Part 39

After sailing a great part of the day through a forest of mulberry trees, planted with much regularity, we arrived on the 10th at the city of _Hang-tchoo-foo_, the capital of the province of _Tche-kiang_. Here that branch of the grand canal which communicates with the _Yang-tse-kiang_ terminates in a large commodious bason, at this time crowded with shipping. From this bason a number of smaller canals, passing through arches turned in the walls and intersecting the city in every direction, are finally united in a lake beyond the western wall called the _See-hoo_. The natural and artificial beauties of this lake far exceeded any thing we had hitherto had an opportunity of seeing in China. The mountains surrounding it were lofty and broken into a variety of forms that were highly picturesque; and the vallies were richly cloathed with trees of different kinds, among which three species were remarkably striking, not only by their intrinsic beauty, but also by the contrast they formed with themselves and the rest of the trees of the forest. These were the _Laurus Camphora_ or camphor tree, the _Croton sebiferum_ or tallow tree, and the _Thuia Orientalis_ or arbor vitæ. The bright shining green foliage of the first, mingled with the purple leaves of the second, and overtopped by the tall and stately _tree of life_, of the deepest green, produced a pleasing effect to the eye; and the landscape was rendered still more interesting to the mind, by the very singular and diversified appearance of several repositories of the dead, upon the sloping sides of the inferior hills. Here, as well as elsewhere, the sombre and upright cypress was destined to be the melancholy companion of the tombs. Higher still among the woods, avenues had been opened to admit of rows of small blue houses, supported on white colonnades which, on examination, were also found to be mansions of the dead. Naked coffins of extraordinary thickness were every where lying upon the surface of the ground.

The lake that extended from the walls of the city to the feet of the mountains, and threw its numerous arms into the wooded vallies, was the seat of pleasure, as well as of profit, to the inhabitants of _Hang-tchoo-foo_. These amusements, however, of floating upon barges in the lake are principally confined to one sex. Few women, except those of loose character, join in the parties of men. How miserable or, at best, how little interest can be raised in that state of society where no social intercourse of the sexes exists; where sentiment, nice feeling and the sport and play of the softer passions are totally unknown, and where reason and philosophy are at so low an ebb! In more enlightened countries, when age may have weakened the ardour of joining in the sprightly female circle, or inclination lead to more serious conversations, numberless resources are still left to exercise the faculties of the mind, and society may always be had for such as can relish

"The feast of reason and the flow of soul."

But in China the tenor of their conversation must be always nearly the same, turning chiefly on the affairs of the neighbourhood, the injustice of the magistrates, the tricks and stratagems of the crafty merchant, or of the low mechanic. In entertainments given by those who can afford to drink wine, it is seldom served round as in other countries, but a number of puerile contrivances are practised to determine which of the party is to drink, as in the case I have already noticed of _the game of the fingers_. Thus, a nosegay is passed round from hand to hand, whilst a man in an adjoining room beats a drum or the gong, and he who happens to hold the nosegay when the instrument ceases must drink a cup of wine. Many other methods still more childish are resorted to, in order to pass the time and to give a zest to their wine; but the usual resource here, as well as elsewhere, against the tediousness of time, is gaming. An attachment to this vice accompanies the lowest Chinese wherever he goes. It is said that in one of our eastern colonies, where Chinese are encouraged to settle, they pay to the government the annual sum of ten thousand dollars for a licence to keep gaming tables and sell opium.

Our route being necessarily delayed for two days at this place, on account of an intervening neck of land over which all the baggage was to be transported, I prevailed upon our good natured companion _Van-ta-gin_ to make a party to the lake _See-hoo_, to which he readily assented; and this was the only excursion that we had in the course of the whole journey. We had a splendid yacht and another made fast to it to serve as a kitchen; the dinner began the instant we went on board and ceased only when we stepped a-shore. It consisted of at least a hundred dishes in succession, among which were excellent eels, fresh caught in the lake and dressed in a variety of ways; yet the water was clear as crystal. Vast numbers of barges were sailing to and fro, all gaily decorated with paint and gilding and streaming colours; the parties within them apparently all in pursuit of pleasure. The margins of the lake were studded with light aereal buildings, among which one of more solidity and of greater extent than the rest was said to belong to the Emperor. The grounds were enclosed with brick walls and mostly planted with vegetables and fruit trees; but in some there appeared to be collections of such shrubs and flowers as are most esteemed in the country. Among the fruits we got at this place was the _Jambo_ or rose apple; and, for the first time, fresh from the tree, but not yet perfectly ripe, two species of oranges, the common China and the small one usually called the Mandarin orange; pomgranates, bananas very indifferent and melons equally bad; apricots far from being equal to those of our own country; a large plumb, resembling the egg plumb, also indifferent, and peaches that might have been much improved by judicious culture; apples and pears that in England we should have no hesitation in pronouncing execrably bad; and a species of fruit unknown to all of us which the Chinese called _Zee-tsé_, of a sweet sickly taste when ripe, otherwise most insufferably astringent. Some of the gentlemen thought they saw hazel nuts among the shruberry, but it is more than probable they were mistaken. A few bad grapes were sometimes brought to us, but the party who went from hence to _Chu-san_ met with abundance of this fruit, and of very good quality, growing upon standards erected in the several canals and forming a shade under which the barges could pass.

