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girl passed sitting on a stool and holding a sword by its point with
a child of four suspended from its handle, and next a girl holding a
sword by its handle, and the child suspended from its point. One
girl sat playing a flute held up high in the air, and a girl of six
appeared to be suspended from it. One poor little thing was borne high
up in the air, astride a turning-pole, with legs well crossed beneath
the pole. And then there came along a little girl swaying about on the
end of a long pole carried by men in the procession. We were on the
second floor of a great verandah of the hotel, and the child swung so
close to us, that we started forward toward her with a cry of pity.
Great tears were rolling down her cheeks, and she seemed to look
straight into our eyes, and attempted a sickly smile at our
expressions of pity.

Later, after the procession of fishes, we sat in company with two
Chinese ministers of the Gospel who came to call upon us, and
discussed in sadness the scenes of the day. They said, if we had
understood the native language and joined in the procession, as they
did at times, we would have heard the old "pocket-mothers" and other
owners of these girls driving bargains for their sale, temporarily
or permanently, with the men of the crowds. These native Christians
marvelled that Englishmen and American men who called themselves
"Christians" could have joined in these festivities in honor of a
heathen temple, and that the Governor should have made a speech of
congratulation, with no rebuke of these scenes of inhuman torture of
women and child slaves, when the procession paused at his door. These
parades continued two or three days, always accompanied by the great
paper dragons, whether in the daytime or at night, by the noise of
deafening tom-toms, and the sickening sight of tortured slave-girls.




CHAPTER 15.

"PR