Here are tables round and square, and
here you are waited on by the sons of the Fiery Flying Dragon clad in
well-made tunics, sometimes of silk material. As your eye studies the
figure before you, the dress and the physiognomy, you do not fail to
notice the long pigtail, the Chinaman's glory, as a woman's delight
is her long hair. The tea, which is fragrant, is served to you out
of dainty cups, China cups, an evidence that the tea-drinking of
Americans and Europeans is derived from the Celestial Empire. The
tea-plant is said, by a pretty legend, to have been formed from the
eyelids of Buddha Dharma, which, in his generosity, he cut off for the
benefit of men. If you wish for sweetmeats they will be served in a
most tempting way. You can also have chicken, rice, and vegetables,
and fruits, after the Chinese fashion. You can eat with your fingers
if you like, or use knives and forks, or, if you desire to play the
Chinaman, with the chop-sticks. In Chinatown the men and the women do
not eat together. This is also the custom of China, and hence there is
not what we look upon as an essential element of home-life--father
and mother and children and guests, if there be such, gathered in a
pleasant dining-room with the flow of edifying conversation and the
exchange of courtesies.
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