The day after my kind reception by Mr. and Mrs. S----, I attended, in company with the latter, an examination of a school of Chinese girls. In order to reach the Albany, where this school was located, we were obliged to clamber some distance up the mountain; and extra bearers and chairs being procured, we sallied forth from the great gateway leading into the Queen’s Road, and were directly passing the houses and shops of the European and Chinese residents,--our bearers threading their way through crowds of people. Here and there we met an English officer, and occasionally one of the city police; while, in passing the barracks, we again encountered the Seapoy soldiery,--the fearfully wicked expression of whose eyes, as they impressed us when first seen at Singapore, can never be mistaken or forgotten. Near the Royal Theatre we turned into a street that led up the slope of the mountain, and for a time our stalwart bearers trotted briskly on with ease and steadiness. When, however, about half-way up the ascent, the man walking in front of my chair began to pant and waver in his movements, until finally he labored for breath like one very ill. My pace being lessened, I was already greatly in the rear of my friend; and, becoming alarmed at the idea of a possible fall and tumble down the side of the mountain, begged earnestly, both in words and pantomime, to have my chair set down. Having at length made myself understood, the chair was put down in the middle of the road; and the Coolie, who had excited my pity and sympathy, although still panting, was quietly standing, and looking on with that grave and apparently unconscious air which a Chinaman knows so well how to affect, when he is intent upon gaining some undue advantage over you. My friend, however, on approaching, read him at a glance. He was only performing an old _ruse_ upon a newly arrived outside barbarian,--for it seems that the man expected to work upon my feelings until I should, out of pity, pay and dismiss him. Poor man! he had melted me into the pathetic, but the sudden change to the ludicrous was irresistible, when my friend, understanding the case, exclaimed, in Canton English,[8] “How fashion that!--what for you no carry that chair?” Not a word was uttered by the Coolie, who, apparently oblivious of what was passing, seemed neither to hear, nor to be conscious that anything was wrong. After a short pause, my friend, accompanying her words with spirited little gestures, continued:--“Fightee la,[9]--I tellee Massee of you, and he no givee you one cash![10] Takee up that chair, chop-chop! no can carry alla proper,--no can catchee that cash! I say you no carry--Massee no givee one single cash!” My bearers, who readily understood what was meant by “Massee no givee one single cash,” unless they performed their contract, thereupon took up the chair, and carried it with apparent ease to the end.