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 imm