 Though the book was originally to be called "Chinese Merry-Go-Round", the title under which it was ultimately published is a quote from Bret Harte's poem "The Heathen Chinee". Though "The Heathen Chinee" had been used a rallying cry by opponents of Chinese immigration to the United States, Harte had intended it as a parody of the anti-Chinese bigotry prevalent in the United States of the nineteenth century.
