LITERATURE.

Globe, Volume III, Issue 238, 15 March 1875, Page 4

LITERATURE.

WAN LEE, THE PAGAN. By Bret Harte. ( Concluded) The next morning’s paper contained Colonel Starbottle’s speech in full, in which it appeared that the ‘ god-like’ Webster had on one occasion uttered his thoughts in excellent but perfectly enigmatical Chinese, The rage of Colonel Starbottle knew no bounds, I have a vivid recollection of that admirable man walking into my office and demanding a retraction of the statement. ‘ But, ray dear sir,’ I asked, ‘ are you willing to deny, over your own signature, that Webster ever uttered such a sentence ? Dare you deny that, with Mr Webster’s well-known attainments, a knowledge of Chinese might not have been among the number? Are you willing to submit a translation suitable to the capacity of our readers, and deny, upon your honor as a gentleman, that the lata Mr Webster ever uttered such a sentiment? If you are, sir, I am willing to publish your denial, ’ The Colonel was not, and left highly indignant. Webster, the foreman, took it more coolly. Happily, he was unaware that for two days after Chinamen from the laundries, from the gulches, from the kitchens, looked into the front-office door with faces beaming with sardonic delight; that 300 extra copies of the Star were ordered for the wash-houses on the river. He only knew that during the day Wan Lee occasionally went off into convulsive spasms, and that he was obliged to kick him into consciousness again, A week after the occurrence I called Wan Lee into my office. * Wan,’ I said, gravely, ‘ I should like you to give me, for my own personal satisfaction, a translation of that Chinese sentence which my gifted countryman, the late god-like Webster, uttered upon a public occasion.’ Wan Lee looked at me intently, and the slightest possible twinkle crept into his black eyes. Then he replied, with equal gravity : * Mishtel Webstel, he says ; ‘ Chinee boy makee me bellee much foolee. Chinee boy makee me heap sick.” ’ Which I have reason to think was true. But I fear I am giving but one side, and not the best, of Wan Lee’s character. As he imparted it to me, his had been a hard life. He had known scarcely any childhood —he had no recollection of a father or mother. The conjurer Wang had brought him up. He had spent the first seven years of his life in appearing from baskets, in dropping out of hats, in climbing ladders, in putting his little limbs out of joint in posturing. He had lived in an atmosphere of trickery and deception ; he had learned to look upon mankind as dupes of their senses ; in fine, if he had thought at all, he would have been a sceptic, if he had been a little older still he would have been a cynic, if he had been older still he would have been a philosopher. As it was, he was a little imp! A good-natured imp it was too —an imp whose moral nature had never been awakened, an imp for a holiday and willing to try virtue as a diversion, I don’t know that he had any spiritual nature; he was very superstitious; he carried about with him a hideous little porcelain god, which he was in the habit of alternately reviling and propitiating. He was too intelligent for the commoner Chinese vices of stealing or gratuitous lying. Whatever discipline he practised was taught by his intellect. I am inclined to think that his feelings were not altogether unimpressible—although it was most impossible to extract an expression from him—and I conscientiously believe he became attached to those who were good to him. What he might have become under more favorable conditions than the bondsman of an over-worked, underpaid literary man, I don’t know; I only know that the scant, irregular, impulsive kindness that I showed him were gratefully received. He was very loyal and patient—two qualities rare in the average American servant. He was like Malvolio, ‘sad and civil,’ with me; only once, and then under great provocation, do I remember his exhibiting any impatience. It was my habit, after leaving the office at night, to take him with me to my rooms, as the bearer of any supplemental, or happy afterthought in the editorial way, that might occur to me before the paper went to press. After night I had been scribbling away past the usual hour of dismissing Wan Lee, and had become quite oblivious of his presence in a chair near my door, when suddenly I became aware of a voice saying, in plaintive accents, something that sounded like ‘ Chy Lee.’ I faced around sternly. ‘ What did you say V * Me say, « Chy Lee.” ’ ‘ Well ?’ I said, impatiently. ‘You sabe, “How do, John?”’ * Yes. ’ ‘ You sabe, * * So long, John ?” ’ ‘Yes.’ * Well, “ Chy Lee ” allee same !’ I understoocMhim quite plainly. It appeared that ‘ Chy Lee * was a form of ‘ good night,’ and that Wan Lee was anxious to go home. But an instinct of mischief which, I fear, I possessed in common with him, impelled me to act as if oblivious of the hint. I muttered something about not understanding him, and again bent over my work. In a few minutes I heard his wooden shoes pattering pathetically over the floor, I looked up. He was standing near the door, * You no sabe, “ Chy Lee ?” ’ ‘No,’ I said sternly. ‘ You sabe muchee big foolee ! alle same ! ’ And with this audacity on his lips, he fled. The next morning, however, he was as meek and patient as before, and I did not recall his offence. As a probable peace offering, he blacked all my boots, a duty never required of him—including a pair of buff deer skin slippers and an immense pair of horseman’s jack-boots, on which he indulged his remorse for two hours. I have spoken of his honesty as being a quality of his intellect rather than his principle, but I recall about this time two exceptions to the rule. I was anxious to get some fresh eggs as a change to the heavy diet of a mining town, and knowing that Wan Lee’s countrymen were great poultryraisers, I applied to him. He furnished me with them regularly every morning, but refused to take any pay, saying that the man did not sell them—a remarkable instance of self-abnegation, as eggs were then worth half-a-dollar a-piece. One morning my neighbour, Foster, dropped in upon me at breakfast, and took occasion to bewail his own ill-fortune, as his hens had lately stopped laying, pf wandered off to the bush.

