I did not know whether to laugh or cry when I had read the letter, and
so I did a little of both. I could not bear to think that my mother
should be so deceived, and so bewildered; but it would distress her
sadly if she really knew where I had gone, and how I got there. I had
some doubts, too, whether she would be able to keep the secret long, for
they worm every thing out of her at the Dorcas Society. So I concluded
that I would write her another letter, at the end of the week, which
wouldn't give her any trouble. Week after week passed by without any
interruption of my business; and I devoted three hours every day to the
study of the Chinese language, under the direction of Chim-jung-tsee, a
young Chinaman who spoke pigeon-English very well, and had been highly
recommended by one of the waiters at the hotel. He was a very sleek,
smooth-spoken fellow: the top of his shaved head shone like a billiard
ball, and his tail hung four feet and a half from his shoulders. I
didn't altogether like the expression of his eyes; for although they
were usually turned up at the outside corners, like other Chinese eyes,
sometimes I would catch him with one of them turned down at the corner,
and then he seemed to be looking at me with one eye, and looking out of
the window with the other. His nails were longer than any I had seen in
Canton; and he usually wore stout leather cots on the ends of his
fingers, to protect them from injury. I never knew him to lose his
temper but once; and that was when, just for the fun of the thing, I
managed to snip off an inch or two from one of his nails with my
pen-knife. From that moment, I have reason to believe that he became my
deadly foe. He couldn't have made more of an outcry, had he lost his
arm.

One day, as I entered my room, I found the young man carefully studying
a copy of "The New-York Times," which, contrary to my custom, I had
thoughtlessly left exposed on the desk. After the hours of study were
over, he asked, in an off-hand kind of way, how far New York was from
Canton. I thought it likely that the fellow knew already, and therefore
I did not hesitate to tell him. He then took up the New York paper
again, and, looking with great care at the date, began to count his
fingers, mumbling something to himself in Chinese which I could not
understand. Nothing more passed between us on the subject; but I felt
from that day that I had a spy upon me. I did not like to discharge him
from my servi