The Commissioner of Police having made representations regarding the large number of armed robberies and the difficulty perienced in detecting eases of pos-sension of arms, his proposal that the Council should issue permits for the possession (as distinct from the carrying) of firearms has been approved, und also his recommendation that a' fee of is, 6 per annum be charged for each' permit. Under Articles 14 and 205 of the Chinese Provisional Criminal Code, permission may be grated to Chinese and others subject to Chinese juris diction to keep arms for their own protection, Article 8 of the Special Police Law for the preservation of order permits the administrative authorities to prohibit the keeping of arms secretly.
At this hearing one of the defendants produced the end sed eard (a translation of which is attached) which purported to authorise these Settlement and outside appeared to have a bona-fde belief in their right to levy this tax and to consider they were perfectly within their rights. The Court took this view and dismissed the It is to be noted that the eard produced by the defendants specially states that "Letters have been sent to officials and Police of this." No record of this is before me. Had such a notice been inued it would have bean the subject of protest.
It is further to be noted that foreign and Chinese cigarette companies (including Messrs. Nanyang Brothers and the British-American Mbegul Collection of Taxes in Settlement.
In terms of the following letter, 'a protest has been lodged by the Council with the Senior Consul against an attempt on the part of an extra-Settlement Authority to enforce a Tobacco Tax within the Tobacco Company) submit to and pay this tax, but not within the Settlement.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.