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How difficult it is to eradicate was shown by the delight of a missionary at Chung-king over the low price for which his trusty Christian clerk had secured a boat for me. For once he felt sure no commission could have been taken. During all this part of my trip I carried no coined silver, only rough lumps of bullion of varying size, converting them into cash as I needed.
My boy he had been a doctor's boy on one of the gunboats at Chung-king thought it was bruised. I acquiesced, and sank fainting to a stone. On the strength of my boy's diagnosis we rubbed it, and found that it hurt still more.
Broad, steep flights of steps lead up from the river to the city gates, and over these stairs all the water used by hundreds of thousands is carried in buckets. In 1895 Chung-king was declared open as a treaty port, and since then its commerce has grown in true modern fashion by leaps and bounds, and there seems no limit to its development, for it is in a position to control the up-country trade.
Chung-king has no less than six local deliveries daily, thus eliminating delays after the delivery of the mails, and a daily service to the coast has also been established.
The roads in general from Yün-nan-fu to Tali-fu were worse than any I have met from Chung-king onwards, partly owing to the mountainous condition of the country, and partly to neglect of maintenance. Where the road is paved, it is in most places worse than if it had not been paved at all, as neither skill nor common sense seems to have been exercised in the work.
No trade has prospered in Yün-nan during the past two years more than the foreign cigarette trade, and the growing evil among the children of the common people, both male and female, is viewed with alarm. From Tachien-lu to Mengtsz, from Chung-king to Bhamo, one is rarely out of sight of the well-known flaring posters in the Chinese characters advertising the British cigarette.
He spoke English fairly well, and was sufficiently at home in the various forms of Mandarin to get on in Yunnan and Szechuan. The cook had come down the "Great River" from Chung-king with an English family returning home, and was glad to work his way back, even though by a roundabout route. Although he spoke no English, he understood European ways and was quick to comprehend my wishes.
My coolies probably owing to having derived more pecuniary advantage than they expected during the journey from Chung-king decided to re-engage, and promised to complete the fourteen-day tramp to Chao-t'ong-fu, two hundred and ninety miles distant, if weather permitted, in eleven days. We were to travel by the following stages: Length of Height above stage sea
Through the holes in the curtain a piece of sacking, but one would not wish this to be known dividing them from us, we could see him preparing his globules to smoke before turning in for the night, and despite our frequent raving objections, our words ringing with vibrating abuse, it continued all the way to Chung-king: he certainly gazed in disguised wonderment, but we could not get him to say anything bearing upon the matter.
I throw it away from me, fling a bottle of cheap brandy which he had bought for me at Chung-king away from me, and the boy looks forlorn. Tea is the best of all drinks in China; for the traveler unquestionably the best. Good in the morning, good at midday, good in the evening, good at night, even after the day's toil has been forgotten.
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