The Chinese Servant

1895

When a Chinese servant becomes dissatisfied, he never tells you of it, but some day you will go into the kitchen to find your Chinaman cook having another Chinaman with him. Without being the least disconcerted he will come up to you and say, "Mrs. Blank, you likee me cookee?" "Why, of course, John," will perhaps be the reply. "You findee no fault, hey?" will be the next question. Then, after you told him he was entirely satisfactory, he will say to you: "Well, Sing Lee will do cookee now. John's going to leave." And with no further explanation he will leave the house. The new Chinaman will immediately begin his duties just as if you had hired and made all arrangements with him. You will find that the new cook has been coached in the dishes that are your favorites, and you will have no more trouble.

This may seem like a day dream to housewives who have worried themselves sick about servants, but nevertheless it is a true picture of the manner in which Chinamen treat their employers. — New York Advertiser.

Chinese Flower Girls

1895

They Are Dainty, Demure and Pretty and Feed on Watermelon Seed.

When, for instance, a Chinese gentleman intends giving a dinner to three friends, he will arrange for it to be provided on a flower boat at a certain hour, and also for the company of eight dining out girls — two for each gentleman. I call them dining out girls, as it best describes to me their calling. They will come prettily dressed, their hair done up in most wonderful shapes and brushed over with a sort of varnish, which makes it appear like a fantastic headdress carved in ebony. They will ornament this structure with bright flowers, though the wreaths will be as stiff as their hair, or they will sometimes add jade, gold or feathered inlaid ornaments. Their faces will be painted in white and pink, very artistically painted, smooth and soft looking; delicately traced, sharp black crescents will mark their eyebrows. Dainty, demure dolls they will appear, and pretty to look upon, but seemingly one touch would destroy their artistic effects, as a rough hand the radiance of a butterfly's wing.

Two of these young ladies will attend to each gentleman, sitting slightly back from the table at each side of the entertained. They will fill his liquor cups, sip from them and pass them on, pick out dainty pieces of "chow" (food) with chopsticks and hand them to him, crack jokes, fill and light his pipe and all the while chat gayly and eat dried watermelon seeds. That is all I ever saw them eat. Behind each group of three a solemn looking cooly, or waiter, will stand to fan them all the while. Other waiters bring in food, wine and tea, change the dishes and attend to their wants. The meal will last for a long time. Eventually all will rise and retire to an outer room furnished with broad couches covered with matting. Opium pipes will be there for those who care for them, and tobacco and cigars in plenty. The girls will sit on the couches, laugh, fill the pipes and still eat watermelon seeds, while the gentlemen will recline at their ease, enjoying their society. — Century.

The Meek and Mild Chinaman

1895

The Chinaman, although proverbially meek and mild, is a man of dauntless courage and unflinching fortitude. Voyages over vast tracts of stormy seas, extremes of heat or cold, prolonged separation from home and all he holds most dear and sacred, contumely and wrong at the hands of men among whom he casts his lot — nothing of all this can turn him from his own purpose in life — namely, the accumulation of a little store of dollars which 20 years forward will make him a rich man in the country of his birth, will enable him to provide for his parents and erect monuments to the honor of his ancestors and will cause him to be looked up to and envied by his fellow villagers.

To achieve this he goes everywhere — everywhere, at least, except to lands whose hostile laws of recent years block him at the ports of entry, and in countries where such laws have been passed the very fact shows that the Mongolian has already secured a foothold. We are told that there is no place of consequence the wide world over where a Scotchman is not to the fore. For myself I expect as confidently, wherever I wander, to find my Chinaman. — Nineteenth Century.

Chinese Swine

1895

The American swine of today are very different from their English ancestors, who a few centuries ago constituted one of the chief sources of British wealth. The improvement in the race is largely due to the introduction of the Chinese and Neapolitan breeds. The crossing of the former upon the English hog has resulted in the production of the Berkshire, Essex, Poland-China, Small Yorkshire and Suffolk breeds.