Among the most conspicuous of the shrubs, on the borders of the lake _See-hoo_, was the _Hibiscus mutabilis_, the _Hibiscus Syriacus_, the _Syringa Vulgaris_ or common lilac, and the paper mulberry; we observed also a species of _Mimosa_, a _Crotularia_, _Cratægus_, _Rosa_, _Rhamnus_, _Sambucus_, _Juniper_ and the cotton plant. Of flowers we particularly noticed a large purple-coloured double poppy which, with the _Nelumbium_ that grew here in all the ponds and a species of _pæonia_, appear most frequently on the large sheets of painted paper used for covering the walls of their apartments. A great variety of beautiful balsams were also in flower, a species of _Amaranthus_, a _Xeranthemum_ and _Gnaphalium_. I mention only such plants as caught the eye in passing, for our Chinese companions, who had a much better appetite for the eels of the lake and other goods things they had taken care to provide than for botany, had no notion of being detained by a bush or a flower.

The next day Lieutenant Colonel, now General, Benson, Doctor Gillan, and myself, accompanied by a military officer and his orderly, rode over the neck of land to look at the yachts that were preparing for our future journey. As it was rather late before we returned, I proposed that we should pass through the city as I had done the day before with our conductor _Van_, which would save us half the distance. The officer perceiving our intention endeavoured to draw us off to the right, but finding us persevere he whispered the orderly, who immediately pushed forward towards the gate. Aware that the intention of this measure was to shut the gate against us, we spurred our horses and followed him, upon which the officer and his orderly set up such a hue and cry that the whole suburbs were presently in a state of commotion. The gates were instantly shut and surrounded by a crowd. Within all was confusion. Message after message was dispatched to the Governor, the gongs were beat and the guards were drawn out in every part of the city. I assured them there was nothing to fear; that we were only three, and had no other design but to pass to our yachts. During this time our _mandarin of war_, in presence of the whole populace, was down on his knees in the dirt, first before one and then another, intreating us to give up the point; so mean and despicable have the maxims of the government made these people. At length our friends _Van_ and _Chou_, with the interpreter and a numerous train of soldiers and attendants, made their appearance, and pretended to enjoy the joke of three Englishmen having caused so much alarm to one of their strongest cities, which at that time had a garrison of three thousand men within its walls. On expressing our surprise at such unnecessary precaution, _Van_ observed, that our conductor did not know us so well as he did, and, as he was responsible for our safe return, he would rather have travelled us all night through the country than brought us among the crowd in the streets. When the new viceroy of Canton (who travelled with us from hence) heard of this affair, and understood from our conductors that the English found great pleasure in walking and looking about them (a pleasure of which a Chinese can form no idea) he immediately gave orders that the gentlemen in the train of the Embassador should walk whenever they pleased without any molestation.

In the city of _Hang-tchoo-foo_, being particularly famed for its silk-trade, we were not surprized to meet with extensive shops and warehouses; in point of size and the stock contained within them they might be said to vie with the best in London. In some of these were not fewer than ten or twelve persons serving behind the counter; but in passing through the whole city not a single woman was visible, either within doors or without. The crowd of people, composed of the other sex, appeared to be little inferior to that in the great streets of Pekin. Here, though mostly narrow they had in other respects much the advantage of those in the capital, being paved with broad flagstones, resembling the Merceria of Venice or courts of the Strand; Cranburn-Alley is rather too wide for a Chinese street, but those of this city were equally well paved. They appeared to be kept extremely neat and clean. In every shop were exposed to view silks of different manufactures, dyed cottons and nankins, a great variety of English broad-cloths, chiefly however blue and scarlet, used for winter cloaks, for chair covers and for carpets; and also a quantity of peltry intended for the northern markets. The rest of the houses, in the public streets through which we passed, consisted of butchers and bakers' shops, fishmongers, dealers in rice and other grain, ivory-cutters, dealers in laquered ware, tea-houses, cook-shops, and coffin makers; the last of which is a trade of no small note in China. The population of the city alone, I should suppose, from its extent and appearance, to be not much inferior to that of Pekin; and the number of inhabitants in the suburbs, with those that constantly resided upon the water, were perhaps nearly equal to those within the walls.

