, ir m TI: A STORY OF SAN FRANCISCO'S CHINATOWN, BY MARY E! BAMFORD. V CHICAGO: DAVID C. COOK PUBLISHING COMPANY, 36 WASHINGTON STREET. -grsr COPYRIGHT, 1899, BY DAVID C. COOK PUBLISHING COMPANY. Bancroft LibrtlJI TI: A STORY OF SAN FRANCISCO'S CHINATOWN. CHAPTER I. THE "NEW WORDS." WAS low tide. Ti sat on a board at the end of the net- drying platform, and looked out beyond the mud flats of the bay. He could see his father's junk far on the water. The junk had i been away down the bay to San Francisco, and now was coming back, bringing a load of salt to be used in curing shrimps. Thousands of shrimps were caught and dried every year at this isolated California Chinese fishing- village where Ti lived. There were large plank floors on which the shrimps were dried. Tons of shrimps were shipped across the ocean to China yearly. His uncle, Lum Lee, hurried past to get some wood to be used as fuel in some of the processes of curing shrimps. As he ran by, he looked at Ti and observed that if the boy should fall oft 3 the board at the end of the net-drying platform, he would land in the mud-flat underneath. " Do not fall," he called out in Chinese, as he ran. But Ti felt entirely above such ad- vice. Of course he could hold on! But what he could not do was to hurry the coming in of the tide, so that his father could bring the junk to the wharf. Ti particularly wanted the junk to hurry, because, when going away, his father had said that he would bring something from the great city for a present to his boy. And now, when the junk was returning and fairly in sight of the fishing-camp, the water near the shore line of the bay must go; out and leave nothing but mud- flats! What junk could sail on a mud- flat? Ti did wish that the water would hurry coming in, so he could get his present! What would it be? Would it be a toy 4 TI: A STORY OF CHINATOWN. balloon, such as the American children intelligible to American as well as Chinese had sometimes? Or would it be some ears. Uncle Lum Lee had long since dis- rice cakes? Perhaps it would be a fish-bladder covered with feathers, for him to use in playing " tack yin." Or maybe it would be candy! Ti clasped his little yellow hands ecstatically across his " shorn," as the Chinese call the blouse. But it does not do to clasp one's hands too suddenly when one is sitting on the end of a board in the air! Ti lost his balance, screamed, caught at the board, and fell over, down into the mud below! Oh, it was dreadful! His thick- soled shoes and blue trousers disappeared in the mud! The ends of his " shorn " spread out over the mud, and he "Do not fall," called Uncle Lum Lee. appeared, but See Yow heard old See Yow, who was going through the encampment to one of the buildings that had a shrine, such as a joss- house has. He was in- tending to put some in- cense sticks before the shrine, for he knew the proverb of his people, " In passing over the day in the usual way there are four ounces of sin." Yet his idea of "sin" was very different from the Christian idea. When he heard the scream he did not wait to go to the shrine, but hurriedly called to others near. There was a loud chat- tering, and at last little Ti was scooped out of the mud, as if he were a screamed a scream that would have been new and valuable variety of clam. He Chinese Fishing Hamlet. TI: A STORY OF CHINATOWN. left one thick-soled shoe buried far out of sight, and he was borne away by old See Yow to be cleaned up again. While he scraped and comforted, the old man told Ti how convenient it would have been to-day, if he had been one of the feathered people, for then he could have flown, when he found himself drop- ping into the mud. See Yow really be- lieved that there are feathered people somewhere in the world, for he had been taught so, when he was a boy long ago, by a man from Swatow in China. " The feathered people are gentle, and they are covered with fluffy down, and have wings," said See Yow, " and they sing." Ti listened and watched the scraping off of his shoe. The old man kept on talking about the feathered people. " If one wishes to visit that nation, he must go far to the southeast and then inquire," he finished, in the words of the tale as he had learned them. By this time Ti was quite as clean as he could be made in so short a time. See Yow was always a kind, lovable old man. " When the junk comes in, I will give you a piece of the present my father brings me," said Ti gratefully. Old See Yow smiled. " May the Five Blessings come upon you!" he answered affectionately. " Surely you were a child that neither learned to walk nor speak early nor had teeth early!" Now as certain Chinese believe that a child who does these things early has a bad disposition and will grow up unlov- able, what See Yow said was very compli- mentary. And as the Chinese " Five Blessings" are health, riches, long life, Old See Yow. love of virtue, and a natural death, the old man wished the best things he knew for Ti. But to himself he smiled at little Ti's promise about the present, and thought, " Some presents will not bear dividing! It is but a child's promise. I shall have nothing." But little Ti meant what he promised. TI: A STOltY OF CH1NAIOWN. He would certainly give a piece of his present to kind old See Yow. The little boy stayed with the shrimp- curers till the slow waters of the hay climbed again over the mud-flats toward the fishing-hamlet. Then the men on the junk out in the bay hoisted sail, and slowly the junk came toward the shore. But about three hundred yards from the shore, it ran aground in the mud. Small boats began to ply between the junk and the shore, however, and on one of these boats came Ti's father. He had not left Ti's present on board the junk with the load of salt, either. The present w r as in- side of the father's blouse. How Ti gazed, as his father fumbled in his blouse and brought out his present! It was a pair of bright, pink, American stockings! Oh, they were so bright and pink and pretty! The boy was delighted. He had never had anything but common white stockings to show above his low, thick-soled shoes before. The new pink stockings were clocked with silk up their sides, and to little Ti they seemed very beautiful. He smiled with happiness, for Chinese small people when " dressed up " like to wear pretty colors. Then suddenly he remembered something. Had he not said he would divide his present what- ever it should be with old See Yow? The little lad's smile vanished. Must he give away half of his beautiful new pink pair of stockings? What good was half a pair of stockings? But the boy's father was still fumbling in his blouse, and a moment later he brought out some Chinese candy. Put- ting this into Ti's hands, he brought out something else. " I saw the teacher woman in the city,'' he told in Chinese, and she said, c Here is something for little Ti! Tell him to fasten it up by a street door, so that all the fishing-people will see it!' ' : But the father frowned a little, as lie said this, though he handed Ti the teacher's gift, which was a piece of red paper on which were some Chinese words in black characters. Ti's father did not like the city teacher