Within a distance of more than one hundred miles round Shanghai, it was not an unusual thing a few years ago, when out in the more remote districts on a shooting excursion, to come across an American or a European in Chinese attire, marrying, and speaking the language of the Chinese, to the almost utter forgetfulness of his own mother tongue. I have met with one or two of these men myself. They are mostly, if not all of them, waifs and strays who served, some in the rebel, some in the Imperial Army, during the fifteen years of the rebellion. Those that I have seen are comfortably settled, with Chinese wives and families, living in Chinese communities exactly as though they were natives of the land. Indeed, I have often fancied that the marked character of the Caucasian features have partly changed into the almond, cat-like eyes and the stumpy nose of the Chinese.

These men were adventurers, like the free lances of the middle ages. If they were well paid, they would hesitate at nothing; they were as willing to lead a forlorn hope as to burn a city, if it would only swell their treasury, which they all carefully looked after at the storming and sacking of the various towns in which they took part. There are still some of them left in Shanghai, who in this way made enough money to keep them for the remainder of their lives, but it was spent with the recklessness with which it was gained, and their cash account is light enough now.