Here our conductor _Sun-ta-gin_ took his leave, after having introduced to the Embassador the new Viceroy of Canton, who was now to accompany the Embassy to the seat of his government. His manners appeared to be no less amiable than those of the Minister. He had travelled post from Pekin and, with many assurances on the part of the Emperor of the highest satisfaction he had derived from the embassy, he brought an additional present from him to His Majesty, consisting of gold tissued silks, purses taken from his own person and the _Card of Happiness_. This is an ornamented piece of paper, neatly folded up and having in the centre the character _foo_ or happiness inscribed by the Emperor's own hand, and is considered as the strongest mark a sovereign of China can give to another prince of his friendship and affection. Another card was given to the Embassador of a similar import, as a testimony of his approbation of the conduct of the embassy, which was further confirmed by a present of silks, tea, fans and other trinkets to every individual of it.

A few miles beyond the city we again took shipping on the river _Tcheng-tang-chiang_, which might properly be called an estuary, the tide rising and falling six or seven feet at the place of embarkation, which was not very distant from the Yellow Sea. After seven days of tedious navigation, if dragging by main strength over a pebbly bottom on which the boats were constantly aground and against a rapid stream, could be so called, we came to its source near the city of _Tchang-san-shien_. But its banks were not deficient in beautiful views and picturesque scenery. The general surface of the country was mountainous and romantic, but well cultivated in all such places as would admit the labours of the husbandman. One city only occurred in the course of seven days; but we passed numerous villages, situated in the valleys and the glens between the ridges of mountains; and fishermen's huts were constantly in view. There was here no want of trees, among which the most common were the tallow-tree and the camphor, cedars, firs and the tall and majestic arbor vitæ. Groves of oranges, citrons and lemons were abundantly interspersed in the little vales that sloped down to the brink of the river; and few of the huts were without a small garden and plantation of tobacco. The larger plains were planted with the sugar-cane. We had thus far passed through the country without having seen a single plant of the tea-shrub, but here we found it used as a common plant for hedge-rows to divide the gardens and fruit groves, but not particularly cultivated for its leaves.

At the city of _Tchang-san-shien_ we had again a neck of land to cross, in order to join the barges that were prepared on another river falling towards the westward, by which a connexion was formed with the usual route from Pekin to Canton, from whence we had deviated at the _Yang-tse-kiang_ river, on account of some of the suite being intended to join the Hindostan in the harbour of _Tchu-san_. We were the less sorry for this deviation, as it gave us an opportunity of seeing a part of the country over which there is no general communication with the grand route. In passing this neck of land, on a very fine causeway, judiciously led through the defiles of the mountains, we first observed the terrace system of agriculture, so frequently mentioned in the writings of the missionaries. The Chinese seem to entertain a particular aversion against sowing or planting on sloping ground and, accordingly, when such occurs, they level it into a number of terraces one rising above the other, which they support by stone walls, if the earth should not be thought sufficiently strong for the purpose. The great conveniency of leading the water from the uppermost to the lowest terrace, without losing any of its nutritive effects by a rapid course, seems to have suggested this mode of preparing the ground. In a hot and dry country, vegetation becomes languid without the command of water; and I observed that on the uppermost terrace there was invariably a tank or reservoir to collect the waters falling from the upper parts of the hills. The expense of labour, that had evidently been employed on such terraces, was so great as to make any suitable return to the husbandman apparently impossible; and still less so in other places where the hills were completely dug away to the skeleton rocks, and the soil carried upon the marshy ground at their feet.

With all this industry it might be concluded, from the general appearance of the people, that they merely gained a subsistence. It was with the utmost difficulty that the officers of government could procure, in the whole city which we last departed from, a sufficient number of chairs for themselves and those gentlemen of the embassy who preferred to be thus carried, and horses for the rest. For the soldiers, indeed, that composed his Excellency's guard, they had prepared a sort of open bamboo chair, fixed between two poles and meant to be carried shoulder-height. But the soldiers, squeezed into these little chairs and elevated in the air, with their feathers and their firelocks, soon perceived that they cut such ridiculous figures and that the soon wretches who carried them were in so miserable a condition, both with regard to their clothing and their habit of body, that, ashamed to be thus dragged along, they presently dismounted and insisted, in their turn, upon carrying the Chinese. Our conductors affected to consider this as a good joke, but others were evidently nettled at it, supposing it might have been meant as a kind of oblique reflection on the indifferent accommodations that had been provided at this place for the Embassador and his retinue; which were however the best that it was possible for them to procure by any exertions.

