.1 VISIT TO THE //.\.X<1(1I0]Y BO HE 



99 



Unlike the bores seen elsewhere, which generally occur inter- 

 mittently, the Hangchow bore ascends the river at every tide, though 

 its magnitude and speed vary considerably with the general state of the 

 tides, and semi-monthly maxima are attained at the third tide after 

 each new and each full moon. The latter affords a better opportunity 

 to witness the bore under the more impressive and majestic stillness 

 of midnight and the light and shadow of a moonlit scent'. These 

 semi-monthly maxima themselves attain greatest intensity at the 

 times of greatest tides. Of these the autumnal equinox is preferable 

 because of the cool and most probably fair weather and the absence 

 of mosquitoes. The eighteenth of the Chinese eighth month is gen- 



The bHND at Shanghai. Clock Tower of Customs House shows in the Distance. 



erally reckoned as the time of the greatest bore of the year. In the 

 fall of 1906 the writer spent the first and second days after the seventh 

 full moon (September 6 and 7) in close observation of one midnight 

 and two noon bores. 



Although observers sometimes go to Kanpu beyond the mouth of 

 the Clrien-tang Kiang, and others content themselves with a view from 

 Hangchow, from the first of these places the bore is seen when not fu'ly 

 formed, its two initial sections not yet united, while at Hangchow 

 the effect, though still fairly remarkable, has completely lost its 

 grandeur; and the best and most easily reached vantage ground is at 

 the Haining Pagoda, though it is likely that at a point some five miles 

 below the pagoda the bore is of even greater grandeur. This is close 

 to where the two branches of the furious " Serpent's Head," as the 



