en we were in possession
of the valley," said the father sorrowfully, "we numbered '12,000 tens'
(120,000 souls), now we are '100 fives' (500 souls). Our men were slain,
our women were taken in prey, only a remnant escaped the destroyer."
Several members of the family were in the court when we entered, and
among the men were three with marked Anglo-Saxon features, a peculiarity
frequently seen in Western China, where every traveller has given a
different explanation of the phenomenon. One especially moved my
curiosity, for he possessed to an absurd degree the closest likeness to
myself. Could I give him any higher praise than that?

That the Mohammedan Chinese is physically superior to his Buddhist
countryman is acknowledged by all observers; there is a fearlessness and
independence of bearing in the Mohammedan, a militant carriage that
distinguishes him from the Chinese unbeliever. His religion is but a
thinly diluted Mohammedanism, and excites the scorn of the true
believers from India who witness his devotion, or rather his want of
devotion.

One of the men talking to us in the old mission-house was a
comical-looking fellow, whose head-dress differed from that of the
other Chinese, in that, in addition to his queue, lappets of hair were
drawn down his cheeks in the fashion affected by old ladies in England.
I raised these strange locks--impudent curiosity is often polite
attention in China--whereupon the reason for them was apparent. The body
bequeathed to him by his fathers had been mutilated--he had suffered the
removal of both ears. He explained to us how he came to lose them, but
we knew even before he told us; "he had lost them in battle facing the
enemy"--and of course we believed him. The less credulous would
associate the mutilation with a case of theft and its detection and
punishment by the magistrate; but "a bottle-nosed man," says the Chinese
proverb, "may be a teetotaller and yet no one will think so."

Our milkman at the mission was a follower of the Prophet, and the milk
he gave us was usually as reduced in quality as are his co-religionists
in number. In the milk he supplied there was what a chemist describes as
a remarkable absence of butter fat. Yet, when he was reproached for his
deceit, he used piously to say, even when met coming from the well, "I
could not put a drop of water in the milk, for there is a God up
there"--and he would jerk his chin towards the sky--"who would see me if
I did."