A friend of mine who employs many hundreds of coolies pays a regular monthly salary to the head of the thieves in that district. This man comes to the office on pay-days like other _employés_ to draw his wages. If, however, anything has been missed from the factory during the month the value of it is deducted from his salary until the article is restored, which is invariably done.
I have heard of a case where a reforming spirit determined not to submit to such an iniquitous tax. The gatekeeper and night-watchman immediately resigned and could not be replaced, while by the end of the month most of his portable belongings had been surreptitiously removed. Thoroughly cowed, he recalled the two servants and instructed them to pay the tax, whereupon the stolen articles promptly reappeared and security was again restored.
Largely owing to the influence of Buddhism, cattle are regarded by the Chinese solely as beasts of burden, it being seldom that any are slaughtered for food; and although many natives will eat beef when it comes conveniently to hand, still, there is a strong prejudice against it. This prejudice extends both to milk and butter, neither of which is a common article of celestial food. From this it may be easily imagined that Europeans are often put to considerable inconvenience in securing an adequate supply of these daily necessaries. Good milk is especially hard to get. So long as it is white the native dairyman considers that his obligations to customers are discharged, while the more water he can add, the better it is for his own pocket. At Hankow the supply was so adulterated that a friend of mine actually found a small live fish in his morning cupful. With a view to exposing fraud I purchased a lactometer and found the usual proportions of milk and water to be half and half.
This was too much, so calling the dairyman to the house I abused him roundly and threatened that if he did not send pure milk in future I would ask the consul to punish him severely. He vowed and declared that the lactometer "no talkee true," and that no water whatever had been added to the milk, adding, that if I did not believe him he would bring a cow to the kitchen door and I could see it milked myself.