ Evidence for the Crown in the Queen v. Tarrant; November Session, 1858.
- ↑ Minutes, etc., p. 32.
- ↑ Letters of the 13th May, 1858, to the Acting Colonial Secretary.
- ↑ Letter of the 17th May, 1858, to Lord Stanley, M.P.
- ↑ Letter of the 17th May, 1858, to myself.
- ↑ Friend of China, newspaper, 28th July, 1858.
- ↑ Daily Press, newspaper, 31st November, 1858.
- ↑ Case of the murderers on board of the "Mastiff." Hong Kong, February Sessions, 1859.