Moment in Peking, by Lin Yutang

Now, the girls of higher families were not supposed to be out in the streets unchaperoned. But Mulan was only fourteen and her sister twelve, and they could not resist the stolen pleasure of wandering about free and alone.

Delighted with the boxer-magician´s show, they went on, and saw a seller of sugared crab apples, which had just appeared for the winter season. Their mouths watered and they each bought a stick of five sugared apples and ate them, as happy as children could be. Further on there was a peep show, with pictures of the Boxers and the foreign gunboats, and the girls paid for a peep, with their mouths still full of sugared crab apples.