The Chinese hog is remarkably prepotent, as is shown by the tendency of the modern breeds to revert to the original type. This is doubtless owing to the many centuries of inbreeding which have so firmly fixed its characteristics. One of the most important of these is its propensity to fatten under the most adverse circumstances. This superabundance of fat prevents the flesh of this breed being highly esteemed in this country, but it has had a most valuable effect in modifying the lean, gaunt hogs of England, while the Neapolitan has added delicacy of flavor.

The original Chinese hog is a very peculiar shape. It has a long body, with short legs, very heavy jowls, small prick ears, short head, neck and snout and the eyes wide apart. In color it is white or black, or a mixture of both, with the white predominating. — St. Louis Post-Dispatch.

Our Day On Earth

1916

Augusta registered its first Chinese voter this. year, Chin Bong, who runs a laundry there. He was born in Seattle 28 years ago and is married, his wife being at present in China. Previous to coming to Augusta he lived for sometime in Boston and was a voter there.

A. Leon Esty, who was in the automobile with James W. Rafter in the smash-up at the Gardiner railroad crossing of Nov. 2, 1913, has brought suit in the United States District Court of Vermont in the sum of $10,000 against the Maine Central Railroad. It will be remembered that Mr. Rafter won in his suit for damages and was awarded $15,464.99. It was claimed at the time that the gates were not properly operated at the approach of the train.

A grand record for faithful performance of duties was rounded out last Wednesday by Edward G. Wyman of Bangor, when he retired from active service at the First National Bank of that city, after 52 years of continuous service, of which 38 was as cashier. He was given an assistant and granted a long vacation, on salary. Few men anywhere has a longer or more honorable career to his credit.

—The Fryeburg Post, Fryeburg, Maine, Sept. 16, 1916, p. 1.

A Chinese Curiosity

1901

"A Chinaman in San Francisco," says a gossiper in the Philadelphia Record, "showed me once an ivory ball as big as your two fists, with six smaller balls inside it. It was the most wonderful thing I ever saw. The Chinaman said that the balls had been begun by his grandfather and that he was the third generation to work on them. He told me how the work was done.

"It begins with a solid block of ivory, which is turned into a ball and then carved in a latticed pattern with tiny saw toothed knives. Through the lattice, with other knives that are bent in various shapes, the second ball is carved, but is kept fast to the first one by a thin strip of ivory left at the top and by another left at the bottom. Then the third ball, with still finer knives, is tackled through the first and second ones, and so the work goes on till all the balls are finished, when the strips that hold them firm are cut away, and they all revolve freely, one inside the other.

"This Chinaman said it was a common thing for families to have such balls for hundreds of years — grandfather, father, son and grandson working on them when they had nothing else to do. They are priceless, of course. Some cheap balls are made of vegetable ivory, being carved while the material is soft, like a potato. These, though, are not worth more than a few dollars at the most."

The Original Caribs

1902

Very mysterious is the origin of the fierce savage, now almost extinct, who were in possession of the Caribs, the smaller West Indian islands, when the white man discovered them.

They showed a distinct Mongolian character and it would be hard to distinguish a Carib infant from a Chinese child. Twenty years ago a Chinaman who had drifted to Dominica declared the Caribs to be his own people and married a pure-bred Carib woman. The resultant child showed no deviation from the native type.

The Caribs have dropped their man-eating ways; but in the sixteenth century they scoured the Spanish main in search of human food and from Porto Rico alone are said to have taken more than 5,000 men to be eaten. Though Spaniards, Frenchmen, Dutchmen, negroes or Arrowaks were all meat to them, the Caribs seem to have shown an interesting preference for certain nationalities. Davis says in his "History of the Caribby Isands," that "the Caribbeans have tasted of all the nations that frequented them, and affirm that the French are the most delicate and the Spaniards are hardest of digestion."

Laborde in one of his jaunts in St. Vincent overtook on the road a communicative Carib who was beguiling the tedium of his journey by gnawing at the remains of a boiled human foot. This man ate Arrowaks only. "Christians," he said, "gave him indigestion."

