Particularly harsh conditions prevailed under a system known as “rumah kechil” (Malay for “small room,” i.e., a hut)—a mode of subcontracting portions of a plantation to laoke headmen. Evidently, this stratum of Chinese petty labor bosses (such as those in the report by Qian Xun) felt no compunction at profiting from their compatriots’ misery and even deepening it: