1. Partake, requires, furrow, sires.

2. What is the chorus? Is corn sown? Who is called "old mother"? Why? Who are the "six thousand golden sires"? Does this description seem to apply to Indian corn? What is corn? What is grain?

XVIII. A TRIP TO THE TEA COUNTRY.

PART I.

1. I was leaning over the tea room table on one of the lovely spring mornings that we sometimes have in China, wondering whether the samples I had tasted and inspected would yield a profit over the latest quotations from London and New York, when my speculations were disturbed by the entrance of my young friend Charley, followed by Akong, one of the most influential tea-brokers in the Oopack district.

2. Charley was the son of an old friend, who was to be sent home to relatives in England, but I had prevailed upon the father to let the boy, now between twelve and fourteen years old, make me a visit before his final departure.

3. "What is it, Charley? Some mischief, I know," I said. "Well, Cha"-the Chinamen call me Cha-tsze, tea-taster, and the boy had abbreviated it to Cha,-"Akong says that he has a boat going up to the tea country to-morrow or next day, and wants me to go up with him. May I?"

4. Charley knew that I could refuse him nothing, but the trip of several hundred miles into a district rarely, if ever, visited by foreigners, involved more of a risk than I cared to assume. Seeing that I looked doubtful, Charley turned to Akong for support.

5. "What for you no go too, Cha-tsze?" said Akong, in his pigeon-English. "Just now my thinkee no got new chop inside two week. Get back plenty time." The proposition was not disagreeable to me, and Charley scampered off to tell Ahim, the cook, and Aho, my boy, to make the necessary preparations.

6. The next morning at an early hour Akong's great mandarin, or house boat, was moored at the jetty, and the boys were packing away provisions, charcoal for cooking, and long strings of copper "cash" to be used for the purchase of eggs and chickens, and the mats of rice that would form the principal article of "chow-chow" for the crew. With the explosion of a pack of firecrackers to propitiate the river dragon, and shouts from the house coolies who were left behind, the boat was shoved from the jetty, and soon we were slowly stemming the broad current of the Yang-tsze.

7. On our right was Hankow, with its million or more of inhabitants, and the mouth of the Han,-its surface so covered with junks that their masts re

sembled a forest, and only a narrow lane of water was left for the passage of the boats. Just beyond the Han was Han Yang, once a fine city, but left in ruins by the Tae-ping rebellion, and across the Yang-tsze, here a mile wide, stood Wuchang, the residence of the viceroy of the Hupeh province.

8. Rapidly we passed the suburbs of these, and, drawing over to the south bank, as the wind was light, the crew were ordered ashore, where, stretching themselves along the tow-rope, they drew us rapidly along. These boats, used by the gentry to transport themselves about the country, are almost like Noah's ark on a small scale,—a boat with a house running nearly the entire length of the deck, with little latticed windows on the outside, and the interior divided into rooms for eating and sleeping.

9. The crew lived aft on the overhanging stern, where the cooking was done, and whence the handle of the great sculling oar protruded. In front of the cabin was a little piece of deck room, where Charley and I had our camp stools, from which we could observe all about us.

10. The boat coolies were straining on the towrope a hundred yards ahead. The country presented everywhere the same compact system of farming, the hills in many cases terraced to their summits, and planted with waving crops of wheat

and millet, beans, and vegetables of every description.

11. There was but little variety in the journey till the following day, when we approached the great bend in the Yang-tsze, and Akong told us that, if so inclined, we might land, and, by walking six or eight miles across the country, join the boat again—the bend rendering it necessary for her to go around some thirty or forty miles.

12. We both experienced a somewhat queer sensation as we watched the boat sailing away, and found ourselves with no other white person within a hundred miles. The country before us was an immense rice field, divided by dikes, or banks paved with stones, and forming paths for walking. I had taken my gun, and on reaching an old lotus-pond we scared up myriads of English snipe, a good bunch of which promised a welcome addition to our dinner. Meanwhile we had been following the course of a creek, which we now had to cross.

13. Aling, Charley's boy, espied a man in the distance at work with a huge buffalo, and rushed off in that direction. He soon returned with the buffalo and his owner, and indicated that we could cross on the back of the former, which threw up its head and snorted at sight of us, but was soon brought into subjection by a pull at the ring through his nose.

14. "How much does he want, Aling, to carry us over?” "He say ten cash can do." ten cash can do." As this sum (one cent) was not an unreasonable ferriage, we nodded, and, the beast being led into the water, I mounted first; then came Charley, with his arms around me, and Aling, who had climbed up behind.

15. When we were halfway over, Charley laughed so heartily at the ridiculous figure we made, that the buffalo gave another toss to his head, which threatened to throw us off; but we landed safely, and, paying the man his ten cash, went on again. The rest of the walk was without adventure, and we arrived at the river bank just as the boat was coming around the point below us.

16. That evening we left the main river and followed a tributary until we came to a broad canal, which Akong told us led direct to our destination. Our walk across the fields gave us keen appetites for our supper, and soon after eating we were very willing to seek our beds.

1. Inspected, quotations, prevailed, abbreviated, involved, scampered, mandarin, stemming, latticed, sculling, protruded, compact, myriads, ferriage, tributary, destination, coolie.

2. What is a "tea room table"? How is tea sampled? What countries supply us with tea? What kinds of tea can you mention? Can you tell them at sight? What is raised in China? How do the people dress? What do they eat?