rican.

Turn which way we choose, within two blocks, on either hand we find
nothing but the infinitely small and astonishingly numerous forms of
traffic on which the hordes around us thrive. No corner is too cramped
for the squatting street cobbler; and as for the pipe cleaners, the
cigarette rollers, the venders of sweetmeats and conserves, they gather
on the curb or crouch under overhanging windows, and await custom with
the philosophical resignation of the Oriental.

On Dupont Street, between Clay and Sacramento Streets--a single
block,--there are no less than five basement apartments devoted
exclusively to barbers. There are hosts of this profession in the
quarter. Look down the steep steps leading into the basement and see, at
any hour of the day, with what deft fingers the tonsorial operators
manipulate the devoted pagan head.

There is no waste space in the quarter. In apartments not more than
fifteen feet square three or four different professions are often
represented, and these afford employment to ten or a dozen men. Here is
a druggist and herb-seller, with huge spectacles on his nose, at the
left of the main entrance; a butcher displays his meats in a show-window
on the right, serving his customers over the sill; a clothier is in the
rear of the shop, while a balcony filled with tailors or cigar-makers
hangs half-way to the ceiling.

[Illustration: "China is Not More Chinese than this Section of Our
Christian City."]

Close about us there are over one hundred and fifty mercantile
establishments and numerous mechanical industries. The seventy-five
cigar factories employ eight thousand coolies, and these are huddled
into the closest quarters. In a single room, measuring twenty feet by
thirty feet, sixty men and boys have been discovered industriously
rolling _real_ Havanas.

The traffic which itinerant fish and vegetable venders drive in every
part of the city must be great, being as it is an extreme convenience
for lazy or thrifty housewives. A few of these basket men cultivate
gardens in the suburbs, but the majority seek their supplies in the city
markets. Wash-houses have been established in every part of the city,
and are supplied with two sets of laborers, who spend watch and watch on
duty, so that the establishment is never closed.

One frequently meets a travelling bazaar--a coolie with his bundle of
fans and bric-a-brac, wandering from house to house, even in the
suburbs; and the old fellows,