CHAPTER V - SHANGHAI TO HANKOW (HANKAU)

Summary

From Hangchow I made a very interesting journey by canal and river to the important and historical city of Shao Hsing, with its beautiful environs, and from thence by inland waterways to Ningpo and its lovely lakes, passing through a region of great fertility, beauty, and prosperity. I must put on record that I made that journey without either a companion or servant, trusting entirely to the fidelity and goodwill of Chinese boatmen, and was not disappointed. At Ningpo the Commissioner of Customs kindly lent me the Customs tender, a fastsailing lorcha, for a week, and engaging a servant, I visited the Chusan Archipelago in glorious weather, spending three days on the remarkable island of Putu, the Island of Priests, sacred to Kwan Yin, the goddess of mercy, and two at Tinghai, on the island of Chusan, where the graves of the four hundred British soldiers who died there during our occupation present a melancholy spectacle of neglect and disrepair. The region beyond Shao Hsing technically belongs to another drainage area than that of the Yangtze, and is therefore passed over without further remark. I returned from Ningpo to Shanghai by sea.

The difficulties of getting a reliable interpreter servant who had not previously served Europeans and who was willing to face the possible risks and certain hardships of the journey I proposed were solved by the kindly intervention of friends, and I engaged a tall, very fine-looking, superior man named Be-dien, who abominated “pidgun,” spoke very fairly correct English, and increased his vocabulary daily during the journey.