When I scratched my head and they saw the spurious pigtail, they smiled; when I flicked the dust off the table with my pigtail, they laughed hilariously.
The wayside inns are usually at the side of an arcade of grass and bamboo stretched above the main road.

Two or three ponies are usually waiting here for hire, and expectant coolies are eager to offer their services.

In engaging a pony you make an offer casually, as if you had no desire in the world of its being accepted, and then walk on as if you had no intention whatever of riding for the next month.

The mafoo demands more, but will come down; you stick to your offer, though prepared to increase it; so demand and offer you exchange with the mafoo till the width of the village is between you, and your voices are almost out of hearing, when you come to terms.
Suppose I wanted a chair to give me a rest for a few miles--it was usually slung under the rafters--Laokwang (my cook) unobserved by anyone but me pointed to it with his thumb inquiringly.

I nodded assent and apparently nothing more happened and the conversation, of which I was quite ignorant, continued.