op. There were a few customers present, and the proprietor waited
on them with great diligence. At benches like writing desks, on which
were tools of various descriptions, were seated some half a dozen
workmen who were busily engaged. They never looked up while we
stood by and examined their work, which was of a high order. The
filagree-work was beautiful and artistic. There were numerous personal
ornaments, some of solid gold, others plaited. The bracelets which
they were making might fittingly adorn the neck of a queen. I learned
that these skilled men worked sixteen hours a day on moderate wages.
Their work went into first-class Chinese bric-a-brac stores and into
the jewelry stores of the merchants who supply the rich and cultured
with their ornaments.

But it is time that we visit the restaurant. This is located in a
stately building and is one of the first class. It overlooks the old
Plaza, though you enter from the street one block west of the Plaza.
You ascend broad stairs, and then you find yourself in a wide room or
dining hall in two sections. Here are tables round and square, and
here you are waited on by the sons of the Fiery Flying Dragon clad in
well-made tunics, sometimes of silk material. As your eye studies the
figure before you, the dress and the physiognomy, you do not fail to
notice the long pigtail, the Chinaman's glory, as a woman's delight
is her long hair. The tea, which is fragrant, is served to you out
of dainty cups, China cups, an evidence that the tea-drinking of
Americans and Europeans is derived from the Celestial Empire. The
tea-plant is said, by a pretty legend, to have been formed from the
eyelids of Buddha Dharma, which, in his generosity, he cut off for the
benefit of men. If you wish for sweetmeats they will be served in a
most tempting way. You can also have chicken, rice, and vegetables,
and fruits, after the Chinese fashion. You can eat with your fingers
if you like, or use knives and forks, or, if you desire to play the
Chinaman, with the chop-sticks. In Chinatown the men and the women do
not eat together. This is also the custom of China, and hence there is
not what we look upon as an essential element of home-life--father
and mother and children and guests, if there be such, gathered in a
pleasant dining-room with the flow of edifying conversation and the
exchange of courtesies. Confucius never talked when he ate, and his
disciples affect his taciturnity at their meals. Though