Sweating Gold Coins

1899

This Trick of Swindling is Easily Performed

Sweating a coin is merely robbing it of a portion of its legal weight without in any manner altering its appearance. Manifestly gold coins alone would hardly appeal to the sweater, for silver would hardly pay for the trouble. In countries where paper money in employed, sweating has taken no root. Also in countries like England, where the largest gold coin is a sovereign, the practice would hardly become epidemic.

On the Pacific slope at one time the nefarious business assumed such proportions that the government found it necessary to pass measures against coin sweating, but even then the manifest injustice of arresting a person for merely "passing" such a coin, such person being almost certainly quite innocent, appealed to legislators to such an extent that the law was made only to affect the actual manipulator of the unlawful process. The consequence of this has been that the authorities have had the greatest difficulty in securing convictions against the malefactors, who have debased no end of coins.

The process of robbing a coin of a part of its metal is simple. The goldpiece is merely immersed, or suspended, in aqua regia, a mixture of nitric and hydrochloric acids, which attacks the metal at once. The manipulator keeps the piece in the bottle only a short time, for a few minutes suffice for the mixture to absorb and hold in solution as much as a dollar's worth of the gold from a $20 piece. The coin is then washed in water and polished with whiting, as otherwise its surface would betray the ordeal through which it had been passed, showing "pockmarks" in great variety.

The process is continued with other coins until the acid is "saturated," when it will absorb no more of the metal. The coins are exchanged for silver or other currency, as only an expert could detect the small subtraction in weight, and the silver is then re-exchanged for more gold, upon which the operator performs his little game in due course. It is only necessary for the villain to boil down his acid to complete evaporation, when the residue in the kettle will be found in the shape of a gleaming button of pure gold, varying in size according to the amount of acid and the charge it carries in solution.

In San Francisco the government secret agents have waged a long and bitter war with sweaters. They have captured many who were guilty enough in all conscience, but against whom no conviction could be obtained for lack of evidence, and they have placed others beyond all worldly temptation for various terms of years.

One of the lone kings of this nefarious business, who finally was obliged to sojourn for a rest in the penitentiary at San Quentin, was named Goodrich. He was an exceedingly modest and retiring man. He occupied an ordinary dwelling and conducted his operations on the roof. After many long weeks of vigil on the part of government detectives he was taken into custody, not redhanded, but at least black fingered by the acid. His apparatus was found most cleverly concealed behind movable bricks in the chimney on top of his house. At the time of his capture a small bottle of greenish fluid was found, and this, upon being carefully reduced in fumes, yielded up a button worth fully $10. A few coins were discovered in the man's pockets and also in his residence. These, to all appearances, were honest coins. Under the microscope they were found to be fairly cross hatched with tiny lines, which had been produced by the process of polishing to remove the traces where the acid had eaten away the metal.

Insidious as this acid thieving may appear, it might be regarded as crude by those who are acquainted with the "tricks that are vain" exercised by the "heathen Chinee." John Chinaman is numerous in California. He gets his long hands on many a golden disk, and with great reluctance does he ever relinquish his grip, He has never learned the "art" of sweating the coins with acid, but he accomplishes his purpose in his characteristically patient manner. He simply places many coins together in a buckskin bag and then proceeds to shake and toss and otherwise agitate that receptacle by the hour or by the week until he has worn off by abrasion $10 or $20 worth of fine dust of gold. The coins wear one another. They present the appearance when at length they emerge from the sack of having been regularly abraded by pocket to pocket circulation, and therefore to all intents and purposes nothing illegal has been done. As a matter of fact, no Chinese has ever been apprehended or put on trial for this work. It is doubtful if the authorities have ever taken cognizance of the practice. Only a few people ever realized what the sly Celestials were at when witnessing the hourly agitation of the coins. It is of course unlawful to bore a hole through a gold coin or to perform any other mutilation, but Mr. Chinaman cannot be said to mutilate the money he wears out so artfully, and therefore he pursues his course serene and unmolested.