woman very well, yet he had brought the paper safely because he thought that the little boy might like its red color. The words on the red paper seemed strange to him. He did not know what they meant. " I will give this red paper to See Yow/' resolved Ti, taking the paper. " Then I shall not have to give him one of my pink stockings! He may have some of my candy, too." He ran away to find See Yow. The kind old man admired the pink stockings, refused the candy, but took the red paper. He tried to read what was printed on it in Chinese characters, but he did not un- derstand. He puzzled over it quite a while. Ti stood by, watching. " What does it say?" he asked. " They are new words," answered old See Yow. TI: A STOKY OF CHINATOWN. He read them aloud slowly: " i Come unto me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.' y ' Ti did not know what they meant. The teacher woman in the great California city where he used to live several years ago had spoken to him once about Christ, but he was a very little fellow then, and now he did not remember much she had said. So he could not help See Yow to understand the words on the red paper. " The teacher woman said to put the paper up by a door where everybody can see/' stated Ti in Chinese. So See Yow held the red paper and went along slowly to the hut where he and some other Chinamen lived. Above and beside the outside of the door were already pasted red or yellow papers with inscriptions that said various things in Chinese. One paper said: "May we never be without wisdom." Another paper read, " Good hope/' and another, " Good will come to us," and another, " May heaven give happiness." But none of them held any such words as the teacher woman's red paper that See Yow's wrinkled old hands pasted now among the other inscriptions. Back and forth through the narrow, dirty little street that ran through the hamlet went the Chinese men and women and children. They were all so busy with the shrimp-curing and the fish-drying and the household work that they hardly looked at See Yow's red paper. Once in a while a man stopped to look, but he did not know what the words meant. Some of the Chinamen who had once lived down in the city had heard of the Ameri- cans' Christ, but had not paid much at- tention. Many of the Chinese had lived in different fishing-villages for years, and had never had any one to teach them of Christ. See Yow had lived in California many years. He had wandered around through Chinese mining-camps and fish- ing-villages, but in the mining-camps there was no teaching of Chinese about Christ, and after all these years in a Christian land, the poor old man was in as dense ignorance of Christianity as when he came from his native land. This whole fishing-camp where he now lived knew little more of Christ than if it had been in China. After seeing the paper pasted up by the door, Ti had. run off with his own precious pink stockings. But old See Yow stood still and looked awhile at the red paper, and tried to think what the words meant. At last he shook his head slowly, saying as he turned away: " They are new words. They are new words!" Yet there those words of eighteen cen- turies stood on See Yow's shabby old out- ward wall, and hither and thither went the ignorant, hard-working Chinese peo- ple, who did not know the meaning of them. TI: A STORY OF CHINATOWN CHAPTEE II. THE CALL FOR "CHOCK CHEE." HEBE was great excitement in the fishing - hamlet. There were six white men yes, six who had come to the hamlet, and no one knew wherefore! Outwardly the Chinese were busy about their usual work, but inwardly they thought of little except the six white visitors and their errand. White men seldom came here, for there was no direct communication between the isolated hamlet and the city save by the Chinese junk's irregular trips. But the six white men had come in another vessel, now waiting in the bay. Some thought they had come to collect poll tax. "I have paid poll tax many times/' said Kim Tong in Chinese. " Perhaps they have come to hunt for some bad Chinaman, to put him in jail," suggested Lin Tan. The six white men walked around, ap- parently noting how many Chinamen there were in the camp, and what their occupations were. They looked at those who were splitting wood, and those who were mending nets, and those who were doing cooking, and those who were grinding shrimp shells and mixing them with sawdust. Great quantities of these ground shells and sawdust were sent to China, there to be used as a fertilizer of land. The six strangers looked at some HAVE PAID POLL TAX MANY TIMES, SAID KIM TONG. TI: A STOHY OF CHINATOWN. of the large nets. About a hundred such nets belonged to the fishing hamlet. Two or three Chinamen were making mat- tresses of red and white cloth, and the white men looked at these workers. None of the dwellers in the little ham- let seemed outwardly to object to the white men's seeing all they wished to see. The Chinese were peaceful, but they did have a desire to know what was coming. They knew this unexpected visit meant something. The white men peered into various lit- tle buildings, and saw in two or three of them such shrines as the Chinese erect for joss- worship. " Religion isn't entirely neglected here!" said one of the visitors to another, laughingly. " You'll find joss-shrines anywhere where you find Chinese living, I guess," answered the other. They had gone around near the wharf again. " It's an opportune time for us to come on our business," said a third white man, looking at the Chinese junk next the wharf. " Even their junk isn't out in the bay." " It wouldn't be so much matter, if it were out there," said another. " These Chinese have a regular system of signals. They run up red and green and white flags on the flag-pole over that house yon- der, and they could signal a junk to come in from the bay back to this place, if necessary. So it wouldn't hinder us from getting the Chinamen all together, unless the junk was too far out to see the signals. But probably all are here wko "Why have these men come?" said one Chinaman. live here, now. We'd better begin pretty soon." The men then went a little farther and gazed at the Chinamen who were attend- ing to fish. Before the very faces of the white men the Chinese kept on talking together about why these visitors had come. They felt safe in talking their own language. They did not know that 10 TI: A STORY OF CHINATOWN. some of these men understood Chinese Chinamen. The white men were care- and knew what was being said about fully looking for fraudulent certificates, them. Ti watched, for he was somewhat " Why have these men come?" said one alarmed by something he heard one of the Chinaman. " Perhaps they will survey Chinamen say that the men had the shore for some purpose. Do they brought a genuine " chock chee " with think they can take away our fishing- them, so as to have a standard by which village?" they might detect any forged certificates; Finally, when the visitors had walked and though the white men had not come around the camp and had satisfied them- to find a real criminal, but only to dis- selves that all the men usually