“An’ so it goes.  I’m in a state iv alarum all th’ time.  In th’ good old days we wudden’t have thought life was worth livin’ if we cudden’t insult a foreigner.  That’s what they were f’r.  Whin I was sthrong, befure old age deprived me iv most iv me pathritism an’ other infantile disordhers, I niver saw a Swede, a Hun, an Eyetalian, a Boohlgaryan, a German, a Fr-rinchman, that I didn’t give him th’ shouldher.  If ’twas an Englishman I give him th’ foot too.  Threaty rights, says ye?  We give him th’ same threaty rights he’d give us, a dhrink an’ a whack on th’ head.  It seemed proper to us.  If ’twas right to belong to wan naytionality, ’twas wrong to belong to another.  If ’twas a man’s proud boast to be an American, it was a disgrace to be a German an’ a joke to be a Fr-rinchman.

“An’ that goes now.  Ye can bump anny foreigner ye meet but a Jap.  Don’t touch him.  He’s a live wire.  Don’t think ye can pull his impeeryal hat down on his bold upcurved nose.  Th’ first thing ye know ye’ll be what Hogan calls Casey’s Bellows, an’ manny a peaceful village in Indyanny’ll be desthroyed f’r ye’er folly.  Why, be Hivens, it won’t be long till we’ll have to be threatin’ th’ Chinese dacint.  Think iv that will ye.  I r-read in th’ pa-aper th’ other day that th’ Chinese ar-rmy had been reorganized an’ rearmed.  Hincefoorth, instead iv th’ old fashioned petticoats they will wear th’ more war-like short skirt.  Th’ palm leafs have been cast aside f’r modhren quick-firin’ fans, an’ a complete new assortment iv gongs, bows an’ arrows, stink-pots, an’ charms against th’ evil eye has been ordhered fr’m a well-known German firm.  Be careful th’ next time ye think iv kickin’ an empty ash-barl down yefer frind Lip Hung’s laundhry.

“It’s hard f’r me to think iv th’ Japs this way.  But ‘tis th’ part iv prudence.  A few years ago I didn’t think anny more about a Jap thin abont anny other man that’d been kept in th’ oven too long.  They were all alike to me.  But to-day, whiniver I see wan I turn pale an’ take off me hat an’ make a low bow.  A few years ago an’ I’d bet I was good f’r a dozen iv thim.  But I didn’t know how tur-rible a people they are.  Their ships are th’ best in th’ wurruld.  We think we’ve got good ships.  Th’ Lord knows I’m told they cost us enough, though I don’t remimber iver payin’ a cent f’r wan.  But a Jap’nese rowboat cud knock to pieces th’ whole Atlantic squadron.  It cud so.  They’re marvellous sailors.  They use guns that shoot around th’ corner.  They fire these here injines iv desthruction with a mysteeryous powdher made iv a substance on’y known to thim.  It is called saltpether.  These guns hurl projyctiles weighin’ eighty tons two thousand miles.  On land they ar-re even more tur-rible.  A Jap’nese sojer can march three hundhred miles a day an’ subsist on a small piece iv chewin’ gum.  Their ar-rmy have arrived at such a perfection at th’ diffycult manoover known as th’ goose step that they have made this awful insthrument iv carnage th’ terror