"AH WONG."

Auckland Star, Volume LXI, Issue 229, 27 September 1930, Page 2 (Supplement)

"AH WONG."

(By Marjorie Morton, 30, Shen\ood * Avenue, Grey Lynn; aged 15.)

The pirate ship was lazily floating about in the waters of the China Sea.. For almost one week the Chinese pirates had been revelling below among the wines and rich cargo which they had captured from the Spanish ships, lhcy had murdered the sailors and the passengers, and had mercilessly thrown tliefr bodies to the waves. Then, for 'about two hours, they had used the ships for targets at which they fired until they were sunk. Then one afternoon towards the end of tlieir week of revelry another ship was sighted. This time it was a yacht on a cruising trip. The owner, Captain Felix, was holidaying with his wife and his baby, aged six; months. With Jhe satno cruel, ruthless murder as with which they had ended the lives of tlje Spaniards, the pirates fell upon the little partv aboard the yacht flying the Union Jack. But the pirate chief refused to allow the baby to be killed. He strode to his cabin with the child, soothing its terrified cries with soft, gentle words, and when it again began to sob he placed glittering amber beads in its fingers and bright green beads about its, neck. J The fierce old man became so gentle with the boy that it would gurgle and chuckle as it played with his long black pigtail, or would gaze jii baby wonderment and awe at his long, Capering finger nails. Old Wall Lee Wong called the child Ah Wong. When he began to speak, little Ah Wong would say "Ah Wong," as though meaning to i say "All wrong! " ("All wrong" was | certainly true.l )