Chinese

“CHINESE LIFE IN AUSTRALIA”

“I will now tell you about another robbery at the same place. One day as I was coming to my fathers' place, my mother met me and told me that a Chinaman had been to the store and got some things, and he had disappeared a moment, and she didn't know where; she missed some money and he must have taken it; while she was speaking she exclaimed 'there's the chinaman, don't let him go, he must have the money.' I then went to him and asked him if he had any money, and he said no. He allowed me to search him, and laughed when I was done because I found no money. I then said 'Let me look in your hat', but he said ?no money stop in my hat.' I then took hold of his hat, and he struck at me with a leg of mutton; but I found the money sticking in the lining of his hat. He then said, 'I think you bushranger, you want rob me," I told him to come to the store, and if the money was his I would give it back; but as it was stolen I made an attempt to apprehend him, and handed him over to two men to hold, but when he saw the rope he released himself in a moment. I followed and caught him, and struggled to throw him, but he immediately began to worry me, and bit large pieces of skin off me. At last I overpowered him, when he said 'You fetch me water, I die'. I said 'No, I will carry you to the water' . We then secured him, I saw a young man going by the place and told him I had apprehended a chinaman for robbing the store, and asked him would he be so kind as to come and help me mind the Prisoner until the police arrived, not knowing that he was a bushranger himself, but he told me to go to a very hot place, and passed on;"

QUOTE:       (from same booklet)

"Well, the first I saw (Chinaman) was a man named Hon Quon; he was acting then as a shepherd, and with this Chinaman there was a dispute between him and the overseer over the counting of sheep, the overseer saying so many of the sheep were lost, and the chinaman said no. The chinaman then told the overseer if he said so again he would kill him; but the overseer still persisted there were some lost. The chinaman then went to the stockyard and fetched a stick some seven or eight feet long, which the stockman used for knocking down wild cattle, and struck a violent blow at the overseer but missed him; the overseer then rushed him and overpowered him, so that ended that affray. ' I mention this to show you that Overseers' lives were in great danger, for there was another chinaman murdered an overseer under similar circumstances; he went to count the chinaman shepherds sheep, and he accused the chinaman of losing some, and when he was counting them the second time the chinaman came up behind him with a tomahawk and struck it into his brains, and then to hide his victim he dug a hole in the dung of the sheepyard, there being several feet of dung accumulated on the lower side, and after he had buried the body he drove the sheep over it, to deface all traces, and then went wandering in the bush, and at night when the native dogs began to howl around him he became afraid, and crawled into a native  dog trap, and the large slab door fell down in the grooves between the two posts and he was unable to get out again; and in some 3 or 4 days an old shepherd came to the trap and thought he had a dingo, but to his horrible surprise he had a wretched chinaman who turned out to be the murderer."

A FURTHER QUOTE:

"As I have seen several deaths and funerals amongst the Chinese, I will now give you a description how they act on such occasions. A chinaman that I was acquainted with died, and I went to his funeral, and as the Chinese most all of them have a dread of laying a hand upon a dead body, they requested me to dress him. They first told me to knock down the end of the house, and about twenty Chinaman stood some few yards back, they then told me to strip the body, and to carry his clothes about 20 yards away from the hut; they then gave me a beautiful new suit of clothes, and told me to dress the body, even to the boots and socks, and then to lift him into the coffin, and to place opium, pipe, tobacco, knife, and rice, and fowl and pork, and lots of paper cut in a peculiar fashion to represent money, in the coffin; and then to poke a threepenny bit down his throat. Whilst this was going on there was one chinaman, with several little red candles burning, worshipping in chinese fashion; they then carried the corpse to the grave and buried it without any more ceremony with the exception of calling him by name and bidding him goodbye. At the funeral they all wore red and white ribbons; they always bury their dead close to where they die in the bush, and their friends come once a year and hold a feast at the grave they bring rice and pork and fowl, fish, eggs and gin, they then cut a little piece off the head of the grave, and spread out a number of vessels, including one for the dead man, they light several little red candles, and explode a great number of crackers, and one man worships at the head of the grave, and then they pour gin upon the grave; they eat their provisions and then mend the fence around the grave, they bid the dead man goodbye, and go away."