Having finished this land journey, of about twenty-four miles, in the course of the day, we lodged at _Eu-shan-shien_, a small city of mean appearance and the following day embarked on flat-bottomed barges, remarkably long and narrow, on the river _Long shia-tong_; but two complete days of heavy rain obliged us to remain quietly at anchor.

On the 24th of November we dropped down the river, which by the rains was swelled to an enormous size and in some places had overflowed its banks, though in general high and rocky composed of a deep brown-coloured freestone. Several rice mills were so completely inundated, that their thatched roofs were but just visible above the surface of the water; others were entirely washed away; and the wrecks of them scattered upon the banks of the river. A vessel of our squadron was upset upon the roof of one of these mills.

During two days' sail the surface of the country was hilly and well wooded with camphors, firs, and tallow-trees; but as we approached the _Po-yang_ lake, a small inland sea, it began to assume the uniform appearance of an extended marsh, without any visible signs of cultivation: here and there a few small huts, standing on the brink of pools of water, with twice the number of small boats floating or drawn up on shore, sufficiently indicated the occupation of the inhabitants. In this part of the country we had an opportunity of seeing the various means practised by the Chinese to catch fish: rafts and other floating vessels with the fishing corvorant: boats with moveable planks turning on hinges, and painted so as to deceive fishes on moonlight nights and entice them to leap out of the water upon the planks; nets set in every form; and wicker baskets made exactly in the same manner as those used in Europe. Large gourds and blocks of wood were floating on the water, in order to familiarize the various kinds of water-fowl to such objects, which gave the Chinese an opportunity, by sticking their heads into gourds or earthen pots and keeping their bodies under water, to approach the birds in a gentle manner sufficiently near to take them by the legs and draw them quietly under the water; a method which is said to be practised by the natives of South America.

The nearer we approached the great lake _Po-yang_, the more dreary was the appearance of the country; and for the distance of ten miles around it, or at least on the south and west sides, was a wild waste of reeds and rank grasses, such as the _Scirpus_, _Cyperus_, and bulrushes, interrupted only by stagnant pools of water. Not a human dwelling of any description was to be seen. This place may justly be considered as the sink of China, into which rivers fall from every point of the compass. It is scarcely possible for the imagination to form to itself an idea of a more desolate region than that which surrounds the Po-yang lake. The temperature was so reduced, by the circumambient waters, that on the 27th November, with drizzling showers, the thermometer was down to 48° in the forenoon. We sailed near four whole days over the same kind of country and came, towards the evening of the last, to the city of _Nan-tchang-foo_, the capital of _Kiang-see_, where we observed from four to five hundred of the revenue vessels lying at anchor. We waited at this place a few hours to take in the necessary provisions and to receive a present of silk, tea, and some other trifles from the viceroy. We were told of a famous temple in the neighbourhood of the city, but we had no curiosity to go out of the way to see it, which was dedicated to the man who, as we have already observed, made his _apotheosis_ comfortably in his own house; that there was a well belonging to this temple full of large snakes, whom the priests venerate and to whom they admonish the people to make sacrifices, as being children of the dragons which, if not constantly appeased by oblations to these their offspring, would destroy the whole world. Thus, in all countries where votaries of superstition are to be found, will knaves be met with to take advantage of their weakness. The priests of this temple are said to have made one observation, which is perhaps no superstition, that when these water snakes appear on the surface, rains and inundations are sure to follow. I took advantage, however, of the short delay, to go on board one of the revenue vessels and to measure the capacity of its hold. It was in length 115 feet, breadth 15 feet, and depth 6 feet; the sides streight and the width nearly the same fore and aft; so that the burden might fairly be estimated at 250 tons. Independent, therefore, of the innumerable small craft, there were lying before this city 100,000 tons of shipping.

The city of _Nan-tchang-foo_ is situated upon the left bank of the river _Kan-kiang-ho_ falling from the southward into the _Po-yang_ lake. It was here about five hundred yards in width, against the stream of which we made a rapid progress with a brisk breeze. For the first sixty miles the country was flat and uncultivated, except in places where we observed a few fields of rice. But there was no want of population. Towns and villages were constantly in sight, as were also manufactories of earthen ware, bricks and tiles. The farther we advanced up the river, the more populous was the country, the more varied and agreeable the surface, and the more extended the cultivation. The banks were skirted with large trees, that cast a cool and comfortable shade on the walks beneath. Of these, some were willows, others camphors, but by far the greatest number were the _Yang-tchoo_, a large spreading tree that threw its branches down to the ground where, like the _Ficus Indicus_, of which indeed it was a variety, they took root and became stems.