A VISIT TO THE HANGCHOW BOUK 105 



a village and large mandarin family boats were frequently met with. 

 The most curious of all the craft encountered, however, were the 

 cormorant fishermen's boats or rafts, with the berumpled and rather 

 miserable-looking black birds crouching upon them or swimming 

 alongside. Usually the fisherman was stamping rhythmically upon 

 a loose board in the stern and yulowing his boat at a fair pace. "some 

 of the birds swimming alongside w T ith a bobbing kind of motion in 

 unison with this stamping, and every now and then making a dive 

 for fish which were no doubt expected to be attracted by the boatman's 

 noise, though to judge from our observation the returns for all this 

 scheming were very meager. 



Occasionally a grating sound under the bottom of the boat told us 

 that we were passing over the loose central portion of the reed and 

 bamboo fish-traps or wires which frequently extended completely across 

 the stream, but always with an apparently unoccupied reception or 

 storage compartment at one corner. At other times the progress of 

 our light craft was somewhat impeded by the heavy growths of water 

 weeds and cresses. 



The banks of the canal are everywhere green and restful, and in 

 the case of the smaller by-ways are often completely overhung. We 

 have seen nothing finer of the same sort anywhere, the famous Fenways 

 of Boston not excepted. Bushes, great grasses, trees straight and 

 tall, dwarfish and crooked trees, laurel, graceful weeping willow, 

 flowering shrubs, and non-flowering covered with some blooming vine — 

 the whole a beautiful fenway for mile after mile. 



The predominant feature is the mulberry-tree, showing everywhere 

 the importance of this region as a silk producer. In well-kept rows, 

 their crooked and wide-spreading branches bid beneath rounded 

 canopies of huge pale-green leaves, the ground everywhere clear of other 

 growth, these little trees represent no small part of the material wealth 

 of a region famous for the splendid silken garments produced in its 

 chief cities. 



These mulberry groves sometimes alternate with clumps of graceful 

 bamboos or spicy odorous pines, which mark the burial ground of the 

 near-by village. Or again there is only a fringe of mulberry trees 

 along the bank, much as the lichee trees occur in the delta near Canton, 

 with the paddy fields soon to become bean fields after the rice harvest, 

 or the lotus ponds all white and pink in their September glory, lying 

 behind this fringe or veil. 



Haining was reached at eight p.m. in the midst of a pouring rain. 

 Passing around the wall on two sides, our journey came to an end in 

 the cul de sac with which the canal abruptly terminates, near a some- 

 what picturesque gateway in the city wall. A five minutes' walk 

 from our mooring at the canal's end brought us to the sea wall and 



