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CHINA. 147
ruins, and the remnants of a fading race, " This once
walled, but now city of ruins, was originally discovered by
a Spanish Jesuit, who published his wanderings in America
in 1529. His account is quite correct. The demolished
structures symbolize, in conception, those of the East. The
language of the remnant of this people, so says an eminent
archaeologist visiting them last season, resembles the Chinese.
And so do some of their minor customs ; such as their reverence
for the aged, and devotion to ancestors. The women
are of the Celestial type, — almond e3'es, protuberant bodies,
and small feet. They dress much in Chinese fashion. Their
religious ceremonials are formal, the priests wearing embroidered
robes." Were not the Aztecs the racial link, connecting
this fading race in New Mexico with the migrating
Chinese and Assyrians of the Tooloong era?
The first
COOLIES IX CALIFORNIA. — WHY THEY COMB.
Chinamen reaching California in 1849 were not
gold-hunters, but fugitives from Peruvian masters, hiding in
ships en route from New York to San Francisco, via Callao.
Others came, ere long, from China in vessels, as Chinese
cooks and servants. Hearing of the gold-diggings, these,
with those from Peru, hurried to the mining districts.
Purses soon filled with the precious metal, they returned to
their native country, prodigies, painting the Pacific coast a
very paradise. The news flew. The lower classes, listening,
became uneasy. While mandarins and Confucian
scholars live in palatial buildings, rich in furniture, sofas,
mirrors, and china dishes, the coolies live in houses built of
bamboo-matting and mortar, with sliding doors for windows,
and no chimneys, neither pulu upon which tjiey may pillow
their heads. Often a room in which a family lives is not
over ten feet square. Their fires are kindled and kept burning
outside their miserable dwelHngs. In this one room
may be found scraps of red paper, as " tablets " to some
guardian spiiit, a kitchen-god, a few stools, and burning joss-