THE MAN FOR THE OCCASION.
Consistency demanded that either the brothel system at Hong Kong
should be abolished, or domestic slavery and so-called "adoption"
should be tolerated. No other courses were open. In his perplexity,
the Governor asked his learned Chinese interpreter, Dr. Eitel, to give
him further light as to this domestic slavery and "adoption" prevalent
among the Chinese. This request was granted in a document entitled
"Domestic servitude in relation to slavery." Dr. Eitel's main points
were:
Slavery as known to the Westerner "has always been an incident of
race." "Slavery, therefore, has such a peculiar meaning ... that
one ought to hesitate before applying the term rashly" to Chinese
domestic slavery. Slavery in China grows out of the fact that the
father has all power, even to death, over his family. The father,
on the other hand, "has many duties as well as rights." Therefore
his power over his family "is not a mark of tyranny, but of
religious unity." "Few foreigners have comprehended the extent of
social equality, ... the amount of influence which woman, bought
and sold as she is, really has in China,... the depth of domestic
affection, of filial piety, of paternal care." "To deal justly
with the slavery of China, we ought to invent another name for
it." "The law, although sanctioning the sale of children for
purposes of adoption within each clan, and even without, is here
in advance of public opinion, as it expressly allows, by an edict,
... the sale of children only to extremely poor people in times
of famine, and forbids even in that case re-sale of a child once
bought."
This last admission on the part of Dr. Eitel, a fact already pointed
out by Sir John Smale, seems to us to clearly demonstrate that a
pretext was now being sought to justify at Hong Kong a state of things
as to slavery that the laws of China forbade and which in no wise
could be justified as Chinese "custom." "The reason for this immense
demand for young female domestics lies in the system of polygamy which
obtains all over the empire, and which has a religious basis." By this
he means that it is from the Chinese standpoint a religious duty for
a father to leave a son, upon his death, to continue the family
sacrifices. Therefore if the father has no son by his first wife, he
will "take a second or third or fourth wife until he procures a son."
"A family being in urgent distress, and requiring immediately a
certain sum of money, take one of their female children, say five
years old ... to a wealthy family, where the child becomes a member of
the family, and has, perhaps, to look after a baby.... But the child
may be sold out and out. In that case invariably a deed is drawn up."
And this is the state of things concerning which Dr. Eitel says: "Few
foreigners have comprehended the extent of social equality ... the
amount of influence which woman, bought and sold as she is, really
has in China ... the depth of domestic affection, of filial piety, of
parental care," etc.
He adds:
"Considering the deep hold which this system has on the Chinese
people, it is not to be wondered at that Chinese can scarcely
comprehend how an English judge could come to designate this
species of domestic servitude as 'slavery.' On the contrary,
intelligent Chinese look upon this system as the necessary and
indispensable complement of polygamy, as an excellent counter
remedy for the deplorably wide-spread system of infanticide, and
as the natural consequence of the chronic occurrence of famines,
inundations, and rebellions in an over-populated country. But the
abuses to which this system of buying and selling female children
is liable, in the hands of unscrupulous parents and buyers, and
the support it lends to public prostitution, are too patent facts
to require pointing out."
"The moment we examine closely into Chinese slavery and
servitude," declares Dr. Eitel, "from the standpoint of history
and sociology, we find that slavery and servitude have, with
the exception of the system of eunuchs, lost all barbaric and
revolting features." (!) "As this organism has had its certain
natural evolution, it will as certainly undergo in due time a
natural dissolution, which in fact has at more than one point
already set in. But no legislative or executive measures taken in
Hong Kong will hasten this process, which follows its own course
and its own laws laid down by a wise Providence which happily
overrules for the good all that is evil in the world."
There was, indeed, a certain justice in defending the Chinese as
against the foreigner, on Dr. Eitel's part. But two wrongs do not make
a right. From this time onward, the word of sophistry is put in
the mouth of the advocate of domestic slavery, just as the word of
sophistry had been put in the mouth of the advocate of the Contagious
Diseases Ordinance. Mr. Labouchere had spoken of the latter as a means
of protection' for the poor slaves, and the expression, 'protection,'
has been kept prominently to the front ever since Dr. Eitel suggested,
likewise, not a change in the conditions, but a change in the name by
which they were known. Let it be called 'domestic _servitude_' instead
of 'domestic _slavery_.' All the advocates of this domestic slavery
from that time have called the noxious weed by the sweeter name.
Governor Hennessey asked the opinion of others of his officials. One
Acting Police Magistrate replied 'When the servant girls (or slaves
girls, as some prefer to term them) in the families in this Colony are
contented with their lot, and their parents do not claim them, the
police cannot be expected to interfere.' Another said 'Buying and
selling children by the Chinese has been considered a harmless
proceeding, its only effect being to place the purchaser under a legal
and moral obligation to provide for the child until the seller chose
to repudiate the bargain, which he could always do under English law.'
The Attorney General, Mr. O'Malley, when asked (at a later period) his
opinion as to the utterances Sir John Smale had made from time to time
on the subject of slavery, replied to the Governor
"With regard to Sir John Smale's observation, I know that
difficulties national, social, official and financial beset the
Government in reference to the special questions I have raised,
I have only to observe that I have never heard of those
difficulties. My own impression is that the respectable parts
of the community, Chinese as well as European, including the
Government and the police, are fully alive to the brothel and
domestic servitude systems, and as well informed as Sir John Smale
himself as to the real facts. One would suppose from the tone
of his pamphlet that he stood alone in his perception and
denunciation of evil. But I believe the fact is that the Executive
and the community generally are quite as anxious is he is to
insist upon practical precautions necessary to prevent the abuses,
and to diminish the evils naturally connected with these systems,
but they look for this to practical securities and not to
declamation. The obvious line of practical suggestions to take is
that of careful registration and constant inspection of brothels,
so that full and frequent opportunity may be given to all persons
whose freedom may be open to suspicion to know their legal
position, and to assert their liberty if they like ...
