The Young Explorer Part 40

But there was one thing of which he was not aware. Though slender, Dewey had trained and hardened his muscles by exercise in a gymnasium, and, moreover, he had taken a course of lessons in the manly art of self-defense. He had done this, not because he expected to be called upon to defend himself at any time, but because he thought it conducive to keeping up his health and strength. He awaited O'Reilly's onset with watchful calmness.

O'Reilly advanced with a whoop, flinging about his powerful arms somewhat like a windmill, and prepared to upset his antagonist at the first onset.

What was his surprise to find his own blows neatly parried, and to meet a tremendous blow from his opponent which set his nose to bleeding.

Astonished, but not panic-stricken, he pluckily advanced to a second round, and tried to grasp Dewey round the waist. But instead of doing this, he received another knock-down blow, which stretched him on the ground.

He was up again, and renewed the attack, but with even less chance of victory than before, for the blood was streaming down his face, and he could not see distinctly where to hit. Dewey contented himself with keeping on guard and parrying the blows of his demoralized adversary.

"It's no use, O'Reilly!" exclaimed two or three. "Dewey's the better man."

"Let me get at him! I'll show him what I can do," said O'Reilly doggedly.

"As long as you like, O'Reilly," said Richard Dewey coolly; "but you may as well give it up."

"Troth and I won't. I'm stronger than you are any day."

"Perhaps you are; but I understand fighting, and you don't."

"An O'Reilly not know how to fight!" exclaimed the Irishman hotly.

"I could fight when I was six years old."

"Perhaps so; but you can't box."

One or two more attacks, and O'Reilly was dragged away by two of his friends, and Dewey remained master of the field.

The miners came up and shook hands with him cordially. They regarded him with new respect, now that it was found he had overpowered the powerful O'Reilly.

Among those who congratulated him was his Mongolian friend, Ki Sing.

"Melican man good fightee-knock over Ilishman. Hullah!"

"Come with me, Ki Sing," said Dewey. '"I will take care of you till to-morrow, and then you had better go."

CHAPTER XXIX.

CHINESE CHEAP LABOR.

Though Dewey had received from the miners a promise that they would not interfere with Ki Sing in case he gained a victory over O'Reilly, he was not willing to trust entirely to it. He feared that some one would take it into his head to play a trick on the unoffending Chinaman, and that the others unthinkingly would join in. Accordingly, he thought it best to keep the Mongolian under his personal charge as long as he remained in camp.

Ki Sing followed him to his tent as a child follows a guardian.

"Are you hungry, Ki Sing?" asked Dewey.

"Plenty hungly."

"Then I will first satisfy your appet.i.te," and Dewey brought forth some of his stock of provisions, to which Ki Sing did ample justice, though neither rat pie nor rice was included.

When the lunch, in which Richard Dewey joined, was over, he said: "If you will help me for the rest of the day, I will pay you whatever I consider your services to be worth."

"All lightee!" responded Ki Sing, with alacrity.

Whatever objections may be made to the Chinaman, he cannot be charged with laziness. As a cla.s.s they are willing to labor faithfully, even where the compensation is small. Labor in China, which is densely peopled, is a matter of general and imperative necessity, and has been so for centuries, and habit has probably had a good deal to do with the national spirit of industry.

Ki Sing, under Richard Dewey's directions, worked hard, and richly earned the two dollars which his employer gave him at the end of the day.

Of course Dewey's action did not escape the attention of his fellow miners. It cannot be said that they regarded it with favor. The one most offended was naturally O'Reilly, who, despite the pounding he had received, was about the camp as usual.

"Boys," he said, "are you goin' to have that haythen workin'

alongside you?"

"It won't do us any harm, will it?" asked d.i.c.k Roberts. "If Dewey chooses to hire him, what is it to us?"

"I ain't goin' to demane myself by workin' wid a yeller haythen."

"n.o.body has asked you to do it. If anybody is demeaning himself it is d.i.c.k Dewey, and he has a right to if he wants to."

"If he wants to hire anybody, let him hire a dacent Christian."

"Like you, O'Reilly?"

"I don't want to work for anybody. I work for myself. This Chinaman has come here to take the bread out of our mouths, bad cess to him."

"I don't see that. He is workin' d.i.c.k Dewey's claim. I don't see how that interferes with us."

Of course, this was the reasonable view of the matter; but there were some who sided with the Irishman, among others the Kentuckian, and he volunteered to go as a committee of one to Dewey, and represent to him the sentiments of the camp.

Accordingly he walked over to where Dewey and his apprentice were working.

"Look here, Dewey," he began, "me and some of the rest of the boys have takin' over this yere matter of your givin' work to this Chinaman, and we don't like it."

"Why not?" asked Dewey coolly.

"We don't feel no call to a.s.sociate with sich as he."

"You needn't; I don't ask you to," said Dewey quietly. "I am the only one who a.s.sociates with him."

"But we don't want him in camp."

"He won't trouble any of you. I will take charge of him."

"Look here, Dewey, you've got to respect public sentiment, and public sentiment is agin' this thing."

"Whose public sentiment--O'Reilly's?"