enough to lend me your purse. It's
quite cold to-day; oblige me with the loan of your coat." If the
venerable elder brother charitably complies, the matter ends with:
"Thanks, brother!" but otherwise, the request is forthwith emphasised
with the arguments of a cudgel; and if these do not convince, recourse
is had to the sabre.'

As a matter of course, Chinese thieves belong in contrast to the
species of which the 'Artful Dodger' may be regarded as the type. The
_modus operandi_ of Eastern appropriators is this: 'Two of them,
associated together for the purpose, hawk about various articles of
merchandise--boots, skin-coats, bricks of tea, and what not. They
offer these for sale to travellers. While one of them engages the
attention of the destined victim by displaying his goods and
bargaining, the other ferrets about, and pockets whatever he can lay
his hands on. These rascals have inconceivable skill in counting your
sapeks for you, in such a way as to finger fifty or one hundred of
them without your having the slightest notion as to what is going on.
One day, two of these little thieves came to offer for our purchase a
pair of leathern boots. Excellent boots, said they--boots such as we
would not find in any shop in the whole town; boots that would keep
out the rain for days; and as to cheapness, perfectly unexampled. If
we missed this opportunity, we should never have such another. Only
just before they had been offered 1200 sapeks for them! As we did not
want boots, we replied that we could not have them at any price.
Thereupon the acting merchant assumed a lofty tone of generosity. We
were foreigners, we should have them for 1000 sapeks, 900, 800, 700.
"Well," said we, "we certainly don't want any boots just now; yet
doubtless, as you say, these are very cheap, and it will be worth
while to buy them as a reserve." The bargain was accordingly
concluded; we took our purse and counted out 700 sapeks to the
merchant, who counted them over himself, under our very eyes,
pronounced the amount correct, and once more laid the coin before us.
He then called out to his companion, who was poking about in the
court-yard: "Here, I have sold these capital boots for 700 sapeks."
"Nonsense," cried the other; "700 sapeks! I wont hear of such a
thing!" "Very well," said we; "come, take your boots, and be off with
you!" He was off, and so quickly, that we thought it expedient to
count our sapeks once more: there were 150 of them gone