employed cover anybody who had violated the law were there, one of them went to the Chi- of " chock chee," yet they were so careful nese "boss" of the fishing-hamlet and in comparing the genuine certificate told him to call all the men together. with those shown by the Chinamen, that " Chock chee," demanded the white there was an impression made among the man; and immediately the camp was suspicious, waiting Chinese that perhaps, astir, for " chock chee " meant the cer- after all, there had been a murder com- tificate a Chinaman must have to show mitted by a Chinaman somewhere in the that he had been legally admitted to this State, and these men were looking for the country. Little Ti stood and looked at the corn- murderer. Ti heard the Chinese about him mur- motion that ensued. Some of the Chi- muring various conjectures as to whom nese hurried to their bunks and brought had been killed and where it had oc- back their certificates. Others were very curred. There were so many surmises cross at having to stop their work, and that he felt frightened. He knew his would not go and get " chock chee " till father would have to come before those command after command had been given, six men very soon, and he did not know " You all come here," said one white what the men might do to him. man in Chinese; and the Chinamen gath- The little fellow grew so scared that he ered in a group. wanted to run away and hide himself in Then the six men began carefully to the building that was used as a sail loft examine the certificates and compare the and a place for storing the ropes and photograph on each with the Chinaman tackle belonging to the junk and other who presented it. As fast as the men boats. But he stayed, because he watched and the certificates were looked at, the Chinese were told to stand aside, so that for his father's turn to come before the white men. He knew that some of the by and by there were two groups of Chinamen were out of temper. One of Tl: A STORY OF CHINATOWN. 11 them had even kicked over a little dwarf certificates were missing, went and pine that sat in a dish by his hut. But changed their clothes from fishing gar- there was no use in being cross when the ments to others more appropriate for a visit to the city. The other Chinamen c all was for " chock chee." Ti knew from his father's looks that something was the matter. Uncle Lum Lee was safe. He had his certificate. When it came his father's turn to go before the six white men, Ti tried to see between two old Chinamen. He thrust his little queued head under the China- man's arm and looked. Before the white men stood his father, talking briskly in English of his own. "Me leave ' chock chee ' in city," he said. " Him velly good number one 6 chock chee!' No have him here. Leave him with my cousin in city." " Very well," answered one of the men. " Then I arrest you. I will take you down to the city,, and you may find ' chock chee '. there and show me. Stand here." Ti's father did not object at all. He had known, as soon as he heard the white men's errand, that he would have to go went back to their work, but these four A Dwarf Pine. came to the men on the net - drying platform. back to the city with them. Such a visit " You all sure you got ( chock chee * ia as this was very unexpected, and Ti's city?" asked one of the men. "Yes," answered the four Chinamen. They had thought the city a safer place to keep their certificates than here in the fishing-hamlet. They looked to see what their captors were going to do. The men began talking among themselves, and the Chinamen waited. During the long time father told himself that he would always keep his "chock chee" within reaching distance hereafter. Three other men were in the same pre- dicament. Little Ti hardly understood. He knew that Uncle Lum Lee looked dis- gusted with his father. When the examination was over, Ti's that it had taken to carefully examine father, and the three other men whose each one's "chock chee," the tide had 12 gone out, and the white men would be forced to wait for its return, before they could start for the city. " Tide's out. Got to wait," explained one of the men to the Chinese. "Will they kill him?" Ti asked. The four captives acquiesced, and sat down with their captors on the net-drying platform. The sun shone warm upon them, and the men stared at the great nets, and said something once in awhile to one another. None of them knew TI: A 8TOEY OF CHINATOWN. that a pair of frightened childish eyes was watching from shore. The other more fortunate Chinamen of the hamlet did not seem to be much con- cerned about the fate of the four who had not been able to satisfy the white men about " chock chee." But Ti, who understood very little about the reason for any certificate, could not bear to go away out of sight of the net-drying plat- form where his father was who knew what those white men were going to do to him? The little boy's heart beat heavily with fear. He went behind a small hut on the edge of the fishing-hamlet, and peered out, keeping watch of his father and the three other prisoners. " I 'don't know what they do to my father!" worried Ti, winking back the tears from his black eyes. The men on the platform all seemed to be waiting for something. Ti did not know what it was, for he had not looked at the water of the bay. He kept his eyes fixed on his father. He expected to see something dreadful happen, but noth- ing occurred. At last the boy came out from his hiding place and set about find- ing out what was to be. " What will they do to my father?" ho asked one of the Chinamen. " Take him to the city." "Will they kill him?" he questioned, with a child's unreasoning fear. The Chinaman shook his head. " He come back," he said. Tl: A STOEY OF CHINATOWN. 13 And Ti was comforted. " Me go, too," he thought, with new inspiration. It had been a long time, about two years, since he had been to the city to see his cousin, a boy younger than himself. His father had been promising to take him sometime. Ti now ran to the net-drying platform, and asked his father's permission. His father spoke to the white men. " Oh, yes," said one. " Take the little fellow, if you want to! But don't take him unless you're sure you've got e chock chee ' in city. If you haven't ' chock chee ' there, you're going to be in big- trouble, and you don't want any boy along!" " Me got number one ' chock chee ' in city," reiterated Ti's father. "All right," said the white man; and Ti ran to his uncle's wife to be dressed for the journey. His mother was dead, so Uncle Lum Lee's wife dressed him. He was a gorgeous little Chinaman by the time his best clothes were on. His ordinary calico apron that he wore over his every-day " shorn " was discarded, and his little body was stuffed out with many blouses, worn one over another in Chi- nese fashion. His outside blouse was bright yellow, and his trousers were green. They were tied about his ankles, but this did not hide the fact that he wore the things that he was most proud of, his new pink American stockings! The little lad was ready long before there was any need of it, and he stood on the net-drying platform, a bright