THREE:"I could go on with a long account of the tortures in China, but they are not very pleasant reading, and, besides, some of them are too horrible for belief. I will stop with the torture known as 'the hot-water snake,' which consists of a coil of thin tubing of tin or pewter in the form of a serpent. One of these coils is twisted around each arm of the victim, and another around his body, in such a way that the head of the snake is higher than any other part. Then they pour boiling water into the mouth of the snake, and the flesh of the prisoner is burned and scalded in the most terrible manner. This punishment is said to be used rarely, and only[Pg 374] on persons accused of crimes against the government. It is too horrible to be popular, even among the most cold-blooded people in the world.The return to Yokohama was accomplished without any incident of consequence. Fred was a little disappointed to think that their lives had not been in peril. "Just a little danger for the fun of the thing," he remarked to Frank; and at one time on the way he was almost inclined to gloominess when he reflected on the situation. "There hasn't been any attack upon us," he said to himself, "when there might have been something of the kind just as well as not. Not that I wanted any real killing, or anything of the sort, but just a little risk of it to make things lively. It's really too bad."
