100 



WOMEN'S PASSION, 



Chap. VI. 



freely as if I liad been a thousand miles away. 

 But many of these Chinese ladies with all their 

 coyness are regular termagants, as the following 

 curious anecdote will show. 



Happening one day at this time to be in a 

 bamboo forest, I came upon two men engaged in 

 cutting down some fine bamboo-trees. Just as I 

 came up with them, a farmer's wife made her ap- 

 pearance from an opposite quarter, and was appa- 

 rently in a state of great excitement. The men, it 

 appeared, had bought a certain number of the trees, 

 which at the time of sale had been duly marked. 

 But in cutting, instead of taking those they had 

 bargained for, they had just cut down a very fine 

 one which was not for sale. The old lady was so 

 excited that she either did not see me, or her 

 anger made her disregard the presence of a 

 stranger. She commenced first in low short sen- 

 tences to lament the loss of the bamboo, then 

 louder and louder sentence after sentence rolled 

 from her tongue, in which she abused without 

 mercy the unfortunate men for their conduct. At 

 last she seemed to have worked herself up to a 

 frantic state of excitement ; she threw off her 

 head-dress, tore her hair, and screamed so loud 

 that she might have been heard for more than a 

 mile. Her passion reached the climax at last, 

 and human nature could stand it no longer. "With 

 an unearthly yell and a sort of hysteric gulp she 

 tumbled backward on the ground, threw her little 

 feet in the air, gave two or three kicks, and all 



