Sir Alexander Hosie

“ Leaving the river we struck west by north through the belt of low hills which separates the Chien Chou and Ch’êng-tu plains. These hills are rocky and little cultivated, the thin poor soil not holding out that inducement which even a Chinese expects for his labour. Snow was falling thickly when we reached the rim of the immense plain—the plain par excellence of the province of Ssŭ-ch’uan—and the imperfect glimpses which we caught through the snow-flakes revealed flooded paddy-fields and the ordinary winter crops, the most prominent of which was the poppy. ”

“ Fifteen miles to the south of the city, the road suddenly descends about two hundred feet down into a wider valley. Far below us, we could see the hamlet of Lung-tung, encircled by plots of yellow rape and green wheat and poppy—a real oasis in the white stony valley. This descent leads not only to a new country, but to a new race. ”

“ While resting at a solitary tea-house on the mountain side, and speculating on the advisability and wisdom of attempting this route in chairs, I perceived in the far south-west a long line of moving objects coming towards us. Red flags and gaily-caparisoned mules and ponies warned me that something more than ordinary was approaching. The red-clad muleteers, armed with swords and spears, and the large powerful dogs trotting at the heads of the pack-animals, told us that we were face to face with a Tibetan caravan. It consisted of some fifty animals laden with medicines, musk, and sundries. ”

“ Walking in Indian file along the pathway that served as a road, they halted every few yards, resting their loads on a crutch which each carried in his hand, and, uttering that half whistle, half sigh, which proclaims the body’s utter weariness and its gratitude for a moment’s relief, scraped from their brows and faces, by a ring of split bamboo attached to the load by a string, the sweat that literally gushed from them. Of a surety they earn their bread by the sweat of their brow! ”

“ I propose now to show that, so far as Ssŭ-ch’uan, Kuei-chow, and Northern Yün-nan are concerned, there is no possible rival to the Yang-tsze route. The fact that there are half a dozen trade routes to Yün-nan affords a proof of the inaccessibility of the province. I agree with Mr. Colquhoun when he says:—“The configuration of Yün-nan is such that no single route can reach or ‘tap’ the whole trade of the province. To propose one route for the whole country is like advocating some quack medicine for a patient who lies ill with half a dozen ailments.” ”

“ At Yang-lin, which is built on the south-western margin of the Sung-ming Lake, we occupied a room in a new inn, and were regaled with excellent fish from the clear water we had just passed. How easy it is for a Chinese official to show his contempt for a foreigner. On the way to Yang-lin, I was provided with an escort in the shape of a small boy of thirteen, wearing a sword nearly as long as himself, who turned out to be fonder of bird-nesting than of affording protection and assistance! ”

“ Had I so willed, I might have ascended the Yang-tsze by boat to Sui Fu and its tributary the Min to Chia-ting, and thus saved myself much overland toil; but, as every explorer knows, the thirst for new fields becomes after a time irresistible and must be satisfied. ”

“ The city is of no great size; but it is exceedingly interesting, as being the junction where the main high-road from Tibet to China and the road from Yün-nan by the Chien-ch’ang valley meet. Here we parted with the brick-tea carriers, sorry that it was not our fortune to accompany them to Ta-chien-lu, and attempt the country beyond that famous border town. From Ch’ing-ch’i the road goes south, descending to the bases of the precipitous mountain ranges hemming in a valley, which expands and contracts, and is plentifully strewn with stones and pebbles. ”

“ We were all wet, cold, and dispirited; the only living things that seemed to be positively enjoying themselves were the ducks flapping their wings and wagging their tails on the edges, the bull frogs croaking in the centres, and the swallows skimming low over the surfaces of the flooded paddy-fields. To the east of Ta-tsu we crossed, by a fine stone bridge of five arches, that tributary of [167] the T’o River on which we took boat for a short distance last year at the city of Jung-ch’ang farther south. ”

“ Darker and yet darker grows the face of the giant range, throwing into still greater prominence the numerous gullies down which flow the icy rills to nurture the plain and then lose themselves in the waters of the Erh Hai. ”

“ To have to take one’s meals in a chair is bad enough—infinitely preferable, nevertheless, to a smoky, dirty, mud cell; but to be surrounded by a mob of gaping men, women, and children, watching every mouthful, does not tend to the preservation of temper, and it required all the banter I could command to make even a temporary impression and keep the peace. This was our experience a few miles to the south of Hsüan-wei Chou, the last city through which we had to pass before entering the province of Kuei-chow. ”

“ Great excitement now began to manifest itself among my followers. We were only a day’s journey from the foot of the Ta Hsiang Ling Pass, and carriers from Yün-nan, who came to our inn, were cramming them with the difficulties that had to be surmounted. Snow, so they said, was lying deep on the passes, and they had only just managed to get through with their lives. Chinese statements have invariably to be heavily discounted, and the problem as to how far a Chinese believes his most intimate friend has been present with me for many years, and still remains unsolved. ”

“ I have traversed all the existing trade-routes between Yün-nan and Ssŭ-ch’uan, and between Yün-nan and Kuei-chow, and I have very vivid and bitter recollections connected with them. In proof of the difficulties that exist, I may state that it is a common occurrence to see pack animals lying dead on the mountain sides, and this recollection is all the more deeply impressed on my mind by the fact that one of my own horses fell a victim to a vain search after a practicable trade-route. ”

