Canton, or Hong-Kong. I saw a vessel in San
Francisco harbour laden with four hundred dead
Chinese. On some of the silent mountain trails
I have come across some of these lonely graves,
only marked with a cleft stick, in which was
stuck a slip of red paper, with the name of the
deceased, followed by one of the sage maxims of
Kungfutzee (Confucius), about the vanity of
things earthly, which the subject of the cousin of
the moon who lay below had already experienced
in his own person.

Every year thousands of Chinese are entering
to supply the place of those who leave, so
that instead of decreasing, their numbers are
increasing with the country. Nobody likes
John over much, and some of the baser sort
have the most determined enmity to him. The
storekeepers don't like him, because he deals
with his own people, though they forget that
he takes nothing from them, and sometimes
does put something in their pockets for mining
tools. Beside, all John's dealings are for ready
money, for though he may haggle long enough
about the price yet he gets no credit, though
worse men may. The labourer doesn't like him,
for he works for lower wages than he. This
is a favourite subject of growling with these
lazy loafers, as they doze away in bar-rooms
with their feet on the top of the stove. Yet
there is room for all of them, and the Chinese
are only taken because white men can't be got.
Politicians don't take him up, because he doesn't
vote, and therefore is of no account in
municipal or state elections, and is not to be
conciliated, while the newspaper editor, who ought
to put in a good word for him, is very lukewarm
on the subject, for John does not
advertise, while his detractors do. Accordingly,
poor John is kicked and abused with very little
chance of redress. He is hunted out of every
good mining locality, and he may think himself
well off if he is not robbed and has his pigtail
cut off as a lesson to him, when of course the
local paper will be sure to repeat the time-
honoured joke about a "long tale being cut
short." Formerly rowdies thought it good fun
to catch a Chinaman and cut his tail off, though,
as every one who knows that people is aware,
he would as soon you took his life, as he is an
outcast among his co-religionists until his "hair
grows." Some of them are Christians, and
have given up this method of hairdressing, but
these are rare exceptions. I am glad, however,
to say that of late years the California legislature
have made it a penal offence to cut off a
Chinaman's pigtail; at the same time I never
heard of anybody being punished, though there
are plenty of pigtails lopped off. In the streets
he is openly insulted. In Christian California I
have seen a poor harmless Chinese stoned by
boys until he was bleeding, hardly one being
manly enough to take his part. I have heard of
others after whom ruffians would hound their
dogs, while the poor persecuted man was torn
and bleeding, and the law touched his assailants
not. The law passes acts against him, taxes
him heavily as he enters, taxes him for making
his living, and taxes him at every turn. It is
quite a perquisite of the local official, this
Chinese taxation, and he is either a very just,
or, by no means, a " smart" man, who cannot
make a revenue out of the unfortunate Celestial.

Even the Digger Indian, taking example from
his superiors (?), persecutes and robs John
also, if he finds him in the mountains; and as
our poor friend will do anything rather than
fight, he comes off very poorly indeed. John,
it must be acknowledged, has an insuperable
objection to paying taxes, notwithstanding his
being in early life accustomed to be " squeezed"
by a mandarin in his own country, and he will
often take to the mountains when he hears of
the sheriff coming his way. In Southern Oregon,
where nearly all the diggings are occupied by
Chinese, the sheriff, in order to take them by
strategy, has to send a few deputies in the guise
of miners, with packs of blankets on their
backs, who surprise John before he has time
to escape, and if he shows any symptoms of
resistance, with a revolver at his head, force
him to " pungle down the dust." I remember
hearing a few years ago of some Chinese who,
expecting the tax-gatherer, went and took
refuge in a cave which they had bribed a
digger Indian to show them. After their
guide had taken their money, he went off to
the sheriff, and receiving another bribe,
informed him where they were hiding. A fire
was kindled at the mouth of the cave, and the
poor fellows, fairly trapped, had to crawl out
one by one, and to pay their money without
loss of time; they never think of the wretched
economy of all this, and of the loss of time
being more than all the tax amounts to, but
only of the sum which has to be squeezed out
of their hoard.

Yet John is not such a bad fellow —even
when from home. Though rarely mingling in
general society, yet on high occasions he is most
hospitable. Once a year in Southern Oregon
the Chinese give a grand dinner, to which
they invite the neighbouring storekeepers and
other friends. These storekeepers almost live
by the Chinese, as there are no native dealers
there. It is amusing to see the stock in trade
of one of these 'cute Yankees, who is possibly
a pillar of the church—Chinese gods, papers
to burn in the temple of Joss, Chinese suan-
pans, almanacks, novels, medicines, pickled
cabbage, slugs, &c., possibly the whole
superintended by a Chinese clerk. These
entertainments were, however, greatly eclipsed by the
grand dinner they gave to Mr. Burlinghame,
at present chief ambassador to the treaty
powers, on his way out to China as United
States' ambassador, and some time previously to
Mr. Colfax, the Speaker of Congress, on the
occasion of his visit to San Francisco in 1865.
It was given by the five great hongs, or
mercantile companies, of San Francisco, and was
quite unique in its way, Chinese dishes and
European being both presented. Of the former
I counted some one hundred and sixty-five, but
there must have been many more. They
included every possible delicacy sharks' fins,
bird-nest soup, young bamboo, scorpions' eggs,