OLD-CLOTHES SHOPS. 
p. XIX. 
intense cold of the latter season, there are large 
shops for their sale. The old-clothes shops and 
their inhabitants are perhaps the most curious of 
all that dwell in this busy thoroughfare. All day 
long the shopmen are engaged in turning over 
piles of secondhand clothing and holding a kind 
of auction upon it piece by piece. Surrounded by 
groups of persons, some of whom are there out of 
curiosity, while others are waiting for bargains, 
the vendors call out, or rather sing out, the prices 
of the various articles as they lift them up and 
pass them from one heap to another. Every now 
and then an article is purchased by one in the 
group, but by far the greatest number are allowed 
to pass unsold. As the shops of the different 
dealers are alongside of each other, sometimes a 
little rivalry will spring up between the salesmen, 
who then raise their voices to the highest pitch, 
and appear to the stranger to be actually shouting 
at each other ! 
In a street beyond the north gate of the city, 
and leading in the direction of the western suburbs, 
there are some large respectable-looking hongs or 
warehouses, and here would appear to be the head- 
quarters of the great native merchants. This 
street is crowded with native produce, such as dyes 
of various kinds, drugs used in medicine, seaweed, 
rattans, and large quantities of hemp or rather 
jute, which is largely grown in the surrounding 
country. 
Shops for the sale of provisions of all kinds were 