little figure in yellow and green and pink. The white men, the four Chinamen, and Ti, sat on the platform and waited for the tide. After a while one of the men yawned and rubbed his eyes. " This ' chock chee ' business is slow/' he said. An old figure in a shabby blue shorn and trousers came down to the net-drying platform. " Here comes a real old Celestial," said one white man. Old See Yow came slowly on. He stopped. " Kunghi, kunghi!" said old See Yow; meaning, " I respectfully wish you joy." "Kunghi, kunghi, old man," said one of the men good-naturedly. " What can I do for you? Have you come to beguile our weary hours?" " You talk Chinese," said old See Yow respectfully in his own tongue. " Can you also read it?" " Some," answered the man. "Will you come?" asked See Yow, beckoning. " I wish to show you some- thing." The man rose lazily and smiled. The time was long, and there were enough others to attend to the four Chinese. So he followed See Yow along the platform, off to the shore, through the narrow street, till they came to the old man's door. There, pasted up beside the en- trance, was the new red paper that Ti had given him. 14 TI: A STORY OF CHINATOWN. The old Chinaman pointed to the paper. Old See Yow looked puzzled and dis-. appointed. " Can you read it?" he asked in Chi- nese. The man looked at the red placard. He studied it a little and then he nodded. "You no read it?" he asked. See Yow nodded. " I read," he said, " but the center of my heart does not un- derstand. What is it the words say?" The man read it: " Come unto me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest." "You no sabe that?" he asked. See Yow shook his head. No, he did not understand. Somewhere in the depths of the visitor's memory something stirred. He remembered a boyhood when his mother read such verses. He remembered when he, too, read them. Little had he read such words in the years of manhood, but he knew what that red paper meant. Yes, he knew. He hesitated. He was glad his companions were not present to listen to his explanation. " Jesus Christ said that," he explained in Chinese. "You know Jesus Christ?" See Yow shook his head. He did not know anything about Jesus Christ. The man stood and looked at the paper. "Where did you get it?" he asked. See Yow explained. The other laughed a little. "Very good paper," he said, and turned away. " What is it the words say?' 7 he asked anxiously in Chinese. "What is it they say?" But the man was walking down the nar- row street. He did not care to talk about the words any more. See Yow stood and looked at the red paper in a distressed way. Something in his heart cried out for the meaning of those words, but there was nobody to tell him what they meant. " They are new words," he re- peated despairingly. " They are new words." There was a puzzled wistfulness in the old eyes. The strange man had said that it was a " very good paper." See Yow gazed at the paper respectfully. He would keep it there. Perhaps it was a charm to ward off evil spirits, as pieces of embroidered silk may keep evil spirits away, if the silk is hung near a bed. Meantime the stranger had gone back to the net-drying platform. The men he had left there were talking together. One of them looked up. "What did your old Chinaman take you off to see?" he asked laughingly. "Just a paper," answered the other, as he walked down to the end of the plat- form, and stood alone a few minutes, looking out at the slow-coming tide. " I didn't come down here to preach a sermon!" he told himself uneasily, trying to forget how old See Yow's face had 'II: A STOKY OF CHINATOWN. 15 looked. " ' ("hock chee ' is more in my line. I wish that tide would hurry!'' He looked off at the distant horizon. Perhaps he saw something there besides low-lying haze. Perhaps he saw a little boy beside his mother's knee. Perhaps, too, he heard something besides the indis- tinct sound of conversation behind him and the cry of sea-gulls. Perhaps ho heard that mother's voice reading out of an old Book. Presently he turned and went back to the others. By and by the tide came up, and the men and the four Chinese went off together with Ti. After a while the little Chinese fishing-hamlet faded, and Ti could see it no more. It was wonderful to the little boy to be really going to the city! He stood on the boat and looked out at the sparkling, ruffled water. On and on they went, and he saw a sea-gull, and the wind blew brisk and salt, and he laughed at the spray that flew in his face. And then, after they had been sailing quite a time, he lifted his eyes and saw in the distance the smoke of an American steamboat. He was delighted. It was only a foretaste of the wonderful things he was going to see, he knew. He was going to the city! But little Ti did not know what things should befall him there, and that he would not see the Chinese fishing-hamlet again for two whole years. Perhaps, if he had known, he would have turned and looked once more in the direction in which the fishing-hamlet lay. But he did not think of such a thins as his staying away more than a few days. He stood looking at the smoke of the American steamboat, and the wind blew his pink-plaited little queue over his shoulder, and the spray lit on his bright yellow " shorn " and green trousers, and his almond eyes took in everything. "You're a regular little sailor," said one of the men in English. But Ti did not understand. He knew only a very little English, for he had not had anybody to talk that language with at the fishing-hamlet, and he had forgotten many words he once had known when he lived in the city as a very little boy. Be- sides, he did not want to talk now. He was going to the great city, and he was so happy! But, alas! back in the Chinese fishing- hamlet, old See Yow went- to and fro, as ignorant and unsatisfied as ever. The " center of his heart " was yet wistfully longing for something, he knew not what. The " very good paper " with its message was not understood. Alas, that "chock chee " had been more in the white man's line! CHAPTER III. KWONG GOON. HE city reached, Ti's father found his certificate and made his peace with the " chock chee " men. Then the two went to Ti's uncle's, and the boy was happy with his 16 TI: A STORY OF CHINATOWN. little cousins in the small rooms above and back of the uncle's store, that was hung with gay Chinese lanterns, and had shelves and cases filled with Chinese dolls, and rice paper pictures, and little storks and frogs, and beautifully made boxes, and white silk handkerchiefs such as Americans buy. It was a great change for Ti, coming baby Hop, who was now two years old> but whom Ti had never before seen. And then Aunt Ah Cheng told him how nice a birthday feast they had had for baby Hop when he was four weeks old. Chinese babies have a feast when they are four weeks of age. The other cousin, Hop's brother Whan, was five years old. Ti went to the little front balcony and from his little fishing-hamlet to this great city. His aunt, Ah Cheng, was glad to see him, and she began to cook some meat in Chinese cooking oil for the visitors. She turned the meat with a couple of red chopsticks while it was cooking, and into a kettle that contained some more cook- ing oil she threw the wet leaves of some vegetable. The leaves, beginning to cook, made a great spluttering in the hot oil on top of the charcoal range, and Ti thought how good dinner would be. His aunt, Ah Cheng, was very pleasant, and told him he ought to have come to the city before, to visit his little cousin, looked out. Across the street he could see a Chinaman standing behind a small table set on the sidewalk. The table had a red, black-stained cover, and the man \vas a fortune-teller. On a farther building were two enor- mous red and green lanterns. All of the people who lived along here were Chinese. Over at the corner was a Chinese butcher's shop, where pork and vegetables were for sale. One shallow, round basket on the sidewalk contained a quantity of white, dry watermelon seeds, such as the Chinese eat. Another basket held beans that had been made to sprout and put Tl: A STORY OF CHINATOWN. 