There have been clever rogues from time to time who employ a slender tool with which to "gut" a coin. Their method is to make a small incision in the edge of a coin and then patiently dig out the inside, after which they refill the hollow space with baser metal. "High art" like this has become almost obsolete, for the acid business has frequently proved safer and less difficult of performance. Laws will multiply and detectives will wax more and more like Sherlock Holmes, but the makers and administrators of penal regulations will be obliged to arise early in the morning to prevent for all time the effort of man to accumulate his "pile" for "nothing."

The Douglas Shoe

1900

The best advertised and consequently the best known shoe in the world today is undoubtedly made by the W. L. Douglas Shoe Co., of Brockton, Massachusetts.

The one idea of this company has always been to sell a shoe for $3.50 which equals in every way the $5 shoes of any other concern. They are able to do this on account of there being no middle man's profit, as the goods are sold direct from the factory to the wearer. In 60 of the principal cities of the country they have their own retail stores. The goods are made in all sizes and widths, and few shoes equal them for style and durability.

The factory at Brockton employs over 3,100 hands, and, all labor troubles are settled by the state board of arbitration. Nothing but union labor is employed, and pay is about the best average wages of any shoe workers in the United States. The factory payroll amounts to $17,435 per week. This company makes shoes for men only, and it is their proud boast that over one million men wear them. — Denver (Colo.) Post.


Geese and Sages

One day in presiding at table at his country home in Windsor, Vermont, with a swarm of grandchildren about him, Senator William W. Evarts is said to have asked: "What is the difference between this goose before dinner and me after?" After much futile guessing, he answered, in quiet glee: "Now the goose is stuffed with sage, and soon the sage" — pointing to himself — "will be stuffed with the goose."


Words

In coining such modern words as "telegram," "photography," etc., the Japanese have recourse to the Chinese language, as we do to the Greek.

A Remarkable Pilgrim — 103, Walks Long Way, Fails

1900

Aged Woman Determined to See Paris Exposition

An almost incredible story comes from France of the resolution and energy of an old Alsatian woman who was determined to see the exposition. She was found, exhausted by hunger and fatigue, on a road in the department of the Marne.

When her strength had been restored somewhat by medical treatment and food she told the following story: She was born in Alsace on January 2, 1797, and is therefore 103 years old. Seized with a burning desire to see the exposition, she had left Alsace two weeks before, intending to walk all the way to Paris, for she had a horror of railroads, and, besides was poor.

She had accomplished more than half the journey and had walked more than 150 miles. On her shoulders she carried her luggage, two bundles weighing fifty-nine livres (pounds). Her money, which she carried in a handkerchief, was a trifling burden, as it consisted of one 2-franc piece. In this financial condition it is needless to add that the courageous old woman had resolved at the outset not to enter an inn or restaurant during her journey. She subsisted entirely on bread and cheese, slept in barns when she could or in default of shelter passed the night under the trees by the wayside.

As soon as she had recovered her senses — for she was unconscious when found — she wished to resume her journey, and it was difficult to make her understand that Paris was yet a long way off. At last she understood and seemed resigned to her failure.


Origin of the Chinese Queue

The custom of Chinamen wearing pigtails is not ancient, considering the period that China has existed as a nation. It dates from 1627, when the Manchus, who then commenced the contest of the Celestial Empire, enforced this fashion of doing the hair as a sign of degradation. The average queue is three feet long, and, reasoning that the adult Chinamen number 200,000,000, we get a united pigtail measuring 113,636 miles long, sufficient to go four and a half times round the earth! — Golden Penny.

Five Hens Lay Eggs in Deep Snow Nests

Feb. 1920

Fowls Dig Their Own Snug Roosts on Roof of Barn

HILERTON, New York — It being the warmest day of the winter, Chester Wasselton, a poultryman of this village, opened the door of his hen house to allow his hens to come out and enjoy the sunshine. Late in the afternoon Wasselton went to the hen house and seeing the hens were on the roosts closed the door.

Next morning the poultryman heard a loud cackling which came from the roof of the hen house. He secured a ladder, placed it against the structure and climbed to the roof, which was covered with three feet of snow. Wasselton says that when he reached nearly to the peak of the roof he was surprised to find five of his white leghorns buried in the snow. Furthermore, he says that when he removed the hens he was dumbfounded to find that each hen had laid an egg.

