THE CHINESE IN SAN FRANCISCO.

Temuka Leader, Issue 1651, 25 October 1887, Page 4

THE CHINESE IN SAN FRANCISCO.

A detective in San Francisco, meeting an old friend, an Australian miner, says we indulged in a cocktail, and started on a tour to the Chinese quarter, I being on duty at the time, We went up Washington-street to Murderers Alley, and turned down Jackson street. This is where the woman was murdered in the nigh*--, within ten feet of where hundreds of people were coming and going all the time. Her murderer, a Chinaman, after robbing the place, coolly washed the blood off his hands and face, and walked away. After tedious iuyestition I saw him hanged for it. Said the detective here where we stand is where another Chinaman cut his runaway mistress open with a long Chinese dagger. I saw that villainous individual pass in his cheques. And further on we proceed. Here, he remarks, is where one of our men of the force got plugged with a six-shooter. I thanked my kind friend for his cheerful information, but suggested that it might be as well to keep -a little of it back for another time, that it was not good to exhaust all the pleasant things of this life at one sitting, so the subject was obligingly changed. He was quite satisfied that the name of the alley is well deserved and appropriate. Swarms of Chinese women, with almond eyes and baby faces, painted red and white in the most lavish manner, lips touched with vermillion, hair black and glossy with a most offensive smell, and clad in blue satin pants and coats,' trotted along the slley, their curious woodensoled shoes rattling like the hoofs of a flock of sheep as they went. Others tapped on the window-panes to attract our attention as we passed, a regular pandemonium of debauchery and crime. Before one house we saw some joss sticks burning, and the white cloth festooned over the door told that death was there. Inquiring into the cause of the defunct’s death, we found that it was one of the worst forms of leprosy. We soon made tracks, not wishing to come in contact with that spicy disease. Going further on he said, “We will step into the dens, and see where they live and die.” Leading the way into a dark passage running from the street into the centre of the block, we stumbled along for some fifty feet, and came to a ricketty, dirty stairway, which we - descended, feeling eur way along step by step until we stood in a stinking courtyard, surrounded with high buildings. For a moment or so we could see nothing, but the stench from rotten vegetables was enough to kill a polecat. The place was literally swarming with the lowest class of the Mongolian population. We struck a match on the wall and lit a candle, and drew out our shooting irons in case of trouble. Immediately a number of curious faces peeped at us from behind a lot of old gunny bags, which took the place of windows and doors in the basement walls. A dozen or two of dirty, dilapidated, demoralised-lookiug, villainous Celestials came out from different corners, and stood with their hands in pockets, regarding us with evident suspicion as unauthorised intruders. This is a regular den of thieves. Not one of these fellows work at any honest trade for a living; they are the loafers and outcasts of China.