17 forth runners about two inches long. The runners and beans were alike very pale and were tender for eating. Ti turned around and looked at the room in which he was standing. The outer room, in which his aunt was cooking, was one used in common for that purpose by other Chinese families liv-' ing in this house, but the little room Ti stood in was exclu- sively- that of Aunt Cheng's family. The little boy gazed at its furnishings. There was a shelf for the household gods, and there was a table with candles and incense - sticks. There were several stools, and a picture of the Chinese god- dess of mercy, Kun Yam, the goddess that is so much worshiped by all Chinese women and girls, whether in China or America. There was a bed made of boards, covered with a square of matting. Around the bed were some curtains, fastened with loops of Chinese money, " cash," and beside the cur- tains hung pieces of em- broidered silk of different colors. These silken pieces were charms against evil spirits. Poor as the room was, it seemed beautiful to Ti, who had come so recently from his fishing- village. He went back to the room where his aunt was cooking. Other women of dif- ferent families were here now, and there was one quarrelsome woman among them. He did not like it so well as when his aunt was there alone, but his little Chinese Fortune-teller's Table. cousin, Whan, was ready to run down into the store with him, so together the two somewhat unacquainted cousins went below and peeped out the store door at the old Chinese fortune-teller and his red covered table, farther down across the 18 street. It did not seem to be a very good day for the fortune-teller. He stood there without any customers. " But it is not so every day," said little CHINESE MUSICAL INSTRUMENTS. Yec Yin. Yet Com. Wong Sev Tai Com. Whan in Chinese to Ti. "He is very wise, and people go to him. Is there a TI: A STORY OF CHINATOWN. fortune-teller at the fishing place where you live?" "No," said Ti, who was greatly im- pressed by the wonders of the city. The two children stepped out on the street. Here and there were other Chi- nese children, some with their parents, some alone on errands. There were many Chinamen going back and forth. Some, who had been to the butcher's, carried little cornucopias of brown paper contain- ing small quantities of meat. Most such Chinese people had very little quantities of vegetables, too. There was a queer sound of music in the air. That is, the music would have been strange in Ameri- can ears. Some one in the upper story of an opposite building was playing a stringed musical instrument. Ti stood and looked over at the unfor- tunate fortune-teller. But he did not seem to be much depressed by his lack of customers, and there was so much else to see and hear that Ti forgot about him. The stringed instrument had been joined by other Chinese musical instruments, and the little boy stared up at the higher window opposite and listened. But his cousin Whan did not like this. He pulled Ti farther on the street. " Come and see," said he, bent on show- ing his country cousin the sights. But Ti would listen for a minute or two. He thought the music was very fine, though it was squeaky. But soon the squeaking instruments were aided by a much more powerful one, for some other Tl: A STORY OF CHINATOWN. 19 player joined in with a loud sound of metal beaten, as of a kettle-drum. Ti saw an old Chinaman sitting on a box on the sidewalk. He had another little box before him, and he was an opium pipe mender. He was busy mending and cleaning part of such a pipe jin-ten now. Around the corner sat a Chinese cobbler, working on the street. He held a blue, thick- soled Chinese shoe, and hummed a funny little song. There were some pieces of leather soak- ing in a small tub be- side him, and on the side of the box before him there was a red paper with Chinese characters. The cobbler had a board put up at one side of his open-air shop, and he looked at Ti and little Whan in a friendly way. Ti gazed into a Chi- nese barber shop, and saw the barber shaving a customer's head. The customer held up a little tin box, and every time the barber clipped off any hair, he dropped it into this tin. Another barber was cleaning out the interior of a, customer's ear with a little black instru- ment. Not i'ar oil was a Chinese druggist's Chinese Cobbler. shop. In the window were two bottles of " horned toads " in alcohol, and, peering into the store, Ti saw a Chinaman sitting, working the handle of a machine up and down. He seemed to be cutting roots to 20 TI: A STORY OF CHINATOWN. pieces, and the machine appeared to work somewhat as a machine for thinly slicing dried beef does in an American grocery store. The two boys went on to a Chinese vegetable shop, where some yellow squares of bean curd were piled for sale. Each square of curd was marked with a Chi- nese character, and the curds were notice- able on account of their yellow color. Chinese manner of carrying wood in San Francisco. Long pieces of sugar cane, brought from China, stood up against the side of the building, like so many fishing poles gilded teeth swinging in the balcony be- There were cut fore the house! He gazed with horror at and Whan looked at this scribe's writing with great respect. In a few minutes the letter was written, the coolie paid the scribe and went away. " We must go home," said little Whan in Chinese to Ti. " My mother will have cooked the dinner." ' They turned around and went back toward Whan's father's store. The two children looked again at the vegetable shop as they went by it, and Whan said that once the Chinese vegetable seller had given him a piece of sugar cane to eat. Both boys would have liked some sugar cane. They looked at the vegetable man's little boy, and lingered near his shop a minute, but the vegetable seller was too busy to notice. Ti turned away. He peeped into an- other street, and beheld a sight that hor- rified him a house with five great or pieces of bamboo. pieces of sugar cane, too, about seven inches long, for sale, two pieces for five cents, Ti gazed at a cage of turtles slowly crawling about their prison. There were some big crabs, too, in a receptacle, one lying on his back. The crabs made Ti feel more at home. He had seen so many of them at the fishing village. Xear by was a Chinese shop for dried fish. Here on a corner was an old scribe, writing a letter for a Chinese coolie. He wrote with a brush that he held upright those big teeth. He had never before known about Chinese dentists, and those swinging, monstrous teeth filled him with fearful conjectures of what was done in that house. He turned and ran. Little Whan could not imagine what had frightened his cousin so. He ran after, calling. Ti ran in the wrong direc- tion, not toward his uncle's store, and nearly plunged down the stairs into a cel- lar below the sidewalk, where wood was for sale by Chinamen. Looking down the stairs, the passers could see the wood and moved mostly by his little finger. Ti tied in little bundles for purchasers. Tl: A STORY OF CHINATOWN. 