American.  The deceased had gained this honor by treating the Chinese as though they were partners in our common humanity.  “Missa Tom,” as he was termed by them, they knew they could trust.  He acquired among them a reputation as the one righteous American in their California Gomorrah.  Chinamen would come to him from distant localities, that he might overlook their bills of sale and other documents used in business intercourse with the white man.  Their need of such, an honest adviser was great.  The descendants of the Pilgrim Fathers often took advantage of their ignorance of the English language, written or spoken.  “Missa Tom” suddenly died.  I had occasion to visit his farm a few days after his death, and on the first night of my stay there saw the array of meats, fruit, wine and burning tapers on a table in front of the house, which his Chinese friends told me was intended as an offering to “Missa Tom’s” spirit.

We will dive for a moment into a Chinese wash-cellar.  “John” does three-fourths of the washing of California.  His lavatories are on every street.  “Hip Tee, Washing and Ironing,” says the sign, evidently the first production of an amateur in lettering.  Two doors above is the establishment of Tong Wash—­two below, that of Hi Sing.  Hip Tee and five assistants are busy ironing.  The odor is a trinity of steam, damp clothes and opium.  More Mongolian tongues are heard from smoky recesses in the rear.  As we enter, Hip Tee is blowing a shower of moisture from his mouth, “very like a whale.”  This is his method of dampening the linen preparatory to ironing.  It is a skilled performance.  The fluid leaves his lips as fine as mist.  If we are on business we leave our bundles, and in return receive a ticket covered with hieroglyphics.  These indicate the kind and number of the garments left to be cleansed, and some distinguishing mark (supposing this to be our first patronage of Hip Tee) by which we may be again identified.  It may be by a pug nose, a hare lip, red hair, no hair or squint eyes.  They never ask one’s name, for they can neither pronounce nor write it when it is given.  The ticket is an unintelligible tracery of lines, curves, dots and dashes, made by a brush dipped in India ink on a shred of flimsy Chinese paper.  It may teem with abuse and ridicule, but you must pocket all that, and produce it on calling again, or your shirts and collars go into the Chinese Circumlocution Wash-house Office.  It is very difficult getting one’s clothes back if the ticket be lost—­very.  Hip Tee now dabs a duplicate of your ticket in a long book, and all is over.  You will call on Saturday night for your linen.  You do so.  There is apparently the same cellar, the same smell of steam, damp clothes and opium, the same sputter of sprinkling water, and apparently the same Hip Tee and assistants with brown shaven foreheads and long cues hanging straight down behind or coiled in snake-like fashion about their craniums.  You present your ticket.