MR. GILPINasked the Under Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, If any and what steps have been taken to restore the kidnapped natives of the Fiji Islands who survived the massacre of their companions on board the "Karl" to their own country; and, if nothing has been done hitherto, whether the Government is prepared to insist on such restoration, that the planters may not have the benefit of the stolen labour, which there is too much reason to fear had been obtained at their instigation?
§ VISCOUNT ENFIELDMr. March reported on the 10th of last September that 10 of the natives rescued from the ship Karl had been sent by him to their homes by the British ship Rifle. The remainder were waiting in Fiji for an opportunity to return home, and Her Majesty's Government are taking steps to carry out this object, if practicable.
§ Afterwards—
§ ADMIRAL ERSKINEasked the Under Secretary of State for the Colonies, If it is true that a sentence of death passed on the 20th of November last, in the Criminal Court of New South Wales, on the master and mate of the British brig "Karl," for murders described by the Judge on passing sentence, as "of so terrible a nature as to be hitherto almost unknown to civilized men," has been commuted for a milder punishment; and, if so, if he can state the reasons for such commutation; and, if Her Majesty's Government are aware that the "Karl," together with the kidnapped Polynesians who survived the massacre for which the master and mate were tried, was given up to one of the Ministers of the now acknowledged Government of Fiji, in part payment of his account as agent for the vessel, and is supposed to be again engaged in the so called "labour traffic?"
§ MR. KNATCHBULL-HUGESSENThe capital sentences passed upon Dowden and Armstrong, the two men convicted of murdering a large number of Polynesians on board the ship Karl, have been commuted to penal servitude for life—the first three years in irons. It was thought by the authorities at Sydney that it would have been improper to execute these men, seeing that they were in the service and acting under the orders of Dr. Murray, the owner of the brig, and that he, the instigator and most active perpetrator of the murders, had escaped all punishment by being accepted as Queen's evidence against his own employés. Perhaps it is right I should add that but for the information given by Dr. Murray these atrocities would probably never have been discovered, and that when he was accepted as Queen's evidence it was not suspected that he himself was the worst criminal. With regard to the second part of the Question, my noble Friend has already answered as to the kidnapped Polyne- 894 sians. As to the brig Karl, we have no official information of her disposal; but from a correspondence in The Sydney Morning Herald of the 30th of December last I gather that she had been seized and condemned to be sold for the benefit mainly of the agents, and that the British Consul had protested against the sale because no cognizance had been taken of the claims of British mortgagees.