21 There was a bright new axe visible in the cellar. A Chinaman came along the street, carrying an amount of wood at wood were not in baskets, but were kept in place at each end of the pole by a Chi- nese contrivance. Whan caught up with Ti, and, grasping his shoulder, said, "You go the wrong way. Why did you run?" But Ti would not tell for he was already a little ashamed to have been frightened over the big swinging teeth. He felt as if he were an ignorant little country Chinaman. No doubt small Whan, five years old, had often seen that house with the teeth, and was not scared; and here was he, Ti, a boy eight years old, afraid of something that did not terrify his little cousin! So Whan did not get any an- swer to his ques- tion. But it was time for dinner, and Ti was quite ready to run home. The boys had dinner together, without any sugar cane, but Ti did not care. The Chinese greens each end of a pole hung across his shoul- and the meat tasted very good, and he ate der, as a Chinese vegetable peddler carries rice, too. his baskets, except that the two piles of Ti's father thought that he and his 22 little boy would stay a few days and visit. It was the time of the feast of Kwong Goon, that heathen deity who, the Chi- nese believe, has much to do with the dead. Ti's father had thought of its be- ing the time of the feast, and he had been all the more willing to come down to the city with the " chock chee " men. The next day after arriving in the city, Ti and his father, and little cousin Whan and the uncle, went to a joss-house to see and to carry gifts for the festival. Those Chinese who had relatives that had died since the last Kwong Goon festival, brought prayer papers and joss sticks to the altar. Candy, tea, cigars and dried fish were laid before Kwong Goon. Well might the Chinese fear him, accord- ing to their religious belief, for he is the deity who is supposed to devour the bodies of irreligious Chinamen. Much money had been spent on this festival. Little Ti, looking at the altar of Kwong Goon, saw it resplendent with can- dles and gilt censers. The gilded altar pieces were imported ones, and in this joss-house in the Chinese part of an American city, the Chinese high priest in- toned the services for the souls of dead Chinamen. Ti and his folks were near the shrine. If this had not been so, perhaps something would not have happened. As it was, five-year-old Whan came to great grief. Notwithstanding the holiness of the altar, the Chinese men occasionally took cigars from a tray that lay before the shrine. TI: A STORY OF CHINATOWN. Seeing this, little Whan reached out his tiny yellow hand and helped himself to a piece of dried fish that had been offered to Kwong Goon. Woe to little Whan! What a crime was this! The Chinese women who were about him pounced down on the little boy and nearly choked him, trying to get that piece of fish, for he had put it into his mouth, and the women were determined to get the fish before he could swallow it. They forced his mouth open. One woman had her bony fingers tightly around his throat. Another had seized the end of the piece of fish. Whan struggled and gasped. Ti looked on in alarm, lest his lit- tle cousin should be choked. But the women got the fish. The tumult subsided. Great Kwong Goon was honored by an offering of punk sticks, and little Whan, the beginner of this confusion, offended against the pro- prieties of the occasion no more. Per- haps what he had done would have been forgotten, had not something happened to him within the next few days, something that his parents regarded as the result of Whan's act at the Kwong Goon festival. What happened was this. The festival continued through the week, and Ti and his father stayed, for the father had some matters he wanted to attend to in the city. Now, about five days after his visit to the shrine of Kwong Goon, little Whan was taken ill. He was languid and slightly feverish. He could not swallow his rice without pain and difficulty. 21: A STORY OF CHINATOWN. 23 "It is because you tried to eat a piece of the fish belonging to Kwong Goon," said his mother. " This is your punish- ment/' Little W h a n , Mho felt very mis- erable, supposed that what his su- perstitious mother said was true, lie did not know that he ha d been ex- posed t o diph- theria, and that he w o u 1 d probably have had the dis- ease anyway, if he had not gone to the festival. He resolved that he would never offend Kwong Goon again. Whan felt no better after his resolve, however, and his father thought that the disease must be produced by some angry spirit. So that night the father went outside the store with some pieces of Chinese money and a bowl of rice, and after prostrating himself several times before the invisible evil spirit, he threw the money and the rice at the place where he supposed the evil spirit to be. Then he went back into the house. "You will be well now," he told Whan. " Lii;tsu, the medicine god, who pities the sick, will help you." But Whan was not well. Seeing this, his father made up his mind to go to a Chinese drug store, although he would not The Vegetable Man's Little Boy. stay there for any other business than that pertaining to the place, for fear that the evil spirits that produce sickness might be lurking among the medicines. So, having seen the sign in Chinese, " Bad Spirits Not Admitted," he got Whan some 24 TI: A STORY OF CHINATOWN. medicine from the "Hall of Joyful Be- lief," as the Chinese characters on the apothecary's shop denoted it to be. But the " Hall of Joyful Belief " did not help the little boy, so his father got some medi- cine from the " Promise Life Palace," and the "Hall for Multiplying Years," and the " Great Life Hall," and from a place where the board read in Chinese, "Wo Ki Ying feels the pulse and writes prescriptions 'for internal and external disease." Moreover the father consulted one of the Chinese fortune-tellers, who looked at the sick child's nose and said it was like a dog's, and for that reason Whan would live long. According to this fortune-teller's rule, " A man with a dog's nose will live long." Moreover, the friendly Chinese butcher, who had recently come from China, gave Ti's father a cow's tooth which had been found in a field near Swatow, and which, the