Wan Lee, who was present during our colloquy, preserved his characteristic sad taciturnity. When my neighbour had gone, he turned to me with a slight chuckle; ‘ Flostle’s hens—Wan Lee’s hens —alle same !’ His other offence was more serious and ambitious. It was a season of great irregularities in the mails, and Wan Lee had heard me deplore the delay in the delivery of my letters and newspapers. On arriving at my office one day, I was amazed to find my table covered with letters, evidently just from the post-office, but unfortunately not one of them addressed to me. I turned to Wan Lee, who was surveying them with a calm satisfaction, and demanded an explanation. To my horror he pointed to an empty mail bag in the corner, and said : “Postman he say ‘No lettee, John —no lettee, John.’ Postman plentee lie! Postman no good. Me catchee lettee last night allee same!” Luckily it was still early; the mails had not been disturbed ; I had a hurried interview with the postmaster, and Wan Lee’s bold attempt at robbing the United States mail was finally condoned by the purchase of a new mail-bag, and the whole affair thus kept a secret. If my liking for my little pagan page had not been sufficient, my duty to Hop Sing was enough to cause me to take Wan Lee with me when I returned to San Francisco, after two years’ experience with the Northern Star. I do not think he contemplated the change with pleasure. I attributed his feelings to a nervous dread of crowded public streets—when he had to go across town for me on an errand he always made a long circuit of the outskirts—to his dislike for the discipline of the Chinese and English school to which I proposed to send him, to his fondness for the free vagrant life of the mines, to sheer wilfulness. That it might have been a superstitious premonition did not occur to me until long ago. Nevertheless, it really seemed as if the opportunity I had long looked for and confidently expected had come—the opportunity of placing Wan Lee under gently restraining influences, of subjecting him to a life and and experience that would draw out of him what good my superficial care and ill-regu-lated kindness could not reach. Wan Lee was placed at the school of a Chinese missionary—an intelligent and kind-hearted clergyman, who had shown great interest in the boy, and who, better than all, had a wonderful faith in him. A home was found for him in the family of a widow, who had a bright and interesting daughter about two years younger than Wan Lee. It was this bright, cheery, innocent, and artless child that touched and reached a depth in the boy’s nature that had hitherto been unsuspected ; that awakened a moral susceptibility which had lain for years insensible alike to the teachings of society or the ethics of the theologian. These few brief months, bright with a promise that we never saw fulfilled, must have been happy ones to Wan Lee. He worshipped his little friend with something of the same superstition, but without any of the caprice, that he bestowed upon his porcelain pagan god. It was his delight to walk behind her to school, carrying her books—a service always fraught with danger to him from the little hands of his Caucasian Christian brothers. He made her the most marvellous toys; he would cut out of carrots and turnips the most astonishing roses and tulips; he made life-like chickens out of melon seeds; he constructed fans and kites, and was singularly proficient in the making of dolls’ paper dresses. On the other hand, she played and sang to him, taught him a thousand little prettinesses and refinements only known to girls, gave him a yellow ribbon for his pig-tail, as best suiting his complexion, read to him, showed him wherein he was original and valuable, took him to Sunday-school with her, against the precedents of the school, and, small-woman-like, triumphed. I wish I could add here that she effected his conversion, and made him give up his porcelain idol; but I am telling a true story, and this little girl was quite content to fill him with her own Christian goodness, without letting him know that he was changed. So they got along very well together—this little Christian girl, with her shining cross hanging around her plump, white little neck, and this dark little pagan, with his hideous porcelain god hidden away in his blouse. There were two days of that eventful year which will long be remembered in San Francisco—two days when a mob of her citizens set upon and killed unarmed, defenceless foreigners, because they were foreigners and of another race, religion, and colour, and worked for what wages they could get. There were some public men so timid that, seeing this, they thought that the end of the world had come ; there were some eminent statesmen, whosenames lam ashamed to write here, who began to think that the passage in the Constitution which guarantees civil and religious liberty to every citizen or foreigner was a mistake. But there were also some men who were not so easily frightened, and in thirty-four hours we had things so arranged that the timid men could wring their hands in safety, and the eminent statesmen utter their doubts without hurting anybody or anything. And in the midst of this I got a note from Hop Sing asking me to come to him immediately. I found his warehouse closed and strongly guarded by the police against any possible attack of the rioters. Hop Sing admitted me through a barred grating with his usual imperturbable calm, but, as it seemed to me, with more than his usual seriousness. Without a word he took my hand and led me to the rear room, and thence down-stairs into the basement. It was dimly lighted, but there was something lying on the floor covered by a shawl. As I approached he drew the shawl away with a sudden gesture, and revealed Wan Lee, the pagan, lying there—dead ! Dead, my reverend friends, dead. Stoned to death in the streets of San Francisco, in the year of grace eighteen hundred and sixty-nine, by a mob of half-grown boys and Christian school children. As I put my hand reverently upon his breast, I felt something crumbling beneath his blouse. I looked inquiringly at Hop Sing. He put his hand between the folds of silk and drew forth something with the first bitter smile I had ever seen on the face of that pagan gentleman. It was Wan Lee’s porcelain god, crushed by a stone from the hands of those Christian iconoclasts !— Scribner's for September.