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136 air with wild, barbarous music, in which the average Caucasian ear fails to catch even the faintest understrain of genuine melody. Chinese women with painted faces, silk and satin garments, and lustrous blue-black hair, wonderfully dressed and adorned, look on and laugh and chatter like so many parrots. Chinese artisans in holiday costume smoke their cigars, and coolly comment on the ceremonies and the performers, while Americans, Europeans, and negroes look in and drop out of the crowd, the scene being too common to them to possess more than a momentary interest. A reporter, note-book in hand, climbs into a window from which he can over-look the crowd, and jots down, "Funeral of Ah Sam, boss Chinese cigar-maker, China Alley—died of consumption, induced by opium smoking," jumps down, and is off in search of something more sensational; and we follow him.

The Chinese Theatre fronts on Jackson Street, nearly opposite the alley from which we have just emerged. There is a large gathering of the lower class of Chinamen, all in dark-blue clothing, around the outer doors, and a deep excitement pervades the surging mass. There is some trouble between two of the leading Chinese clans or companies, and the factions have met before the theatre by accident or design, to discuss the question of the day. The women keep away from the crowd, and a number of well-dressed Chinamen, evidently of the mercantile class, stand some distance away, watching the progress of events with evident anxiety. Suddenly the tide of angry discussion