hauled and stepped, dropped the weight and hoisted again, making up
for heavier hammer and higher drop by more blows per minute. When we
reached Shanghai we saw the pile driver being worked from above.
Fourteen Chinese men stood upon a raised staging, each with a
separate cord passing direct from the hand to the weight below. A
concerted, half-musical chant, modulated to relieve monotony, kept
all hands together. What did the operation of this machine cost?
Thirteen cents, gold, per man per day, which covered fuel and
lubricant, both automatically served. Two additional men managed the
piles, two directed the hammer, eighteen manned the outfit. Two
dollars and thirty-four cents per day covered fuel, superintendence
and repairs. There was almost no capital invested in machinery. Men
were plenty and to spare. Rice was the fuel, cooked without salt,
boiled stiff, reinforced with a hit of pork or fish, appetized with
salted cabbage or turnip and perhaps two or three of forty and more
other vegetable relishes. And are these men strong and happy? They
certainly were strong. They are steadily increasing their millions,
and as one stood and watched them at their work their faces were
often wreathed in smiles and wore what seemed a look of satisfaction
and contentment.

Among the most common sights on our rides from Yokohama to Tokyo,
both within the city and along the roads leading to the fields,
starting early in the morning, were the loads of night soil carried
on the shoulders of men and on the backs of animals, but most
commonly on strong carts drawn by men, bearing six to ten tightly
covered wooden containers holding forty, sixty or more pounds each.
Strange as it may seem, there are not today and apparently never
have been, even in the largest and oldest cities of Japan, China or
Korea, anything corresponding to the hydraulic systems of sewage