Particularly it might be thought right to create a system of
registration applicable to domestic servants and strangers in
family houses. It would be a good thing if Sir John Smale would
place at the disposal of the Government (as I believe he has never
yet done) any facts connected with the brothel system or the
domestic servitude of which he possesses any real knowledge."
This letter gives us some conception of the almost insuperable
difficulties Sir John Smale had to encounter in his endeavor to put
down slavery, for not a case could come up in the Superior Court for
conviction on the Judge's information, of course, for that would
be assuming both prosecuting and judicial powers, and the men who
occupied in turn that office, during Sir John Smale's incumbency,
refused to act in unison with him, and this Attorney General's
language betrays hot prejudice, lack of candor as regarded the facts,
and insolence toward Sir John Smale.
The Attorney General has a fling at the Chief Justice as
"impracticable," yet the only practical suggestion that the former
makes in his letter as to how to meet the conditions he seems to have
taken from Sir John Smale's own words upon which he was asked to
express an opinion. The Chief Justice had said:
"I think the evils complained of might be lessened,--(1) By a
better registration of the inmates of brothels, and by frequently
bringing them before persons to whom they might freely speak as to
their position and wishes, and by such authoritative interference
with the brothel-keepers as should keep them well in fear of
exercising acts of tyranny. (2) By a stringently enforced register
of all inmates of Chinese dwelling-houses, &c., (at least of all
servants) with full inquiry into the conditions of servitude, and
an authoritative restoration of unwilling servants to freedom from
servitude. This would apply to 10,000 (according to Dr. Eitel
20,000) bond servants in Hong Kong."
The injustice of the attack of the Attorney General upon Sir John
Smale was not ignored by Governor Hennessy, when he forwarded Mr.
O'Malley's letter to London. He said:
"The apparent difference between Mr. O'Malley's views on brothel
slavery and the views of Sir John Smale is due to the fact that
Sir John Smale knew that the real brothel slavery exists in the
brothels where Chinese women are provided for European soldiers
and sailors, whereas Mr. O'Malley, in discarding the use of the
word slavery, does so on the assumption that all the Hong Kong
brothels form a part of the Chinese social system, and that the
girls naturally and willingly take to that mode of earning a
livelihood. This is a misconception of the actual facts, for
though the Hong Kong brothels, where Chinese women meet Chinese
only, may seem to provide for such women what Mr. O'Malley calls
'a natural and suitable manner of life' consistent with a part of
the Chinese social system, it is absolutely the reverse in those
Hong Kong brothels where Chinese women have to meet foreigners
only. Such brothels are unknown in the social system of China. The
Chinese girls who are registered by the Government for the use of
Europeans and Americans, detest the life they are compelled
to lead. They have a dread and abhorrence of foreigners, and
especially of the foreign soldiers and sailors. _Such girls are
the real slaves in Hong Kong._"
We underscore the last sentence as a most painful fact in the history
of the dealings of the British officials with the native women of
China, set forth on the authority of the Governor of Hong Kong, who,
with the help of Sir John Smale, the Chief Justice, waged such a
fearless warfare against slavery under the British flag, with such
unworthy misrepresentation and opposition on the part of the other
officials equally responsible with them in preserving the good name of
their country, and in defending rather than trampling upon its laws.
Governor Hennessy continues
"To drive Chinese girls into such brothels [i.e., those for the
use of foreigners] was the object of the system of informers which
Mr. C. C. Smith for so many years conducted in this Colony,
and which in his evidence before the Commission on the 3rd of
December, 1877, he defended on the ground of its necessity in
detecting unlicensed houses, but which your Lordship [Lord
Kimberley, Secretary of State for the Colonies] has now justly
stigmatized as a revolting abuse. On another point the Attorney
General also seems not to appreciate fully what he must have heard
Sir John Smale saying from the Bench in the Supreme Court. It
would be a mistake to think that the Chief Justice had not before
he left the Colony, realized the public opinion of the Chinese
community on the subject of kidnaping. In sentencing a prisoner
for kidnaping, on the 10th of March, 1881, Sir John Smale said he
was bound to declare from the Bench that, to the credit of the
Chinese, a right public opinion had been growing up, and on the
25th of March, 1881, (the last occasion when Sir John Smale spoke
in the Supreme Court of Hong Kong), he said, in a case in
which the kidnapers had been convicted--This case presents two
satisfactory facts first, that a Chinese boat woman handed one of
these prisoners to the police, and that afterward an agent of the
Chinese Society to suppress this class of crime caused the arrest
and conviction of these prisoners. These facts are indicative of
the public mind tending to treat kidnaping as a crime against
society, calling for active suppression. On the same occasion, in
sentencing a woman who had severely beaten an adopted child, Sir
John Smale said, 'In finally disposing of these three cases, with
all their enormity, sources of satisfaction present themselves in
the fact that, in each of these cases, it has been owing to the
spontaneous indignation of Chinese men and women that these crimes
have been brought to the knowledge of the police.' The Governor
closes his letter with the statement, 'It is only due to Sir John
Smale to add that his own action has greatly contributed to foster
the "healthy" public opinion of the native community, which
induced him, when quitting the Supreme Court, to take a hopeful
view of the future of this important subject.'"