Wasselton placed the eggs in his coat pocket and threw the hens from the roof. He expresses the opinion that the hens flew to the roof the night before, dug their way down to the shingles through the snow and, as it was warm, made no effort to leave.


Cake 14 Years Old, Served At Wedding

First in Family to Marry Won the Fruity Confection

ST. LOUIS, Missouri — A wedding cake made fourteen years ago was served as a breakfast following the wedding her of Miss Geraldine Isabelle Buchanan, of California, Mo., to Lieut. Austin Smith Parker of Greenville, S.C.

The cake was made from a recipe for Chinese fruit cake and preserved in brandy to be served at the first wedding in the family of Mr. and Mrs. Thomas J. Buchanan, parents of the bride.

Peculiar Chinese Parents and Daughters

1896

It is a disagreeable fact that Chinese parents are in the habit, in certain circumstances, of abandoning female infants to death by starvation, and it is one that an apologist for China would like to pass over in silence.

On the other hand, nothing is gained by exaggeration, and as far as my most limited experience allows me to speak, it is enormous exaggeration to talk as if Chinese mothers exposed their daughters habitually and without a second thought. At any rate, the people of Fair-Reply would repudiate the charge with amazement. "He han kai, tso mak kai fit?" "Is she a good one, why throw away?" they would ask.

Why indeed, when a girl of ten in good health and fairly bonny will always fetch $100; while each of the next five or six years will add $10 to her market value? So remembering that from the age of five she will be useful to gather bambu husks for fuel, mind the baby, feed the buffalo, and a year or two later cut fern, dig up pistachio nuts, and carry water, it will be seen that a healthy female child will be by no means an unprofitable investment.

But if the child be sickly, then it is different. The nasty little thing looks so red and helpless and repulsive. If it dies within doors its fractious spirit will remain there, and add another torment to the teeming world of imps that surround us. Better for all parties to deport the tiny spirit to some lonely spot, turn away quickly, and think of something else.

Charity might possibly accept some such revulsion of the maternal instincts in explanation; and the anthropologist will remember "Nature," that "holy thing," and the case of the rabbits once so aptly cited in this connection. — Blackwood's Magazine.

How Queer Fish Are Bred

1914

Curious Results Obtained by Chinese and Japanese in Selection and Crossing

The telescope fish, a monstrous variety of carp, is a creation of the Chinese and Japanese fish breeders, who are past masters in the art of deforming nature. It has an almost globular glistening body, gilded on the sides, double dorsal fins and a long tail of peculiar shape. Its eyes and their sockets are very prominent and resemble the object glasses of telescopes, whence the name telescope fish.

A carp possessing this abnormal feature was discovered in Japan in the sixteenth century, since which epoch the peculiar character has been perpetuated and combined with many variations in form and coloring, by careful selection and crossing.

The variety known as Yen-tan-yen or "veil tail" preserves the normal structure of the eye during life, but its delicate transparent tail attains an enormous size and falls in graceful folds, like a veil, producing effects that a "serpentine" dancer might envy, when a little flsh moves in the sunlight.

Other Japanese varieties of the telescope fish are the "sheep's nose," which owes its name to the convexity of its body; the "pig's snout," which has a head resembling those of Asiatic swine, and the "fan tail," which raises and spreads its tail in the manner of a fan-tail pigeon.

The Chinese breeders of telescope fish disdain these abnormalities of structure and devote their attention chiefly to coloring. By modifying the temperature of the water, and by impregnating it with lime and iron, they produce startling shades and markings.

Among the innumerable varieties thus obtained we may mention the "spotted," with a belly of silver, and sides and back marked with blue, yellow, black, rose and carmine dots; the crimson "ruby" and the "superb," with glittering scales, scarlet belly, and black or bright red markings on the back.

