282 



RAMBLES OP A NATUEALIST. [Oh. XVII. 



with the speculating crowd, and winning or losing with the 

 rest.* 



One other element of the busy and motley scene may 

 be mentioned — viz., the mountebank dentist. He was a 

 Chinese, and standing in a public place, loudly invited 

 patients to be relieved of their troublesome teeth. Several 

 came forward, and the treatment was not a little singular and 

 puzzling. Clapping a red plaister upon the cheeks, over the 

 spot where the guilty tooth was situated, he, at the same time, 

 put inside the mouth a small quantity of a kind of white 

 paste. Then inserting an instrument which looked something 

 like an ordinary dentist's key, he rapidly whipped the tooth 

 out entire. But the most curious part of the circumstance was 

 that no cry escaped the patients ; and on narrowly watching 

 their features, not the slightest symptom of momentary pain 

 was revealed. But the bleeding fangs of the teeth as held 

 up to view negatived the idea that there was any trickery or 

 delusion. The price of the operation was only 10 cents (5d.) ! 

 Sometimes the feUow pretended to charm the tooth out 

 without any operation — a feat which he accomplished by 

 sticking the plaister on the face, and inserting the white 

 paste within the mouth as before, after which, instead of 

 using any extracting instrument, he stuck against the tooth 

 the pointed end of a piece of folded paper containing a little 

 of a black substance which looked like pitch. Then having 

 kept the patient waiting for three or four minutes with his 



* Since this has been written gambling Las been legalised among the 

 Chinese population of Hong Kong — a step which while it has naturally given 

 great offence to certain European classes, will be regarded leniently by those 

 best acquainted with Chinese character, and will save the police a vast 

 amount of trouble in hunting up and bringing to justice the numberless cases 

 in which the attempt to restrict this Chinese institution was constantly being 

 evaded by all classes, in whom the habit is too much a second nature to be 

 eradicated by legislation. 



