6th May. Tne changes that are noticed as takin place in the Huangpu River at Shanghai naturally cause much dixqniet to those who forecast the future, In the course of fifty years the stream has gradually and regularly receded from the Settlement. Fifty yards or thereabouts have been gained of firm land from the river, and this process of making new land is constantly in operation, On account of the great width of the river and the vastness of the mass of water which it conveys to the sea, the natives feel no alarm. Their mode of looking at the matter is simply that the river will continue to recede from the Settlement and become narrower and deeper, and that centuries must pass away before changes in the channel can affect materially the commercial-prospects of Shanghai, The space between the city and the river, and between the foreign Settlement and the river will increase, and the.value of property will change in the ratio of its increased distance from the river to some slight extent. Jetties will need to be lengthened and. other changes will be rendered necessary. That is all.
The cause of ¢ change in the river, is either silting alone or silting combined with subterranean elevation. Perhaps the best way of accounting for the change is to suppose a combination of silting up and underground elevation, That silting. up above is not sufficient to account for the facts, seems-highly probable, because in the Gulf of Pechili changes of nearly similar magnitude take' place where there are no rivers and where the rivers are very small. At Tengchoufu, 60 miles west of Chefoo, there is no river. Ihe sea here has receded so far from the old coast line that large vessels lave ceased to frequent this place as a harbour. In the course of 300 years half a Ji has been gained by the land from the sex and five feet depth of water been lost, In the Ming dynasty the frequent marauding expeditions of Japanese pirates rendered necessary a fortified harbour. 'I'his walled enclosure at Tengchou, called Shuicheng,"water city," dates from that time. When the Wotsi, as the Japanese were then called, appeared, the shipping were safe in this fortified harbour. Water deep enough for the shipping of that time extended tothe south of the Shuicheng. 'I'he Shuicheng itself was in the water onthe east, on the west the wall rested on a hill, The sea is now half a de to the north of the "water city." A literary graduate and native of l'engchou relates these facts.
Kiaochou on the south coast of the promontory has been port for not more than two centuries. Before that there was not far from it some other harbour that has now yielded to the inevitable tendency to grow shallow as the years roll on. At Chefoosince the erection of foreign houses by European residents facing the sea margin, receding of the sea ling been observed to be rapid and constant. Many years ago high tides regularly reached the gates in front of foreign houses then built. Now the tide never reaches these same gates, It has been noticed that a stone path outside acertain gate was formerly much injured by the tide,. It is never injured now. The owner of the house thinks the tides have in nine years receded two feet, measured vertically. Yent'ai is a new town which has grown up within the last 200 years. Before this time Kisanso was the port and it was walled asa protection from the Japanese. It is now nearly a mile from the beach.
The receding of the sea taken vertically may be obtained in an approximate form in the following manner, Ab fengchoufu, the water in the "water city" is two feet deep. Iv the Ming dynasty junks took shelter there which would require on an average seven or eight feet depth of water. Hence the alteration of sea level in three centuries has amounted to about five feet. 'I'he visibility of subterranean elevation is greater in proportion to the steepness of the coast. If the upheaval be even and regular for all Asia, then there will be a period of rich garden agriculture for each river system. At the mouth of the: Euphrates and tigris, horticulture prospered tivo thousand years ago. It is not so now. In Midian and near Mount Sinai there were once rich tures and the abodes of men, at present they are deserted by vegetation and by-man, Captain Burton speaks of "the return of the desert to lands once fertile," where the intrusive band
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.