Steamer Leaving Hawaii Orders More Bananas

1897

HAD A GOOD EYE

Sam Parker Bowls a Bunch of Bananas

There was an amusing incident on the Pacific Mail wharf Saturday afternoon, just as the O. & O. S. S. Belgic was hauling away from the Pacific Mail wharf. In this Sam Parker, Clarence Crabbe and a Chinese fruit vendor were concerned.

Just a few minutes before the steamer departed for the Orient Mr. Crabbe thought that he would like to see some bananas aboard. He called a Chinaman and told him to get three bunches from up town as quickly as possible. The fellow demurred, thinking it too late, but finally ran up town and brought down three bunches.

He arrived on the wharf just as the steamer was hauling away from the wharf. Grasping one of the bunches he threw it up toward the lower deck. It fell short and into the water. The second bunch met with the same fate. Just then Sam Parker went to the rescue, and, grasping the third and largest bunch, gave it a swing and sent it aboard without trouble. While the Chinaman was mourning the loss of the two bunches in the water, native boy swimmers were tying a rope to these, and in a short time they were hauled aboard. The shouts of the people on the wharf when Sam Parker threw the third bunch aboard were heard uptown.

—Hawaiian Gazette, Honolulu, June 8, 1897, p. 5.

Here and There — Miss Fairy Straley's School Closed

Pennsylvania, 1921

Miss Fairy Straley's school, Midway, closed on Tuesday. A summer school will be opened in Midway schoolhouse on Monday by Miss Ioma Yake to be conducted for the next eight weeks.

A .22 cartridge in a pipeful of tobacco exploded as Chas. Kappes was smoking in the Eagle's home, Gettysburg, on Tuesday night, shattering the pipe. The bullet just missed the head of Wm. Tipton, Jr., who was seated nearby.

When A. E. Walker, aged 42, of East Berlin R. D., was arrested by Patrolman Stayman for disregarding the traffic signal Saturday afternoon, he explained, not as an excuse at all, that altho he is the father of nine children and is a truck farmer, he clean forgot all about the traffic regulations. Chief Craver discharged him with a reprimand, declaring that a man with nine children, and who has nerve enough to buy an automobile, too, ought to have some consideration.

A service for the benefit of the starving Chinese will be held in Maple Grove chapel, near Abbottstown on Saturday evening. The Rev. Paul Glatfelter and William H. Menges, of Menges Mills, will be the speakers. A silver offering will be lifted.

George W. Rudisill, about 65 years old, a well-known farmer of near Glenville, was injured in a horrible manner Friday morning, and later in the day had his right arm removed at the West Side sanatorium, York. His arm was caught and shredded in a grain separator, which he was operating at the time of the accident.

—New Oxford Item, New Oxford, Pennsylvania, April 7, 1921.

Must Dress Spanish To Be in Style Now

1916

Last Season The Fashion Trend was To Chinese — Now It's Changed
By Margaret Mason.

NEW YORK. Feb. 11. — Sing ho! for the Spanish main, for anything Spanish is the main thing in the new trend of Fashion. Last season we were all to the Chinese and goodness knows where we will be season after next. At the pace they are going it looks as if the designers would soon be sitting around on their haunches and weeping a la Alexander the Great for more worlds to copy.

Personally it strikes me Borneo fashions might be smart for the summer season, but the designers are probably holding them in reserve for the winter months. But to return to Spain; even as a Spanish omelet the fashion designers are undoubtedly being egged on to the Spanish mode by the recent production of that much-heralded Spanish opera, "Goyesca," at the Metropolitan opera house. Incidents in the life of Goya and his paintings inspired the opera, the opera inspired our present fashions and so Mr. Goya is really the responsible party.

Goya was the father of twenty children, one of the most favored lovers of the duchess of Alba and a great artist. Not for these achievements, however, is he now known to fame, but as the designer of these feminine frocks and frills for 1916.

Quantities of Spanish lace, both white and black, are used in flounces on the new old Spanish gowns which are copied outright from old portraits by Goya and Vesasquez. One of the French houses offers a gown which is a replica of that worn by the infants in Velasquez's most famous portrait. The gown is dubbed Velasquez, and it is wired out over the hips in the same exaggerated manner as the portrait. In fact, almost all of the frocks with Hispanic tendencies show this wiring over the hips, and the bodices are tight-boned and pointed.

