Copying despatches with the thermometer at 100° in the shade, with a basin of water and a towel at one’s side for very necessary hand-wiping, and a pad of blotting-paper over the blank part of one’s paper, is indeed an affreux métier.
I find that Englishmen who can’t speak the language are a little capricious as to exchanging courtesies which the Chinese press upon them. Sometimes it amuses them immensely to stop and talk twaddle with the natives through an interpreter, while at others, especially if there is just a touch of headache in the case, the Chinamen get short answers. To-day as we were walking we passed a group of peasants, one of whom as usual called out civilly, “Hsie yi hsie pa?” (Won’t you sit down a bit?)
F.—“What the devil’s he saying?”
Chinaman (thinking to be intelligible by being still louder)—“Hsie yi hsie pa!”
F.—“Don’t make that damned noise!”
I.—“He’s only asking you to sit down.”
F. (savagely)—“Well, he needn’t make such a confounded row about it!”
Chinaman (to his friends)—“The gentleman is not very quiet,” as if he were speaking of a restive horse.
Friends (assenting)—“Ah! these foreigners! they are indeed terrible people. Unsurpassable! unsurpassable!”
The poor villagers would have been too civil to utter their opinion if they had thought they were understood, but I had held my tongue to hear what they would say.