A CHINESE HOEY.

Evening Star, Issue 3369, 6 December 1873, Page 1 (Supplement)

A CHINESE HOEY.

It was the <S 'mi J<’rinir{sri> ('hrouirfc which. I came out the other day with colossal head-lines I on the-discovery of a formidable “ Hoey” at San Francisco ; -“A Council of Twenty, with Power of Life and Death ;” “ A Tribunal of i Judgment without Appeal.” The facts of the case seem to warrant to the full these startling announcements, which, even in a city that not’ very long ago owed its possession of tolerable order to a vigorous Vigilance Committee, were calculated to jae s » ; ‘infullv ou American citizens, whose strongest impulse, even when they seem to be farthest from their ideal, is to be resolutely law-abiding. The question which reveals the worst side of the “ Heathen Chinee,” the woman-question, namely, was at the bottom of the matter, lip to very recently no Chinese women at all were included among the emigrants from the Celestial Umpire ; but of late the bar set by Chinese opinion against female emigration has begun to be raised, and a few weeks ago we read of a cargo of three hundred women and girls being disposed of by public auction in the Chinese quarter of (San Francisco. What is the fate of some at least of these < 'hinawomen may he gathered from our ; narrative. On the 18th of June last, the chief I of the San Francisco police received a letter, j dated the preceding day, from “704 Pacific, j street,” a locality which will be recognised I as peculiarly Chinese. The letter purported to j be written at the supplication of All Sing, Sang I Chow, and Sang Fung, three Chinese girls, I held in infamous slavery by the procuress, Ah Yee, and subjected to 'the most merciless, scourgings whenever their miserable earnings fell below the expectations of Ah Yec and her male partner Hon Chan. Acting on this information, the police at once proceeded to the den “ 7J4 Pacific street,” and finding the girls as j described, removed them to a place of safety at i the Chinese Mission, DID Washington street, under the guardianship of the Kev. Mr Hibson, | pastor of the mission. Shortly afterwards tjie I wretches Ah Yee and Hon ('hau were hauled 1 up before the ('ourts, and fined in the sum of | .’>oo dollars each. , Down to this point, the Secret Society had. not made its appearance, and had not had the 1 opportunity, the girls being under safe custody, ! and American officials being the other parties; moving in the affair. ISovr the “Hoey” only ; acts, and can only act, upon Chinese, the white’ man being altogether outside tlm organisation and the reach of society. It was Hot long, however, until the requisite occasion rose. ThreeChinamen were easily found to marry the , liberated girls according to law, and each of the? husbands being previously bound clown in a. 1 security of five hundred dollars to behave with j humanity, Ah Sing, Sang Chow, and Sang j Fnng departed to their new homes. A few days after the triple wedding, a fresh letterreached the chief of police. It was Lun Yat I Sung, the husband of Ah Sing, who wrote to re- ' veal an astonishing state of facts. He had been summoned, on the 17th of July, before the ' ' Secret Council of Twenty, composed of the. ; > richest and most influential Chinese - men ; - worth thousands and ordered, under paiu of 1 , death, to pay over to the procuress Ah Yee the. { ( sum of three hundred and fifty dollars, as com ' 1 pensation for the emancipation of his wife, j Here wo see very clearly an idea of justice- • j according to the Chinese notions. Lun Yat- ' Sung was not required, in theory, at least, to. i pay the fine which had been imposed by tlnv ; 1 Courts on the barbarous mistress of Ah Sing, j I It waq to quote Ids own letter, “ the value of j mywife,” which he was ordered to pay to the j 1 person who had been at the expense of the im- t portation of the girl; and however the abonv ] Liable purposes and conduct of the horrible .Aih I • Yee had vitiated any title of the kind, it catv I 1 be acknowledged that the “ Hoey” did not pro- • j coed without a certain darkened and distorted! * equity. Lun Yat Sung’s letter to the polios? 1 was dated on the 27th of July, so that it appears that he took ten days to make up his mind c

I to dare to call in the white man’s law to cop( with the perilous mysteries of the Assassinatioi Council. The other husbands made no stir, and nia} I be supposed, accordingly, to have obeyed tin I sentence of the “Hoey.” As for Ah Sing’.' ; husband, he seems to have felt that when then ’ was no drawing back, the only safety was in ! going boldly to extremes, and we have the strongest notion that it was the wife who iniI parted such exceptional courage. Be it rei membeml that she had signed the original application to the American authorities the first of the three girls. Taking refuge in the mission, Jam Yat Sung gave it to be understood that he was prepared to venture all lengths, and the Council of Twenty had the weakness or the guile—they could have him knifed in a year as well as in a month —to olfer to let him off on payment of one hundred dollars. It was an undeniable blunder that the proffered compromise of the “ Hoey’' was in writing. Bun Tat Sung handed the communication to the police, who now had documentary evidence to work upon. He next denounced the names of the principal members of the Council, ! which led to the arrest of some of the wealthiest merchants of the Chinese quarter, and finally consented to guide the police to

the very seat of the society itself. The grotesque character of ('hinese terrorism was faithfully preserved in the appearance of the judg-ment-chamber. At the end of a room eighteen feet long by twelve feet wide was a species of altar, set with hideous idols. Huge heads of demons, in wood and paperwork, glared with great goggle eyes from the walls, their grinning jaws being in addition capable of opening and shutting by means of hidden strings and pulleys. A square coffer of immense weight—the muniment-chest of the “Hoey”—stood at the entrance of the den. The Bau Francisco police have made a clear haul of all these curiosities, and as a result of the preliminary investigation, the seven merchants denounced by Lun Yat Sung have been hound over to stand their trial at the assizes on a charge of threatening to murder. The bail required has been fifteen thousand dollars, ineachca.se, an amount significant of the wealth of the accused. We might not believe this story, or even set i it down to the race hatred notoriously existing I in California, hut that it tallies too well with all that is known of the Chinese difficulty in Singapore, and even with some things suspected of tile highly respectable Chinese colony in Calcutta. The “Hoey”reigns wherever Chinamen settle, and is so powerful, so secret, and so de- I tennined, that the late 1 ami Dalhousie, a despot, | if ever there was one, absolutely refused to encour- • age( 'hinese immigration into Pegu. No( ’hristian j Government, he declared, could govern Chinamen well, for no Christian Government could ■ behead the Council of the “ Hoey” because a l Chinaman was found dead in the street. He ] knew in detail precisely the facts that the Han Francisco magistrates have just lighted on. j