Crude, strong tones of yellow, red, green and orange are used to get the true Spanish effects and mantillas, scarves and sashes of gay hues, high back combs and gaudy fans are accessories after the fact. Stunning evening wraps and negligees are fashioned out of the gorgeously embroidered Spanish shawls, and in some instants they are even made into evening gowns verily reeking of Carmen and bull fights.

Indeed all the Spanish fashions are bully.

Considering the shortage of dyes and the fact that all the real blue-blooded senoritas are raven-tressed, this is bound to be a closed season for blondes, and peroxide peaches will all stop trying to conceal their dark pasts.

With our characteristic whole-souled manner of entering entirely into the spirit and atmosphere of a new mode I have no doubt that even our diet will now smack of the Spanish tendency toward onions, omelettes, mackerel and sweet peppers. Our fox-trots and one-steps will give way to the fandango, our national sport become throwing the bull and our Irene Castle go around looking like a castle in Spain.

—Fort Wayne News, Fort Wayne, IN, Feb. 11, 1916, p. 4.

A Chinese Trick Explained — "Melican Man Do Findee Out"

1878

George III, it is reported, was once puzzled when eating apple dumplings to know how the apple got inside the dumpling.

During a recent Chinese banquet at San Francisco an orange was laid at the plate of each guest. The fruit, on being cut open, was found to contain five kinds of delicate jellies. Colored eggs were also served, in the inside of which were found nuts, jellies, meats and confections. When one of the Americans asked the interpreter to explain this legerdemain of cookery, he laughed heartily, shook his head and replied: "Melican man heap smart — why he not findee out?"

The orange "trick" is easy to see through. A hole about of the size a ten-cent piece is made in the skin, through which the pulp is taken out; then one kind of jelly, warmed so that it will run, is poured into the orange; when it has cooled another is poured in, and so on until the orange is filled. When the jellies are different colors, the effect on cutting the orange is very striking.



He Made a Mistake

A Michigan farmer, named Harris, has had so many adventures with burglars that he never dares in go to market, in Detroit, without having a gun behind him in his wagon.

Soon after daylight last Tuesday he saw something on the highway that looked like a horse blanket, and while he was getting out of the wagon to pick it up a man confronted him and cried out: "I was waiting for you to come along." Without delay the cautions farmer seized his gun and fired a charge of bird shot almost in the face of the enemy, who retreated in great disorder, screaming and yelling.

The farmer drove on very complacently, thinking that he would have a good story for the boys at the tavern, but discovered a few yards down the road a broken wagon loaded with poultry. The man whom he had stuffed with bird shot was not a robber, but a small farmer who had lost his horse blanket and gone back to look for it.

The repentant marksman went back and tried to comfort his unfortunate fellow-traveler, and found him sitting on a log and counting the wounds — some thirty or more.

Note: "Last Tuesday was sometime in January 1878 or perhaps 1877 sometime. By the way, how do you like the guy's policy of shoot first and ask questions later? Not so good. He could've pulled the gun and had the guy state his business.

Chinese Music Played As the Musician Thinks Best

1920

Chinese Music Unwritten

Chinese music is not written. The words of some of the famous songs have been preserved, but the music has been handed down from father to son for generations that go far back before the day of the troubadours. When music is played it is played according to the memory of the musician and his ideas of interpretation. A musician varies the performance as his best judgment dictates, and the strings, reeds or brass may break in at almost any time.


Effect Not Appreciated

Instead of candles, Lucille's mother placed six large marshmallows on top of her birthday cake. When little Doris returned from the party her mother said, "Well, did you all have a jolly good time?" and she replied: "Yes, all but the cake. Oh, mother, that cake looked so bad, just like a cemetery. It had little tombstones on it!"


Hadn't Thought of That

A man, unable to choose a wife from three girls whom he admired, sent duplicate letters of proposal to all, intending to marry the one who assented first. The trouble that be did not foresee was that the two too-late ones would sue for breach of promise.

