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<h2> LETTER V </h2>
<p>SAN FRANCISCO, 18—.<br/></p>
<p>DEAR CHING-FOO: You will remember that I had just been thrust violently
into a cell in the city prison when I wrote last. I stumbled and fell on
some one. I got a blow and a curse; and on top of these a kick or two and
a shove. In a second or two it was plain that I was in a nest of prisoners
and was being "passed around"—for the instant I was knocked out of
the way of one I fell on the head or heels of another and was promptly
ejected, only to land on a third prisoner and get a new contribution of
kicks and curses and a new destination. I brought up at last in an
unoccupied corner, very much battered and bruised and sore, but glad
enough to be let alone for a little while. I was on the flag-stones, for
there was no furniture in the den except a long, broad board, or
combination of boards, like a barn-door, and this bed was accommodating
five or six persons, and that was its full capacity. They lay stretched
side by side, snoring—when not fighting. One end of the board was
four inches higher than the other, and so the slant answered for a pillow.
There were no blankets, and the night was a little chilly; the nights are
always a little chilly in San Francisco, though never severely cold. The
board was a deal more comfortable than the stones, and occasionally some
flag-stone plebeian like me would try to creep to a place on it; and then
the aristocrats would hammer him good and make him think a flag pavement
was a nice enough place after all.</p>
<p>I lay quiet in my corner, stroking my bruises, and listening to the
revelations the prisoners made to each other—and to me for some that
were near me talked to me a good deal. I had long had an idea that
Americans, being free, had no need of prisons, which are a contrivance of
despots for keeping restless patriots out of mischief. So I was
considerably surprised to find out my mistake.</p>
<p>Ours was a big general cell, it seemed, for the temporary accommodation of
all comers whose crimes were trifling. Among us there were two Americans,
two "Greasers" (Mexicans), a Frenchman, a German, four Irishmen, a
Chilenean (and, in the next cell, only separated from us by a grating, two
women), all drunk, and all more or less noisy; and as night fell and
advanced, they grew more and more discontented and disorderly,
occasionally; shaking the prison bars and glaring through them at the
slowly pacing officer, and cursing him with all their hearts. The two
women were nearly middle-aged, and they had only had enough liquor to
stimulate instead of stupefy them. Consequently they would fondle and kiss
each other for some minutes, and then fall to fighting and keep it up till
they were just two grotesque tangles of rags and blood and tumbled hair.
Then they would rest awhile and pant and swear. While they were
affectionate they always spoke of each other as "ladies," but while they
were fighting "strumpet" was the mildest name they could think of—and
they could only make that do by tacking some sounding profanity to it. In
their last fight, which was toward midnight, one of them bit off the
other's finger, and then the officer interfered and put the "Greaser" into
the "dark cell" to answer for it because the woman that did it laid it on
him, and the other woman did not deny it because, as she said afterward,
she "wanted another crack at the huzzy when her finger quit hurting," and
so she did not want her removed. By this time those two women had
mutilated each other's clothes to that extent that there was not
sufficient left to cover their nakedness. I found that one of these
creatures had spent nine years in the county jail, and that the other one
had spent about four or five years in the same place. They had done it
from choice. As soon as they were discharged from captivity they would go
straight and get drunk, and then steal some trifling thing while an
officer was observing them. That would entitle them to another two months
in jail, and there they would occupy clean, airy apartments, and have good
food in plenty, and being at no expense at all, they could make shirts for
the clothiers at half a dollar apiece and thus keep themselves in smoking
tobacco and such other luxuries as they wanted. When the two months were
up they would go just as straight as they could walk to Mother Leonard's
and get drunk; and from there to Kearney street and steal something; and
thence to this city prison, and next day back to the old quarters in the
county jail again. One of them had really kept this up for nine years and
the other four or five, and both said they meant to end their days in that
prison. **—[**The former of the two did.—Ed. Mem.]—Finally,
both these creatures fell upon me while I was dozing with my head against
their grating, and battered me considerably, because they discovered that
I was a Chinaman, and they said I was "a bloody interlopin' loafer come
from the devil's own country to take the bread out of dacent people's
mouths and put down the wages for work whin it was all a Christian could
do to kape body and sowl together as it was." "Loafer" means one who will
not work.</p>
<p>AH SONG HI.<br/></p>
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