[figure description] Page 114.[end figure description]

I met a Californian to-day who says he don't believe
Chinamen have ordinary common sense.

“They haven't ordinary sagacity, Uncle Eli,” he said.

“Why?” I asked.

“Because,” said he, growing excited about it, “because—
b-e-c-a-u-s-e they haven't.”

“But why?” I asked. “I want to know an instance
where a Chinaman has ever shown himself to be a
darned fool.”

“Why, Eli, I've known a Chinaman to secrete two
aces in his sleeves, and when I've played the three
aces I had secreted in my sleeves, why, there'd be
five aces out! How absurd!”

“Yes, that was very foolish for the Chinaman, but
what other cases of foolishness have you seen among
the Chinamen?” I asked.

“Why, it was only the day before I left 'Frisco, Mr.
Perkins, that we put some tar and feathers on one of
them Johnnys, just to have a little fun, and then set
fire to it to amuse the children, and the darned fool
ran into a clothes-press and spoiled a dozen of my
wife's dresses putting out the fire, though I told him
better all the time. Dog-on-it, it is enough to make
a man lose faith in the whole race!”

And then that good California threw a colored
waiter out of a fourth story window and went on cutting
off his coupons.

p627-124

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