CHAPTER V

Summary

A few hours' ride next morning brought us to the city of Laichow-foo. My husband immediately went into the city with books, and left me at the inn, to give attention to matters relating to provender. Crowds of boys came rushing in to stare at the foreign woman. I was speedily considered fair prey by a small army of young ruffians. To escape from them, I closed the double-leaved door, and retired to a corner with my books. They crept quietly up to the door, and suddenly, with a bang, opened both sides of it, and whooped and howled distractingly. Outside there was quite an embankment of faces. Again I shut the door and bolted it, and hoped for quietness, but the hooting and noise of the boys continued. They shouted, ‘Devil woman, open the door!’ Then they began to use language which they would not have used had they known that I understood it. This was not to be borne; I opened the door to make friends with these boys. That crowd of youngsters had something like half-a-dozen Chinese ‘Tom Sawyers,’ hooting and yelling as if possessed. Out I came, and said, ‘Look here, boys. Have you got fathers?’