'A more respectable seaman woald be hard to picture. He assured the Court in politely aggressive accents that he was not what anyone could call a drinking man. He had a wife and a family at home, and in fact he never had been a drinking man.
"Your Honour," interpolated the police at this point. "The charges are for vagrancy, as your Honour "What have to you say to that?" queried the Court.
Accused turned on the prosecute ing police. "Didn't you tell me could tell my story to the 'Beak' hho snapped, and the Court ruled uninterrupted' revelations.
As accused had stated before he woe not a drinking man. It was his first, trip to Shanghai, and he hoped his last, as his idea of the place was considerably _changed through his mishap. "As his Honour knew it was a hot day, and he: had been perfectly sober standing on a corner in Broadway. There! hadn't been a soul in sight, but few Chinese and accused's thoughts about Shanghai were getting more and more unprintable.
Unfortunately he hadn't' got a bean on him; though it was hi pression that he might have had on board his ship. Anyway man came along about then, and accused decided to start a little pleasant conversation. As he had said ft was a very hot day. "Have you rot ® wet on you", accused questioned, and to "his' immense and wholly undeserved surprise the man had replied "That's where you! make a mistake. I arrest you for} vagrancy." The man wasn't. in uniform but he said he was a subinspector.
suppose he was a sub-inspector, your Honour?" asserted the respectable accused, "but anyway it didn't strike me at the time that 'a decent man would be taken up, in that fashion. Gorblim haven't T struck a snag thi Said his Honour making marks in the book while witness-accused, cast a disgusted look, inclusive of] the whole of an unhealthy place called Shanghai, over the room, "Well. my man, you mustn't try to got drinks onthe cheap in Shanghai, You might meet a plain-clothes policeman at almost any, time."
Adjournment.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.