🚀 go-pugleaf

stayed in the
    house three days, and sold her to the first and second defendants
    (mother and daughter) for $120. She added: "This was in the tenth
    month last year.... I was never allowed to go out. I have never
    been out of the house since I came to Hong Kong [nearly six
    months]. First, second and third defendants never went out of the
    house together [some one always being on guard]. Last year Tai-Ku
    and A-Neung told me that I should have to go to San Francisco.
    This year I was again told that I was going to San Francisco. I
    said I did not want to go. Tai-Ku then beat me." Another girl
    only 19 years old, married about four years, declared that in
    consequence of a quarrel between herself and another wife of her
    husband, he sold her to Sz-Shan, fifth defendant, for $81, who
    brought her from Tamshui by steamer to Hong Kong, and took her to
    A-Neung's house, where she was being held for sale. She finished
    her testimony thus: "Several men have been up to the house to see
    me. They were going to buy me if they liked me." A letter was
    produced by the Inspector, which he found in A-Neung's house, from
    Canton to the writer's sister-in-law in Hong Kong, urging that as
    the owner had lost money on the "present cargoes," a higher price
    must be set on them and the sale hastened, as soon as the letter
    should arrive, and word returned that they had been disposed of;
    also directing that "after the transaction, one cue-tassel and one
    shirting trouser" were to be taken back and sent to Canton by the
    hand of a friend at first opportunity. (This as a pledge of good
    faith.)

    A-Neung, first defendant, declared that she was "a widow,
    supported by her son-in-law now in California. Mine is a family
    house.