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that of the Hok-lo that the Cantonese are willing to work and do certain things that a Hok-lo would not do, or vice versâ ?
A. I fancy that the Cantonese are more inclined that way, although it does not always happen. The Hok-lo has more stamina than the Cantonese. Take the average Swatow man and the average Cantonese, and you find there is quite a difference in them. Then some of the Hakkas are very good. I remember once, years ago, riding nearly the whole way to Mountain Lodge with Hak-ka coolies and, so far as I remem- ber, they only stopped once the whole way. You can't get coolies to do that now. They seem to have lost the power to carry as they used to.
Mr. Wilcox. Yes, I have noticed it myself.
Mr. Badeley. You have told us that private chair coolies can, at any time, leave their employ and get very big wages at the godowns and such places.
Witness.-Say about fifteen dollars, or a dollar a day in some cases.
Q.-What, in your opinion, determines that rate of wages for a godown coolie? Is it a matter of guild combination to keep it up or is it a matter of minimum living wage?
A.-[ suppose wages have gone up in the Colony in every line of business.
Q. Do these coolies employed in godown work combine to keep up the wages? A.—I am not aware that they do. I have not gone into that subject. There are strikes occasionally in Hongkong.
Q-What would be the lowest wage that a coolie can manage to live on if he has got to pay his own rent and food? What is the lowest wages paid in the Colony for
an able-bodied coolie ?
A.-I think a coolie to live respectably and send home money to his family in the country would need about seven or eight dollars a month.
Q.-As a matter of fact they get a great deal more?
A. That is so. Supposing he gets lodging at a dollar--he wants to send some- thing home to his family-anything from seven to nine dollars one would think a coolie could get on splendidly with and have ample to send home.
The Chairman.-What is the average wage in China do you know? ordinary occupations not in European employ but in a Chinese village or town?
I mean
A.-I don't know what it is in Swatow, but in the country the wage is very little. A man is supported by his master and gets lodging and food and so on and he gets only a few dollars in addition.
Q.-Take the case of a man who is not supported by his master and has to pro- vide his own food and so on; what is his wage ?
A.-Take Canton City-chair coolies are paid better than any other class of workmen. You have to pay more for chair coolies there.
Q. How much does he get a month?
A.--I can't tell you exactly now. I could tell you what they thought ample wage twenty or thirty years ago.
Q. What could he live on then?
A.--You could get a house coolie who knew nothing for three and-a-half-dollars, the same sort of man you would get here for chair coolies.
Q.--That represented the living wage?
A. That represented the li
ige.
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