March 17th,—The house in which we lodged Inst night was spacious enough. Our two rooms were in a sort of rickety loft, the only furniture in which was a few rough wooden bedsteads or frames doing duty us such, each frame as weal in thes parts being covered with a lot of bamboo Inths doing duty for springs. Over the laths is stout straw mat, pnesably good wh now and clean, but simply horrible when eld and verminized xs must of them are, espooinlly in summer. Fortunately the weather is not yet warm enough for those hibernating pests of Below our rooms ye distillery, piggery nnd all adjoining each other without much as @ partition between them, ize is the grain from which the whi Ned wfter mashing or mal usual way. 'The residue is then used to feed the hogs, which appear to thrive amazingly well on such noucishinent; whiskey produced in " distillery so pleasantly situated, and under a fluor full of erevizes through' which fall all the dirt from the many feet tramping above, is certain]; not the most desirable of liquors; but this good Saint Patrick's day ought to be re-vorantly kept in the best or any kind of procurable whiskey.
We marched at six o'clock in the morn-porta: of tro Yuméuites, who preing, despite the little sleep and the im-
sented themselves last night with duly signed papers and documents, all in bogktionary order, sayin escorted to riy and ferrying wherever necessary throughout jurisdiction and Magistracy of Niping Hsien; and the said Yaméuites, whose names were duly inscribed on the docu-monts they carried, were to see that all the people behaved respectfully towards my excellent self and suite. But the Yoméuites only turned up last nigh demand money for their travelling penses on th journey; they m to part order to yo to next Hsien, which we were to pass withi twenty li, and where they would be lieved of the important duty of conduct-me, but would see that other reliable and safe conductors, like themselves, we gout on after me immediately, etc', etc. Tcomforted them with the ant journey, and expressed some surprise not having seen them before, especially where they ware very much needed—at the Suey-f f -kuang port, eto, Disappointment and displeasure was visible on their ugly" countenances when I left them to pay their own way back to whenes they came, We passed out of town on leaving the inn, which is wt the end of it, and we crossed the river Wen-shuey Ho on a stone bridge, th turned to the left, with down on our left hand, then ascended the right slope before us ina thick fog, passing a lot of ferns, and other plants, spread all over withspider's we band forming an almost continuous sheet of netting over the mountain We also passed several niches and miniature temples, with idols of various sorts, sexes wud sizes, A Buddha's head or two were stuck on the top ofa atone-peat to terrify the evil-disposed passing apitils and to rectify the evil fluences of the local feng-shui, From the, mountain ridge we looked Gown on the masaea of fog, spread over the valleys below us on either aide, whiler we still. ascended, passing lots of rough sprouts, growing on the decapitated stumps of their ancestors, At 7.25 we reached the top of the pass in Yi-huang-poh, where my barometer indicated a height of 800 fest above the town we lad left. We then descended rapidly into a ley, the mountain slopes on either side being cultivated to the very tops in a fanciful mauner, forming a cert +f herring boning work' about the mountains, th backbone being represented by path up the central portion, The valleys also louked splendid, with lots of fine fields in full bloom on all sides. Wo passed forests of bamboos, where is gathered the famous delicacy ' called tung-sen, young winter bamboo sprouts, which do duty for asparatus and other things. Bofure eight o'clock me had reac ed the bottom of the valley, which we crossed on stone bridge, then going along a pretty level rond and then towards a large town at the foot, with the river Wéu flowing down north on our left, We passed through the market town called i, which has " popi tion of 140 families, and_ao1 near the middle forty-boat only Inege enough for one or two animals at a time, #0 I preferred to ford, ove of the boatmen acting as guide, We then a conded south, up a small valley, amon, lot of limestone rocks and coal min some ponies backing coals, this being abundant all through these moun-tama. Wo then ascended easily in another fine valley, with fine cultivated fields of barley, beans, peas, rape and when, and fine forests of various kinds of trees and bamboos in all directions around the farmatends and villages, and over the slopes and ridges, We halt.
akfast in m town of 75 familion called Lung Tou, done about 40 1 Our coolies hat it into their not to 10 is consid lered a Yell, and those famous vocaliste Bosses. Shout and Be Glad; but chat tune is not the ples est one in the world to my way of think-and arriving here at 10.40 a.m. on a day, and going no further table affair to any the least of i But coolies will be coolies everywhere alway the The iron to build those importa ripening fast in th Ta-have Mountains of Shan-si, and I am only awaiting the oppority Of converting that peculiar fruit of mountains into jelly.
Well, here we are, in a fine valley, with no accommodation for the al very little suitable food, w modation for ourselves woul the Royal So Cruelty to Animals as to ite suitability for animals of any kind; indeed that Society would very likely bring an action against us for keeping our animals in such rooms as we wow occupy. By the way, my boss coolie tells me that he returned from Yunnan at the bare end of last year, having been employed to carry twenty-ci pieces of ordinance, great guns, to th frontier of Tonquin, where some 20 odd battalions of braves, under the Commander-in-Chief of Shen Long-shan, a Taust'ai of Yunnan, who lao commanded troops in managed to keep himself fne enough from that province for a long time, and always
theseus of war—like most Chinete Generals t penetrated into the country three day ney, until they met a lot of other troops, who objected to the invasion of the country is lively manner, and so many of the braves died, and the Common f resigned in disgust from his active Ixbours, to enjoy the fruits thereof with leas danger to his life. The men. who. entered For qui were certain of victory when entering, but were soon convinced of the erroneo! ature of the calculate counting their chickens before they were hatched. It appears that a class of very ferocious people from the outer world had invaded the country first and held it against all comers by the might of 1 which vomited fire before being March 18th.—We matched at 6 through the town, and saw several water-mhools at work on the right, the water being ducted in bamboo pipes, wrapped ro with straw to keep them from but when a force of water is on. Wo went about east, in a fine valley, the beauties of which were considerably marred to us by the narrowness and exoussive tortuous ness of the path e bearera were, however, in the best of spirits, and cat along very well, and at a good rate, reached I dismounted, was carried over empty. The horses forded easily, excepting my grey Ili stallion Kuldja, whois troubled with gripes, cai undoubtedly by the wnsuitablensss of th food, no bran being procurable. I ordered rice to be given on account of its cooling properties, but the poor berist did not like it, and is ing fne it, wh all the others are well enough, though By th dinner, and "chi all of which I declined to receive, with thanks, having made up my mind not to aco-pt anything more from the Szechuen yamens, As we advanced the scenery be-cane boautifal, with well cultivated slopes and summits of mount hidden by clumps of The scenery was also considerably b fied by the many peaks, points, cles of the rocks and hills on either side, the pence gradually tapering up to five udos, and splendidly decorated with fields, looking grand at times, Spurs utted out here and there from the mountain ides, forming points, around which th river and road were obliged to courses; whilst. the pinnacles rose bolt upright ere nnd there, li eelles of gigantic apites of churches Into.
passed a specially fine lot of hen, of stone gode A he close by was a. pair of orphi may call them so—detached portions from the main mountains, Que rose up in a rocky bluo'c conical form on our right, covered all over with verdure; the other massive buttress of its own fields and crops looked splendid throughout!
There was barley in the ear, and opium, first a couple of fect above ground, in tows about 24 to 3 feet apart, ts in the rows being 8 to 10 inches apart, and all well held up at the feet of the stalks, A little further on, the opium had buds, and still " few li further on the beautiful yin-shen-tua was in full bloom—ion in thie valley, although the most peruicivus. In some places be more growing amongst the opium; but it
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.