e walked along the principal street of the suburb
leading to the West Gate unmolested, and were amused at the unusual
title of _Heh-kwei-tsi_ (black devils) which was applied to us. We
wondered about it at the time, but afterwards found that it was our
clothes, and not our skin, that gave rise to it. As we passed several of
the soldiers, I remarked to Mr. Burdon that these were the men we had
heard so much about, and that they seemed willing to receive us quietly
enough. Long before we reached the gate, however, a tall powerful man,
made tenfold fiercer by partial intoxication, let us know that all the
militia were not so peaceably inclined, by seizing Mr. Burdon by the
shoulders. My companion endeavoured to shake him off. I turned to see
what was the matter, and at once we were surrounded by a dozen or more
brutal men, who hurried us on to the city at a fearful pace.

My bag now began to feel very heavy, and I could not change hands to
relieve myself. I was soon in a profuse perspiration, and was scarcely
able to keep pace with them. We demanded to be taken before the chief
magistrate, but were told that they knew where to take us, and what to
do with such persons as we were, with the most insulting epithets. The
man who first seized Mr. Burdon soon afterwards left him for me, and
became my principal tormentor; for I was neither so tall nor so strong
as my friend, and was therefore less able to resist him. He all but
knocked me down again and again, seized me by the hair, took hold of my
collar so as to almost choke me, and grasped my arms and shoulders,
making them black and blue. Had this treatment continued much longer, I
must have fainted. All but exhausted, how refreshing was the remembrance
of a verse quoted by my dear mother in one of my last home letters--

"We speak of the realms of the blest,
That country so bright and so fair,
And oft are its glories confessed;
But what must it be to be there!"

To be absent from the body! to be present with the LORD! to be free from
sin! And this is the end of the worst that man's malice can ever bring
upon us.

As we were walking along Mr. Burdon tried to give away a few books that
he was carrying, not knowing whether we might have another opportunity
of doing so; but the fearful rage of the soldier, and the way he
insisted on manacles being brought, which fortunately were not at hand,
convinced us that in our present position we