had laid out upwards
of 40,000l. sterling in building, and was still laying out more, when I
quitted it. This is, certainly, by far the largest expenditure that has
been made by any single establishment: but many others have spent from
6000l. to 10,000l. in a similar way; and the outlay by individuals on
speculation, is by no means inconsiderable.

The Chinese population of Victoria and the neighbourhood amounted, last
January, to ten thousand souls; certainly not the choicest collection
that could be wished, as the number of robberies that take place in and
about the town sufficiently testify. This evil the magistrates were,
however, doing their best to remedy; and some scores of idle vagabonds
had been sent across the Channel dividing the Island from the main land
of China. Some of the chiefs of the robber-gangs had been apprehended
and set to work on the roads, in irons; a proceeding that alarmed their
confederates not a little.[24]

[Footnote 24: An account of the capture of two of these scamps
was given to me by the chief magistrate, the day before I left
Victoria, and was to the following effect:--A China-man in the
pay of the police, though never seen by any magistrate, came to
the police compradore's house one evening, and said: "If you
will send two European constables to a certain spot (which he
named) at nine o'clock to night, I will shew them where they
will find two robber-chiefs smoking opium and looking over
their gains." This hint was immediately communicated to the
chief magistrate, who at once resolved to act upon it, and sent
the constables to the spot indicated. There, the spy met them,
masked, and made signs for them to be silent and follow him. He
guided them down past West Point upwards of a mile, when he
turned up the hill by a footpath, which, in half an hour,
brought the party to a small hut, through the crevices in the
wall of which a light was visible. To the door of this hut, the
guide significantly pointed, and instantly disappeared without
uttering a word. The constables took the hint, and burst the
door open, when they found what they had been led to expect;
two men smoking opium, the room almost full of European
clothing and other stolen property, quite sufficient to convict
the smokers of unfair play towards the late owners of it. These
men were of course secured; and the day I sailed from Hon