I was told that his profits some years
amounted to forty or fifty thousand pounds! He was sitting in a small,
dingy, ill-lighted little office on the ground floor, and had before him
a Chinese calculating machine, over the numerous small balls of which,
strung on wires, he was running his hands for amusement, as a gambler
will sometimes do with his checks. At the suggestion of the gentleman
who was with me, I requested him to multiply four places of figures by
three places, naming the figures, and the operation was done about as
rapidly as I could write down the result. Their shaved heads, and long
queues, sometimes nearly touching the ground, are curious features of
their personal appearance. The workshops front upon the streets, and in
them busy, half-naked creatures may be seen, working away as
industriously as so many beavers all day long, seeming never to tire of
their ceaseless toil.
Amid all this busy population I saw but one female in the streets, and
she was of the lower class. Dined in the country with Mr. Beaver. The
ride out was over good roads flanked by large forests and ornamental
trees, among which was the tall, slender, graceful palm of the
betel-nut. The Botanical Gardens are on an elevation commanding a fine
view of the town and the sea, and are laid out with taste, ornamented
with flowering trees and shrubs, and flowers. Hither a band of music
comes to play several times a week, when the townspeople turn out to
enjoy the scene.
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