The four assistants then laid him out at full length on the ground, face downwards, and held him firmly, whilst his master took a red-hot marking-iron from the fire, and branded him on both thighs, just as if he was marking a horse or a cow.
Luckily, the boy escaped from the house, and found refuge with Father Barrado, who took charge of him, and administered a severe reprimand to the brutal Chinaman.
The Chinamen abominably cheat all those who are unable to protect themselves. Their business is based upon false weights and measures, and on adulteration. In the end, they spoil every business they enter upon, just as they have done the tea trade in their own country, and the tobacco and indigo trade in the Philippines.
They require to be closely looked after, and should be made to pay special taxes, which they can well afford.
Some of the Chinese become converts, not that their mean and sordid souls are in any degree susceptible to the influence of the Christian religion, but in order to obtain material advantages.
They hope to be favoured in business, and to be able to get a Christian wife, which otherwise might not be easy; for although a Visayas woman does not disdain a Chinaman, she would not care to marry a heathen.
In any case, the Chinaman most likely remains a heathen at heart, and if he returns to China he becomes a renegade.