butcher said, if brought into a dwell- ing and put on the shelf of the gods, would keep demons from entering. With all this, little Whan did not seem to get better. CHAPTER IV. LITTLE WHAN. TIRING Whan's sickness the other children were not kept away from him. It was not the Chinese custom to do that. When the teacher who was not the person who had sent the paper to the fish- ing camp, but another teacher came through the district and saw little Whan, she knew that something serious was the matter. She said to his father, "Your boy is sick. You should get an Ameri- can doctor." " It is Kwong Goon who makes Whan sick," said Ah Cheng, the child's mother. " Kwong Goon will punish him for taking the fish! His throat is sick." But the father did as the teacher said. He sent for an American doctor. "Your boy has diphtheria," said the doctor, as he looked at little Whan. " That's what ails him." The doctor told the father to keep the sick boy in a room separate from the other children. "Yes," said the father stupidly, and he looked at the doctor and wondered if, after all, it would not have been mucli better to have gone again to the " Hall of Joyful Relief " and got some more Chi- nese medicine, than to have called this American doctor. For what was the reason why Whan should be shut up in a room by himself? Would not the evil spirits that make sickness come to him? What a singular thing! The father looked suspiciously at the doctor and his medicine. It was Kwong Goon who had made Whan ill, no doubt. and was it likely that putting the boy off in a room by himself would cure him? What did this American doctor know about Kwong Goon, anyhow? Tl: A STORY OF CHINATOWN. 25 The doctor saw the father's distrustful the midst of the work, the three children look, and tried to explain as best he could all were together again. There was noth- in English. ing before the doorways of the rooms, " Do you not see?" asked he. " If your boy has diph- theria, your baby might take it. and so might the cousin from the country. You must keep Whan in a room by himself." "Yes," said the father. " Yes." " Be sure to do it," reit- erated the doctor. "Yes," said the father; and, after the doctor had gone, he told his wife, who had not seen the doctor, for he had not been allowed to come to the living-room upstairs, but only to enter the store. But the next day, when the teacher came back, she found that Whan's mother had not done as the doctor said. She meant to do the best for her children, poor Ah Cheng! but she did not understand about infection. " You must put Whan in a different room, away from the other children," said the teacher kindly, and she showed the anyhow, except thin red curtains. Ti mother how. and Hop wanted to be with Whan con- Wlian stayed separate till after the stantly, and the mother thought that teacher went away. Then, somehow, in keeping the sick child separate was only Chinese Festival of Kwong Goon. 26 TJ: A STORY OF CHINATOWN. an American notion, anyway, and not of much importance. It seemed too bad to separate the children, when they liked one another so well. In pure kindness, Ah Cheng allowed the three to be together. Toward evening the teacher came again. She was alarmed over Whan, and stayed to watch by him, but the ignorant mother slept. In the morning the father and mother were frightened about the sick child, for they saw how very much worse he was. They lighted tapers and burned incense, hoping to make him bet- ter, and to appease the evil spirit that they felt sure was tormenting him. Diphtheria is common enough in China, sometimes. But Whan grew worse. He could not drink without strangling. He did not wish to eat. By this time, two-year-old Hop and his cousin Ti were both taken with the same disease, diphtheria. "It is Kwong Goon who does this," still said Whan's mother. " It is the god Kwong Goon." But little five-year-old Whan was dying, though his mother did not realize it. The teacher, who had been obliged to go herself for the American doctor and had not found him in, hurried now from the street into the narrow alley. Around it stood Chinamen as usual, talking. A Chinese woman with ankle ornaments like bracelets went into a doorway. The teacher nodded to the woman and hurried on. All these Chinese were used to see- ing the teacher now, and they did not watch her suspiciously, as they had once done. They knew, now, that she was friendly, and she could talk their tongue. The teacher hastened up the long out- side narrow stairs that led to the rooms where Ti's aunt lived. A door at the top of the stairway had some Chinese char- acters on it. She rapped, said something in Chinese, and entered without waiting. Directly in front of her, in the tiny, box-like entry, was what would look to American eyes like a large, rectangular tin for ashes. There were ashes in the tin, but there was a red paper on the wall above, and this was a place for worship of the gods. The teacher did not stop an instant. She hurried through the narrow passage at the left. The passage was cut with several doors, hung with thin red cur- tains. A person could readily enter any room, but the teacher hastened to the one where Ti and Whan and Hop were. She had not meant to be away so long. But she knew, now, before she entered the room, that One had been there before her. He who loves the children had looked not only upon little Whan in his pain and suffering, but on baby Hop, and was taking them to himself. The teacher heard wailing before she lifted the thin red curtain of the room. Little Whan was dead. The dreadful diphtheria had done its work, and when the teacher took baby Hop into her arms, she believed that the child would follow his brother soon. TI: A STORY OF CHINATOWN. 27 The teacher did all she could. The American doctor came at last, but it was too late. In those last dreadful moments Whan's Mother, of baby Hop's life, his mother, poor Ah Cheng, prostrated herself before the old picture of the goddess of mercy, and prayed and sobbed. " Oh, save my baby! Save my baby!" she sobbed wildly in Chinese. " Oh, Kun Yam, goddess of mercy, save my baby!" The teacher's tears ran down her cheeks, as she saw the heart agony with which poor Ah Cheng sobbed and wrung her hands and prayed before that picture. But the dear little two-years-old baby in the teacher's arms drew a last, faint gasp, and the teacher saw with reverent awe the seal of death set itself on the baby face. She laid down the little body and put the chubby brown hands gently together, and then went softly across the room, and knelt beside the poor wailing mother. Ah Cheng lifted up her drawn, agonized face, and looked toward her child. As she realized what had hap- pened, a cry of despair broke from her Whan. lips. She flung herself wildly down, and beat her head against the floor. 