The policeman who acted as Robertson's guide told him that they had known all about the movements and intentions of the mob long before it had reached the police headquarters, by way of the Bowery and Elm Street, and begun to force its way from the Bowery through some of the side streets into the Chinese quarter. Fearing that the latter would be set on fire, the chief of police had given orders to protect it from the irresponsible mob by barricading the streets with all the available members of the force. In this attempt, however, they had been only partially successful. It was out of the question for six hundred men to hold out against tens of thousands; the enormous pressure from the rear had hurled the front rows like driftwood against the thin chain of policemen, which, after a stubborn resistance, had simply been broken through at several spots. A hand-to-hand fight had ensued and shots were soon fired on both sides, so that the police had to content themselves with an effort to check the worst excesses. Then, too, the spirit of patriotism was just as rampant in the breasts of the police as it was in the breasts of those who urged on the mob. As it was impossible to catch hold of the treacherous invaders themselves, their natural allies should at least not escape unscathed. The Chinese were of course prepared for such an attack. The howling, raging mob found barricaded doors and windows wherever they went, and even when they did succeed, after considerable labor, in breaking these down, it was usually only to find that the birds had flown, that the occupants had made their escape in time. Wherever resistance had been offered by the Chinese, the mob had gone beyond all bounds in its frenzy. "Several hundred Chinamen must have been killed," said the policeman, "and it would be best for the papers to hush up what went on inside the houses." Robertson and his companion stopped near a lamp-post, and the former hurriedly made some shorthand notes of all the information he had received. "Look," said the policeman, "Judge Lynch has done his work well," and he pointed with his club to a lamp-post on the other side of the street from which two dark bodies were hanging. "Simply hanged 'em," he added laconically.