“ He had a stable of two splendid ponies, on whose backs we spent nearly the whole day careering through the Tung-ch’uan plain. None but those who have spent years in solitude in a strange land can realize what it is to meet a fellow European. China was entirely forgotten in the discussions of French and British politics, and it was with the greatest difficulty that I could tear myself away from his kind hospitality on the following morning. All honour to men of surpassing ability who give up their lives for heart-breaking work in China! ”

“ A noble stone bridge of seven arches—the most substantial and artistic I have seen in Western China—spans a stream which flows southwards to the west of the district city of Lu-fêng, on its way to swell the Song-koi. The city itself is badly ruined; but the plain in which it lies contrasts very favourably in an agricultural point of view with the valley occupied by the next city to the east—An-ning Chou. ”

“ Wet to the skin we entered the village of Mao-k’ou, which consists of one street, with numerous gardens surrounded by hedges of cactus, on the left bank of a stream fifty yards in breadth, which issues from a gorge a few hundred yards above the village. Here there was no resisting the appeal for a day’s rest which was at once made to me. A carrier’s luggage is of the lightest possible description; the single suit of clothes in which he stands is, as a rule, all that he possesses, and when that is reduced to a pulp, it has to be washed and dried before he can again venture out. ”

“ The Ya-lung is unnavigable, and the only craft on its green waters were three ferry boats, each about thirty feet long. From the bed of shingle which lies below the customs station, we followed for a short distance the right bank, which is here lined with huge boulders, and then turned south-west up a gully, down which flows a streamlet to the main river. The country gradually opens out, and cultivation, which had practically ceased since we left the Ning-yuan plain, began to reappear on the gentler slopes of the mountain sides to the south-east. ”

“ Immense trees are found deeply embedded in the soil on the hills, their positions being discovered from lines of pine sprouts. They are dug up, sawn, and sent north in large quantities.
When I made it known that, instead of proceeding south through Hui-li Chou to Yün-nan Fu, I was about to attempt the road through Yen-yuan Hsien to north-western Yün-nan and Ta-li Fu, hundreds of objections were at once forthcoming. The road was a mere bridle-path impassable for chairs, there were no inns, no rice, nothing but wilderness. ”

“ Twenty miles may seem a poor day’s work; but my readers should bear in mind that roads, in the proper sense of the word, do not exist, and that the mountain paths which we have been travelling have been sadly neglected. During the whole of my time in Kuei-chow I never once saw a cart, the entire trade—such as it is—being conducted on the backs of bipeds and quadrupeds. A nearer acquaintance with the country between the Wu Chiang and Kuei-yang failed to leave on my mind a livelier impression than that derived from the panorama of desolation as seen from the Kuan-ai barrier. ”

“ A dreadful plague annually sweeps down the valley and mows down its inhabitants. Can it be wondered that few people care to risk their existence in the plague-stricken hollow, and that accommodation unworthy of the name is all that can be obtained? I managed to distribute my followers over the small village of Huang-chia-p’ing; but I was unfortunate enough to be laid up with an attack of fever, which compelled us to remain for a couple of days in a small mud stable without door or window. ”

“ Such was the boat and crew with which I ascended from Ichang into Western China, reaching Ch’ung-k’ing on the 24th of January, 1882, after a passage of a month. It is unnecessary for me to describe this journey in detail. Blakiston, Gill, Little, and others have given their experiences; they have painted living pictures of the grand, majestic gorges; they have brought the world within earshot of the hissing, seething rapids; and it only remains for me to say a few words on a subject which has of late years received no little attention—the navigability of the Upper Yang-tsze by steamers. ”

“ Beneath the huge, dark-green, spreading banyans by the road-side, houses and restaurants spring, mushroom-like, and invite the traveller to tarry for a moment and enjoy their cool shade. As pack animals are usually turned loose to forage for themselves, the peasantry, whose lands adjoin the high-road, have hit upon a novel plan to prevent their depredations. Wheat and beans were thickly sprinkled with feathers, which, as might naturally be supposed, are not a pleasant sauce.
For some days at the Chinese New Year, business of every description comes to an absolute stand-still ”

“ RETURN TO CH’UNG K’ING.
My men, who for the last few days had been unable to procure rice, and had subsisted for the most part on bean-curd, rejoiced to find themselves in a valley of their own province where paddy, maize, tobacco, hemp, and beans were well advanced, where silk was being reeled and tea-plantations abounded. A streamlet flows north-east down the valley, and following its course for two days, we found ourselves on the 24th of June in the village of Huang-shui-k’ou, where we soon engaged a long empty cargo boat; and, shipping our whole caravan, sped down the Nan-kuang River. ”

“ We lodged for the night in the miserable village of Yün-nan-yi, where, with an exhausted larder, I could get nothing to eat for love or money. It is not a very pleasant position to be stranded in the dark without food, and to know that only a few miles off there are thousands of duck cackling to their hearts’ content. ”

“ If left undisturbed in the broken scale, the beetle, which, from his ungainly appearance, is called by the Chinese the niu-êrh, or “buffalo,” will, heedless of the cocci which begin to crawl outside and inside the scale, continue to burrow in the inner lining of the scale, which is apparently his food. The Chinese declare that the beetle eats his minute companions in the scale, or at least injures them by the pressure of his comparatively heavy body; and it is true that the scales from Chien-ch’ang [194] in which the beetles are numerous are cheaper than those in which they are absent. ”