28 TI: A STORY OF CHINATOWN. "Kim Yam! Kun Yam!" she wailed. " I shall never see them again! Both my sons are dead, and I shall never see them again! Kun Yam! Kim Yam!" "Poor Ah Cheng! I am so sorry for you," said the teacher, slipping her arm around Ah Cheng and drawing her head down until it rested upon her shoulder. " I am so sorry for you, and there is One who is more sorry for you than anybody else can be, for He is here and knows our sorrow. It is Jesus, Ah Cheng, Jesus, who loves the children. Your children are with him and he will keep them safe. And, Ah Cheng, he loves you, too, and wants to comfort you." Ah Cheng's sobbing grew a little quieter. " You cry out to Kun Yam, Ah Cheng, because your heart must have help in this trouble; and Jesus is listening to every cry, and he can help you. He has taken the little ones to himself. Some day he will restore them to you, if you trust him and open your heart to his love, believing in him as your best Friend." Then very lovingly and patiently did the teacher try to explain to the stricken mother that this Jesus is the one true God, and that he is close to us, though our eyes cannot see him. The night that baby Hop died, Ti was too ill to know it. He did not compre- hend the wailing. It had been a confused outburst of sound without any meaning to him, as he half dozed on his bunk. As feverish Ti lay there the next day, how- ever, he looked continually at the teacher. Sometimes he seemed to himself to know her. Other times he .thought he did not. There was an odor of much burning in- cense in the air. He felt very strangely. He wished he were back in the fishing vil- lage with his father and old See Yow and Uncle Lum Lee and the others. He had never felt so queer there. He did not know that he was sick. He only knew that sometimes the teacher sitting as he supposed by baby Hop seemed to turn into old See Yow, and sometimes she looked like his father. And sometimes the tapers that were lit seemed to whirl and change, as he had seen the moonlight on the waves near by the fishing village at night. His throat hurt. He had not eaten his rice. His throat felt as little Whan said his felt that day at the feast of Kwong Goon, when the bony - fingered woman clasped his neck so tightly, to keep him from swallowing the piece of fish. As Ti lay looking with feverish eyes, suddenly the teacher's face seemed to him to be that of the heathen deity, Kwong Goon. The child shuddered. He could not reason any more. He thought Kwong Goon's fingers were clasping the neck of this little sick Chinese boy, Ti himself. " I did not touch your fish! Whan did it!" Ti struggled to cry out, but the words stopped in his throat. Surely the great, the dreadful Kwong Goon would not make such a mistake! TI: A S'lORY OF CHINATOWN. He must know the difference between Ti and Whan! He tried to shut his feverish eyes, but they would come open again, and every time he opened them he became more and more sure that it w r as not the teacher woman who sat there, but it must be Kwong Goon. Poor little Ti! He was becoming more and more feverish and confused. He did not have his right mind, or he would not have thought so foolish a thing, but the continual talk of his relatives about Kwong Goon, the last few weeks, had frightened him, and now his feverish brain was alarmed at seeing what he thought was Kwong Goon's face. The teacher did not know that the little boy lay there in a state of terror, or she would have sprung up and come to him. He opened his lips and tried to cry, " Go away, Kwong Goon! Go away!" He tried to say, " You must not kill me!" but something in his throat seemed to stop the words. The imagined face seemed to come nearer. It was dreadful Kwong Goon. Ti tried to cry out, to escape. Kwong Goon came nearer. "Go away!" the sick boy tried to scream. " Go away!" But he could not speak. He felt as if he were choking. Suddenly he felt the teacher woman bending over him. " Ti," she said gently in Chinese, " lit- tle Ti, what is it? Do not be afraid. Remember Jesus is here Jesus that I told you about, Ti Jesus who loves 29 you. He is strong. He can keep you safe." Ti could not answer. The teacher lifted him. He heard a wailing. There came a strong odor of incense. He gasped. Then he did not remember things any A man with a dog's nose will live long," said the fortune-teller. more for a while. Occasionally the teacher's face would show in the mist that seemed to surround him. One time it occurred to him to wonder why the teacher woman did not leave him any more and go to Hop. He tried to turn his head and look toward baby Hop. It took a good deal of trying, but at last he did turn his head. The place where the baby had lain was empty. Ti shut his 30 TI: A STORY OF CHINATOWN. eyes, and everything drifted away into mist again. At the fishing - hamlet he had sometimes seen the fog roll up the bay and cover everything from sight. So now everything vanished. He did not know when the wailing- women came, and candles were burned, and afterwards Chinese imitation paper money was thrown away on the street, as the bodies of little "VYhan and little Hop were taken away to the Chinese burying ground far out toward the ocean. In the days that came the Christian teacher woman stayed with Ti and did her best to comfort Ah Cheng. When- ever she could, she tried to teach her more about Jesus. But Ah Cheng was afraid to believe, for all her life she had feared the gods, and what the teacher told her seemed too good to be true. Gradually Ti grew better. He was out of danger. His father, who knew from the epidemics of diphtheria in China how that disease can take away children, felt much relieved that Ti was growing better. He believed that diphtheria is caused by an evil spirit, and now he went to the joss-house and posted on the wall a red paper of thanksgiving for Ti's recovery. According to the Chinese custom of wailing, little Whan and baby Hop were wailed for by their mother at a set time of day every seventh day for seven suc- cessive weeks. But it was no formal mockery of wailing with poor Ah Cheng. Sometimes Chinese people wail at the set time and then suddenly break off wailing and go about their work as if nothing had happened except that they had performed a duty. But Ah Cheng's mourning came from her heart, and many a time, besides the set wailing periods, she wept for her little children, and often in her loneliness she sobbed, " I shall never see them again!" When Ti was well enough to be around again, his uncle and aunt besought his father, saying, " Let Ti stay with us a while! Whan is dead and Hop is dead. Let Ti stay to comfort us a while." So Ti's father, pitying the lonely par- ents, went back to the fishing-hamlet alone, and Ti was left to live on with his uncle and aunt. CHAPTEK V. A NEW ACQUAINTANCE. HEY were very kind to Ti in his uncle's home. The Chinese are fond of chil- dren, and Ti had no mother at the fishing-hamlet to worry about him. When the twenty-first day after the death of little Whan and Hop was pass- ing, Ti's aunt looked very sorrowful. She spread a table with food, such as little Whan and Hop had liked in their life- time. That night the doors were all left unlocked, and the uncle and Ti and his aunt went to bed. But Ah Cheng wept, for she believed that at midnight her little boys' spirits would return and she would not see them. JJut the doors must not be locked on her own children. They must be allowed to come in. The Chinese think that it is not till a person has been