but whether the Tzu-liu-ching workmen did not understand the mechanism of the machine, or whether they saw in it a formidable rival and so wrecked it before its real capabilities became known, it was impossible to find out.[1] The only thing that was quite certain was that it did not work. My informant objected that the cost of coal would render it too expensive; and yet the buffaloes employed cost at least £5 apiece to purchase, and 300 cash a-day to feed, and only last from one to five years.
During the evening I had a visitor in the shape of an itinerant dentist, who showed me with much pride a stock of false teeth (made in Japan). He had been at Tzu-liu-ching, he said, for a month, and had inserted no less than 100 teeth in the mouths of the townspeople during his stay. I become more and more suspicious of round numbers as used by the Chinese every day.
- ↑ Gill states that some time before he was at Tzu-liu-ching in 1877, some Chinese connected with a European firm had attempted to introduce pumps. "They had only their heads broken for their pains by the coolies, who declared that their labour was being taken away from them."
