Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1889-11-24
LIFE IN CHINATOWN.
Thousands of AlmOnd-Eyed Celestials
Packed Like Sardines in
THE HEART OF SAN FRANCISCO.
A Visit to the Opium Joss Houses and the
Theater.
HIGHBINDERS AND THEIR DARK DEEDS

north and south and from east to west three.
It occupies one of the finest sites in San
Francisco, as the streets infested by the
"Asiatic curse" are on gentle slope, rising
almost from the bay, and from the top story
windows of the celestial dwellings beauti-
full view of the bay, Oakland and all its
pretty suburbs can be had. Night in the
Chinese quarters is rather picturesque on
the exterior, and its streets are rife with
colored lanterns and promenading pigtails.
A conservative estimate has placed the num-
Der of souls habitating these few blocks at
40, 900. A faint idea of the Chinese superior
faculty for economizing space can be CLEANED
from the fact that there are quartered, at the
present time, in the old Globe Hotel, 1, 100
people in 200 rooms, Those rooms having a
10 or 12-foot ceiling have been ceiled a
second time half wav down, each room
having, as it were, an attic. A ladder leads
to hole cut through the floor of this second
story, which is used as an entrance and exit
for the family or families occupying it.
This building has been condemned time and
again, but the authorities seem 10th to rid
the earth of this filth and disease-breeding
hole.
THE CHINESE QUARTER.
A visit was paid to the Chinese quarter
last evening. We entered an alley way,
dark as Stygia, and after few stumbles
were landed in kind OF court. An oil
lamp against the wall sent Pickering lights
and dancing shadows among lot of old
sheds, and one had to wonder that even
shadows permitted themselves to be seen in
such an ill-smelling space. The buildings
which backed on this space reminded
one of rickety old Jail. They
were three stories high. with base
ments level with the space in the
court, which was some feet lower than the
pavement. To each story of the surround
ing buildings hung ancient and dropping
stoops, and every window in the place was
barred with thick wooden slabs. This is a
very necessary precaution, as the people,
from experience, have learned not to trust
one another. Honesty is so rare an excep-
ton to the rule, and its existence
is so speculative matter among
themselves that the precaution was general.
Opening into this court were a number of
opium dens in cellars or Easements. As we
passed along we came upon an old China
man kneeling on the ground over a small
blaze built of kindling, on which was placed
an old tin can. He was brewing his supper.
His bending attitude, claw-like fingers and
nails, his yellow withered face, scraggly
chin whiskers and pigtsil, seen by the fitfuI
light of his fire, which lit the squalid sur
roundings family now and then by fits and
starts, lent demoniac air to the old fellow.
IN AN OPIUM DEN.
At door further along our guide raped
and spoke a word in Chinese which seemed
to be the SESAME" We stepped inside.
and found ourselves in a typical opium
"joint," of which there are hundreds. The
ceiling could be touched with no effort by a
person of medium height, and it was in
keeping with the walls, which encompassed
a space not exceeding nine feet square,
ebonized by dirt and smoke. On small
deal table wick spluttered
in some oil in bowl, and served to light
the spacious dwelling. Between ceiling
and floor were three layers of hunks built
clining head to the wall. This freak of
architecture broughtour heads in dangerous
proximity to several pairs of dirty booted
and unbooted feet which dangled over
the sides of the bunk, but as they
remained motionless we presumed the
attached trucks and craniums were hap
PLY in the "fends'" heaven OF fantastical
dreams. There were twelve men sleeping
or smoking themselves to sleep in this
place, while one sat on an old soap box and
gazed at us and another stood by the door.
None of US spoke, and after lew breaths
of the atmosphere, which can be better
imagined than described, we went into the
dark court again, and closed the door on the
''fends" who, the guide said, were 'Lappy
as lords"
We looked into dozens of such places, of
which the above-described is a fair speci-
men. Many were much worse, but with
few exceptions were any an improvement.
THE CHINESE THEATER.
We next visited the Chinese theater. The
interior of the place was labyrinth of tiny
rooms, honeycombed up and down, cross
wise and lengthwise and in every direction
by halls scarcely wide enough to admit of a
The actors apartments were very nobbyfn
their ''little artless Chinese fashion," and
very clean; furnished with oil
cloths on the floors, matting-covered couches
and rows Of small chairs. Their opium out
fits very dudish, the pipes and other necessi-
ties being pearl inlaid, and in one cozy den a
life-sized Chinese beauty gave us bias-eyed
smile from an ebony frame, on the wall, and
BY her hung a musical instrument
not unlike guitar. We traversed below
stairs, and on accidentally opening a door
leading into cellar under the pavement,
we were confronted by coffin containing |
The remains of Chinaman. The |
clothes which had been taken from him |
we're thrown on the ground beside |
The coffin, and the everlasting wick burned |
By bowl of rice and some chop stick, there |
was not even chair in the hole they had |
poked him, and so he was left alone in his |
glory, while occasionally the faint tinkling |
If the music overhead in the theater stole |
iown the stairs to keep him company.
When misfortune or illness oVertakes |
heir fellow eOuntrymen, the Chinese have
10 further use for them, and in illness, when |
hey are known to be beyond recovery, they |
IRE deserted and left to die, or taken to the !!
Chinese undertaken and LEFT to wait, nm
for the inevitable, and not seldom |
ire they thrown into the streets. One of the |
San Francisco dailies contained an account |
not long since of such case. A man,
swollen beyond semblance to anything |
human BY dropsy, was carried out, thrown |
in the gutter and left to die. The unfortu-
nate wretch was discovered by police |
1fficer and removed to the receiving hospital,
where he died on arrival.
After leaving the poor fellow who had
gone before, we went up several flights of
stairs and were landed by the sudden
of one Of them in the green
room of the theater. 1t was large room,
and at least 80 people were in it, a number
of white men among them. The actors were
waiting their turns to go on; painting their
iaces and arranging the most obvious of
false whiskers. We were conducted through
3 curtained door and found ourselves
ON THE STAGE
facing an audience of 500 or 900 heathens.
We were seated little to one side, and
The play went on.
There is no scenery. The only shifting
done on Chinese stage is the removal of a