Chinese Temple at Singapore. 147 



song," while the auditory, penned in within a careMly-locked 

 court-yard, chant a vociferous accompaniment to this some- 

 what monotonous exhibition. Moreover, Singapore possesses 

 a Chinese temple of such splendour, that one would hardly 

 find its match in the Flowery Land itself. This is called the 

 Telloh-Ayer, situated in the street of the same name, and is 

 decorated with handsome carvings, innumerable mysterious 

 inscriptions, and grotesque figures of stone and wood. The 

 Chinese who conducted us all round were exceedingly 

 friendly, and when, at parting, we slid a few pieces of silver 

 into their hands as a recompense for their trouble, they gave 

 vent to their feelings in repeated chin-chins, a mode of greet- 

 ing which corresponds to the Salaam of the Mahometan 

 races. 



Many of the Chinese of Singapore belong to secret societies 

 (Hoes), the members of which seem banded together for both 

 good and bad objects and for mutual protection. Their 

 rules are so strict, and their slightest infraction is so fearfully 

 punished, that hardly an instance has ever been known of an 

 associate having been denounced or proved a traitor. In the 

 British possessions, where the government attaches no sort of 

 importance to these associations, and suffers them to pass un- 

 molested so long as the laws of the country are not violated, 

 these societies are unimportant, and are productive of no 

 evil consequences ; but in the Dutch East Indies, where the 

 government has always kept theii' subjects in a state of 

 tutelage, and is in a marked degree adverse to the Chinese 



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