The times., 1899-03-11
LoNDoN's oRIENTALs.
Floating Population of Ten Thou
sand AsEatics.
From ID Paris Messenger.l


London has floating population of
some 10000 Asiatics-equaling that of
small town; and, IL a little malodorous
sometimes. and inclined TO linger outside
the pale Of modern civilization. il is inter-
esting to make their acquaintance, note
their habits and the places they frequent
Even their vices have certain element of
picturesqueness, and especially among the
Chinese-some of their ceremonies OBJ
trude upon the attention. For high life
among the Asiatic population you must go
to Bayswater, which is spoken of among
foreigners as Asia Minor" Here reside
the rich Orieutals who are engaged in COM
merce or have come for purposes OF edu-
cation or pleasure These are the small
and cultured minority. For the large ma
jority, the Asiatics Of the slums, you must
go out 10 Poplar and Shadwell-tO the
neighborhood of the East India Docks by
preference. II is here the Oriental is to
be seen in all the richness of his infinite
variety. Poplar, it may be remembered,
is the original hCme of the Asiatic in Lon
don. The East India Docks were the docks
OF the Old John Company which first
brought Oriental labor into repute in Brit
ism shipping. Bow Common, hard by the
docks. where the cOmpany's Asiatics were
housed in huts. has long since been built
over. and the foreigner has had to mingle
with the dock laborer in the slUms OF Pop
lar and Blackwell.
The first thing one finds out is the in
dsiniteness of the term 'Lascdr'' so COM
monty used. Properly speaking, it is only
applicable to sailors from India: but in
general use the term is bestowed upon all
foreign seamen. There are about twelve
Shipping companies using Asiatic and Afri-
can labor. OF these the Peninsular and
Oriental Company is the largest. Il is in
terestng TO ferret out the details. Take
the Peninsular and Oriental Compauy's
large ships. They are vessels of some
1000 tons On such vessel they will have
at least l2O foreigners on board. Starting
with the deck crew. you will find that they
are all from India, mostly from the vieini-
ty Of Bombay, and Mahometans. as mat
ter of course. The engineers crew will be
a mixture. There will be- in all probabili-
ty twelve men from the Punjaub and
among the others. Pathans. from Afghan
istan, and number OF Swahilis, or what
they call Sidi boys-boy of course being
Il corruption of the Indian bhai. which
means brother
Humorous are some OF the eorruptions
OF Indian words used on board. Khabadar.
which means take care" becomes cup
board door; khrab." which means bad,
makes an easy descent into crab There
will also be Arabs and Africans-everv
imaginable class of peOple-from the Red
Sea, the Nile. Alden, Zanzibar and even the
interior Of Africa. These last mentioned
are rescued slaves from the interior. ana
first-class men in the engine room. stand
ing any amount of heat and working well.
They are easily recognized, for they are
black as ebony, with woody heads. The
only other foreigner on board is the bar
ber who, somewhat curiously is always
Cingalee While this is the usual proper
tion of Asiatics on Peninsular and Oriental
boats, other companies employ only Arabs,
and others only Chinese. The British
Steam Navigation Company. the next IarE-
est to the Psninsular and Oriental en-
polys mostly Bengalese; the Clan Line IA
vors HindOos, mostly from Madras, but
they only come into Tilbury Dock aud the
Arab Line only carries Arabs On the 9TH
er hand hand. the Ducal Line has ceased to
carry Lascars.
With such a large Oriental population
one naturally expects to find an Oriental
quarter But they are not so gregarious
as the Jews and do not exclusively occupy
streets and districts In many parts of the
East End the jews object to Christians Iiv-
ing among them: but out Shadwell way
the Asiatics are scattered, though there
are many houses devoted entirely to them.
and presided over by Chinese. Malays and
Indians most OF whom have married Eng
lish women. II is curious to hear these
women addressed as Mrs. Muhamed. Chi
nese Emma, Lascar Sally, according to
their husbands nationality-for they rarely
adopt the proper name OF the men they
consort with. They seem entirely on the
down grade, but the half-caste children
one sees running about are often decidedly
good looking. and it is amusing to hear
them prattling Chinese or Swahill, and
singing native dittie5.