The plaintiff's own evidence is in accordance with her petition. The necessity for putting the property unch protection of a foreigner's name arose, she says, from claim made by one Go (or Wu) Tok-kun, whose father had sold the property to the plaintiff's husband.
Tt would appear from the documents put in that the property was originally conveyed to the plaintiff's husband by Go Tok-kun's father by way of mortgage, and Go Tek-kan's claim would seem to have been based on this circumstance.
However this may be, Go Tek-kun, ao-cording to the plaintiff, applied to St. Julien Edwards to assist him, and St.
Tulion Edwards sent for the plaintiff and told her that Go Tek-kun laid claim to the property, and it was on account of this that she had recourse to the defendant. Her husband was dead, and her opponents were very pressing. Go Tok-kun, she said, was a Saigon man and claimed ' the protection of the French Consular Agent. The land was within the limits of foreign residence, and there was a foreign-built house on it, which she says was on it when the land was taken over by her husband.
Tt was occupied by foreigner, Dr. McDougall, who had paid the rent to her son who collected it for hei the rent book was put in, the rent forthe month of February 1896 was paid to the son on the 28th of January, 1896, that payment for March was made on the 3ré of March and for April on the 8th of April, but to whom those two months' rent was made doos not appear. Before the May rent was due, however, the French Consular Agent had apparently intervened, and payment of the rent for the months of May, y Sune, July, and August was made to him on the 10th of August. The existence of Go Tek-kun's claim is clearly proved and under the circumstances the advice to her to transfer the property to signor and preferably to a British subject, was what would most naturally occur to any one conversant with the conditions prevailing at the Treaty Ports. It may be here observed that it is no part of this case to examine into the monte of the contest between the plaintiff and Go "Tek-kun. The result would seem to show that Go Tek-kun's claim was finally abandoned bus its only importance here is s explaining the plaintiff's action.
The plaintiffs advisor and agent at this time was one Ong Bo or Wong Bo. He is still alive, and has given his evidence as to the occurrences. He consulted one Chang Siew-kun, otherwise called Wong who recommended the defendant as a proper person to apply to for assistance, he being 'a man of some, influence and having an acquaintance with Edwards who was pressing Go Tek-kun's claim. since then, and we therefore lose the benefit of their testimony in clearing up the conflict of evidence between the plaintiff and the defendant.
This much is clear that the plaintiff executed a document in Chinese which was treated by the defendant as giving him a charge over the property for $4,000. This document he took to Edwards, with the result that Edwards gave up his advocacy of Go Tek-kun's claim, and became a purchaser of the property himself, giving the plaintiff an undertaking to defend her against the claim. The transfer by the plaintiff to Edwards which was witnessed by the United States Consul is dated the 6th of August 1896 and "Whether this latter date is'& tee is dated the 7th of
mistake or not does not appear, but its genuineness seems to be confirmed by the the|fact that in the conveyance to him Edwards took a convenant against the lawful claims and demands of all persons claiming by, through, or under her, "but inst none others."
The plaintiff it appears to mo has iven a sufficient reason why she should jove executed a document purporting, to mortgage the property to the ant without at the time requiring any loan from defendant. That she a fact at the time require a loan ie it apy to me satisfactorily proved. She denies that she did receive in this she receives a certain amount of confirmation from the evidence of those who would probably have known if she had received such " largo sum as $4,000. Mr. White-Cooper who has made on behalf of the defendant every point that could properly be made, has laid stress on her verbal acknowledgment to Bt. Jalien Edwards that she had received the money from the defendant. But when the ciroamstances are considered it is quite natural that she should have made such acknowledgment. Edwards was at the time pressing Go Tok-kun's claim, and the mortgage tothe defendant was prepared as a shield claim, and it would h as such if it had been admitted that the money had never been advanced.
But then comes the 1c upon" which it appears to me, the case turns, the evidence of what took place after the payment of the purchase money by Edwards. As to one thing there is no dispute. The defendant on the 6th of August 1896 received at the United States Consulate either from the plaintiff or direct from Edwards the cheque for $5,000 which Edwards gave as the purchase money of the property. The de-fondant took that cheque to the Hongkong and Shanghai Bank, and having obtained $1,000 in cash paid that sum to Ong Bo, and placed the balance of $4,000 on deposit in that Bank in his own If, as the defendant asserts no claim for that $4,000 was made to him by the plaintiff from thet day until he left Amoy in the following November, then the defendant would, to say the least, have very strong grounds indeed for asking that the plaintiffs claim should be considered wholly unfounded. But according to the story of the plaintiff demand was at once made for '$4,000 and repeated until the defendant's departure, and the demand was mot by excuses and promises but by no denial of indebtedness. Ong Bo says:—"On leaving the U.8. Consulate, defendant
said he might go over and wait for him said witness need not ea with him: tt defendant's hong, the Yuan Chi hong witness with plaintiff and her son wont
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.