Christmas was now close at hand, and we accordingly bought some meat and other things, that we might not eat such an un-Englishlike dinner as rice, turnips, and very small fish, our usual food; and with a little coaxing on our part, we prevailed on the old jailer to allow us to have some samshu, a liquor very like gin, and obtained from rice. We made a better Christmas of it than I had expected, and after our dinner we called our jailer in, and drank his health, to his great delight; in fact, he was so much pleased, that he ran out of our room, and immediately returned, bringing with him a haunch of goat, which he said "he gave to us;" and was going to hang it up in our room, but we deemed it expedient to place it in the outer air, so he hung it up outside, and we had it for dinner the next day. From this time we were allowed to have as much samshu as we liked; and with the exception of one Lascar getting drunk, no one ever forgot himself. The Lascar, when he came to his senses in the morning, we tried by court-martial, and sentenced him to receive three dozen, which were administered with a cat made for the purpose, of threads twisted and plaited together. The marine was now the only Englishman in irons, and notwithstanding the mandarins had promised Lieut. Douglas, in consequence of his remonstrances, that they should be taken off, they had as usual deceived him; so one day we took them off ourselves, and lifting up one of the floor planks in a corner of the room, hid them there. This we were enabled to effect the more easily, as they had been taken off when he was at the jail, to allow him to put on a pair of flushing trousers Lieut. Douglas had given him; and therefore they were not rivetted, but merely padlocked together. The Chinese never noticed that his irons were off, and they were left in the hole as a legacy to the rats.