—Bedford Gazette, Bedford, Pennsylvania, January 9, 1920, page 10.

The First Dolls, Beautifully Carved in Babylon

1920

First Dolls

The first dolls of which there is any knowledge were found among the treasures unearthed from the ruins of Babylon. They were small figures in terra cotta and ivory, beautifully carved and must have been fascinating playthings for little Assyrian children. The little girls of Syria had mechanical dolls. The dolls the classic children played with were made of wax and clay, decorated with bright colors. As these children married very young, they played with their dolls until just before their wedding day.


Artesian Wells

The Chinese have obtained water through means of artesian wells for over 1,000 years. One of the most famous wells in existence is that at Grenelle, in the outskirts of Paris, where the water is brought from a depth of 1,508 feet. It yields 516½ gallons of water a minute. Many years ago a well in Petsh was sunk to the depth of 3,100 feet.


Eliminated

Marie and Helen were playing house one day, when Ruth joined them. They were not particularly anxious to see her that day, and finally said, "Well, you can be the maid and this is your day out."—Nebraska Awgwan.

—Bedford Gazette, Bedford, Pennsylvania, January 9, 1920, page 10.

Chinese Lit Professor Discusses Chinese Lit

Madison, Wisconsin, 1921

CHINESE LIKE DOYLE'S YARNS

American Detective Stories Make Big Hit Among Oriental Students

A. Conan Doyle's detective stories and Stevenson's Doctor Jekyll and Mr. Hyde are "all the rage" among Chinese readers of today, according to Prof. Chia Len Chen in a talk on Chinese Literature Thursday afternoon in Bascom hall.

"The Chinese language is very difficult to learn," said Mr. Chen. "This is due to the fact that each word has four tones, each with a different meaning." He gave for am example the word "fang," meaning room and proceeded to pronounce it to show the difference in tone. Strangely enough, to the inexperienced American ear, each pronunciation sounded exactly alike.

"'Our robbers will not disappear until all the wise men are dead,' was the belief of a Chinese philosopher living in the third or fourth century B. C.," said Prof. Chen, in his lecture on The Essentials of Chinese Philosophy in Bascom hall Thursday night.

"This same ancient philosopher looked upon the taming of the horse, the making of pottery, carpenter work, weaving and all the advancing marks of civilization as an evil to the race," he said. "He could not see why nature should not keep its course as when man and beasts lived fearlessly together. As people got farther away from natural laws and living, the more corrupt they became and the more in need of sermons and music to keep down their evil passions, this sage believed.

"Confucius was the great moral teacher of the Chinese people. He taught 'Do not do unto others what you would not have them do to you.' The most brilliant exponent of the school of Confucius was Mencius.

"The first Chinese philosopher of which there is record was born in 804 B. C. and was 30 years the senior of Confucius. He wrote two books of his beliefs and observations consisting of about 5,000 words."


ENGLISH AUTHORS INFLUENCE CHINESE, DECLARES DR. CHEN

Modern Writers Not Recognized But Older Works Are Studied

All of the recent novels of China show the influence of the old school of English authors, especially Scott, said Dr. Chia Lin Chen Chinese scholar and educator, who delivered the first of a series of three lectures in Bascom hall yesterday afternoon.

More modern authors have not yet been recognized by the Chinese, but Shakespeare, Irving, Dickens and Scott have been translated into Chinese and are bases of study in secondary schools. The Sherlock Holmes stories of Conan Doyle are particularly popular in China, he declared.

Dr. Chen divided the Chinese literature into two classes, the classical, written before 1900, and the modern, written since then. The older is written in a poetic prose style, similar to the blank verse of the Shakespearean works, while the modern is written in a smoother and freer style. Dr. Chen translated several of the typical poems of the various dynasties since 1800 B. C. Their subject is chiefly of the ruins of the older dynasties or of the renowned beauties of the period in which they are written.

Dr. Chen will speak on Chinese drama this afternoon at 4:30 in 165 Bascom hall.

—The Capital Times, Madison, Wisconsin, May 13, 1921, page 3.