an most European
countries."

The report goes on to show that nevertheless the practice of polygamy,

"leaving the childless concubines liable to be sold or sent adrift
at any moment, the law of inheritance neglecting daughters in
favour of sons," and "the universal practice of buying and selling
females combined with the system of domestic servitude," makes
the suppression of prostitution difficult. "This intermixture of
female slavery with prostitution has been noticed in Hong Kong at
the very time when the Legislature first attempted to deal with
Chinese prostitution."

We now understand the nature of this wretched form of slavery as
carried on at Hong Kong. There did not exist a class of women brought
to the pitiable plight of prostitution by the wiles of the seducer, or
through the mishap of a lapse from virtue, after which all doors
to reform are practically closed against such, as in Western
civilization, nor were there those known to have fallen through innate
perversity; but such as existed among the Chinese were literal
slaves, in the full sense of that word. From the standpoint of these
officials, for the most part, prostitution was necessary. This was
plainly declared in many official documents. The fact that they
licensed brothels proves also that prostitution was considered
necessary. And since necessary, if the means failed whereby brothels
in the Occident are maintained, then they must be maintained by
Oriental means,--which was slavery. Under such circumstances, to
license prostitution meant, from the very nature of the case, to
license slavery. To encourage prostitution, as it always is encouraged
by the Contagious Diseases Acts, meant to encourage slavery. Hence
they reasoned, and declared--to use the language of the Registrar
General, Cecil C. Smith--that it was "useless to try and deal with
the question of the freedom of Chinese prostitutes by law or by
any Government regulation. From all the surroundings the thing is
impracticable."

It must be admitted that the conditions at Hong Kong favored the
development of social impurity. From the moment of British occupation,
and before, in fact, there were at that place large numbers of
unmarried soldiers and sailors, many of very loose morals; also
many men in civil and military positions as officials, and numerous
merchants, etc., most of them separated far from their families and
the restraints that surrounded t