1082 ADMINISTRATION AND LEGISLATION [PART V
immoral, or he is a pauper, or he has some other objection
which can be defined in an Act of Parliament, and by which
the exclusion can be managed with regard to all those whom
you really desire to exclude.
He then reiterated his approval of the Natal principle, and
invited the adoption of a settlement which would spare the
feelings of the Indian subjects of the Queen while protecting
the Colonies from any invasion of the class to whom they
would justly object.
The Conference ended without a definite settlement, but
the report expressed confidence that a solution on the lines
indicated was possible.
The Natal Act No. 1 of 1897 referred to in the speech by
Mr. Chamberlain embodied the principle of a test of writing in
a Huropean language an application for admission in a pre-
scribed form, as well as excluding paupers, idiots, diseased per-
sons, criminals, and prostitutes, and it was held up to approval
also as regards the question of Japanese susceptibilities in a
dispatch of October 20, 1897, from Mr. Chamberlain to the
Australian Colonies, which was published in Australia! In
it he said that M. Kato, the Japanese Minister, would be
satisfied by the exclusion of Japanese by a language test,
and the same principle might well be adopted with regard
to Indians. Western Australia legislated in 1897 (No. 13)
on these lines. New South Wales proceeded to adopt this
principle in 1898 (No. 3), the Bill being restricted to the
writing test by the Legislative Council, and Tasmania did
so in 1898 (No. 69), while New Zealand adopted a similar
Act (No. 33) in the next year. In Victoria the two Houses
disagreed, and nothing was done. But in 1900, according to
a return given to the House of Commons? no restrictions had
been adopted in South Australia, in Victoria, or in Western
Australia, except that a special Act of 1897 provided for
the introduction of indentured labour, and in Queensland
there were certain minor restrictions? On the coming into
' Commonwealth Parl. Pap., 1901, No. 41.
Parl. Pap., H. C, 393, Sess. 2, 1900.
The franchise was not given for the Assembly except for a freehold
