How Our Chinamen Are Employed [pp. 231-239]

HO [V OUR CHINAMEN ARE EfPLO YED.
HOW OUR CHINAMEN ARE EMPLOYED.
HE Chinese in their own country the intelligence offices until there is
are a remarkably industrious peo- another call for laborers. Also, where
ple, working from early dawn until dark, men are lying idle, and with the money
and without the rest of the seventh day. received for wages in their pockets, the
The effects of this continuous applica- gamblers and others who live by dis tion, however, are plainly visible; they honorable means will be sure to conlack the elasticity of motion which those gregate. A large number of the Chinaexhibit who, being temperate and regu- men who lounge in the shops and upon
lar in their habits, enjoy also a weekly the streets of San Francisco are men
rest. returned from the mines to rest awhile,
Most of the Chinamen, after landing or to wait for a ship to take them home;
on our shores, start off immediately in or men who, having finished one consearch of employment, and they travel tract, are waiting to be hired again.
till they find it, though it be to Kern San Francisco being the only port on
River, Montana, or to "The End of the coast at which they enter the counthe Line" of the Pacific Railroad. Nor try, and at which they embark again for
are they fastidious about the kind of their native land, we may always expect
business to which they may be set at to see here many of them who appear
work. What they want is employment to have nothing to do.
and such pay as will support them and But, if we meet with idle Chinamen
leave something over to send back to during the day and evening, there are
the father and mother, or to the wife other hours of the day when the indusand children, left at home. So accus- trious portion of them may be seen.
tomed have they always been to give They who have occasion to visit the
a full and honest day's labor to those lower part of the city early in the mornwho have hired them, that they expect ing will encounter multitudes of these
to give their employer the service of people; some hurrying to the families,
their muscle and their skill during all or offices, where they work; others, with
the hours of the day, only asking a rea- their dinner pails, on their way to the
sonable time for meals, together with various establishments in all parts of
the stipulated wages when their work is the city where they are steadily emdone. ployed.
The Chinaman's reputation for indus- That they are people possessing
try, however, is liable to suffer from ability and inclination to labor, and
what we may see of this people in the that their services may be secured, are
cities. Whatever idlers there are will facts of great importance to all who
be sure to hang about the towns. The desire the full and speedy development
sick and the disabled get back to the of such a country as this which has
towns, for here they can be better ac- fallen to the inheritance of the dwellers
commodated and provided for than in on the Pacific Coast.
the mines, and where there are but few of There were once men who came to
their countrymen. When a company of San Francisco with capital, energy and
men has accomplished any job of work, enterprise, and with experience in manunless some other employment offers, ufacturing. They found California prothey come back to the city to wait near ducing wool in great abundance, and of
I 869.]
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