A favourite way of tormenting the Chows was to rob them of their pigtails.  A Mongolian’s pride in his pigtail is very great, and his grief over the loss of it seems to be tinged with a superstitious fear.  As soon as the diggers were made aware of this they vied with each other in reaving Sin Fat and hi brethren of their cherished adornments, and the rape of the lock was a daily occurrence at Simpson Ranges.  No Red Indian was ever prouder of his trophy of scalps than the diggers were of their collection of tails, and the woe that fell upon the de spoiled Asiatics was most profound, but touched no sympathetic chords in the callous hearts of the miners.

It is not to be assumed that the Chows bore all their afflictions like lambs.  They had methods of their own of getting even, and were efficient tent thieves, and peculiarly expert in the art of rifling tips, although this was not proved against them until the eleventh hour.  They fought back on occasions, and one morning a big Californian was found near their claims, beaten almost to death.  Evidently the digger had deserved his fate, and had been caught stealing wash-dirt from Sin Fat’s tips; but his denials were readily and gladly accepted by the whites, and another excellent reason for demolishing the Chows was registered in the minds of the men.

Being up just after daybreak one morning, or not yet having gone to bunk, Levi Long was the unsuspected witness of acts of Chinese iniquity that brought about the climax of the anti-Chinese agitation.  There was no water-supply at Simpson’s Ranges, and the wash-dirt had to be carted four miles to the river at Carisbrook, to be puddled and washed.  This morning the Chinamen were busy bright and early, carting their wash away; but the Celestials, always frugal, to save as much as possible the expense of drays, each carried two hide-bags of dirt suspended on a bamboo, and followed the loaded carts through the diggings with the peculiar trot they always adopted when bearing burdens.  What Long noticed was that every now and again, when passing the tips on the claims of the Europeans, the sly Celestials dug their shovels into the wash-dirt, and threw a few shovelfuls on to their own loads or into the bags they carried.  Keeping himself in concealment, Levi quietly awakened a few of the diggers, and drew their attention to what was going on.  The Chinamen chattered noisily as they passed, and the movements of the crowd were evidently artfully designed to cover the depredations of the thieves.

Within a quarter of an hour every white man on the field knew what had been going on, and now the miners thought they understood the motive of the Chows in always carting their dirt away in the gray hours of morning, before the too-confiding Europeans were up and about.  This was the last straw.  A meeting was held very quietly, and, to Done’s astonishment, his mate took an active part in the proceedings.

‘The lepers have got to change their spots, I guess,’ said Long.  ’Is that understood, men?’