NOTES ON PISCICULTURE IN KIANGSI. 545 



chow. Foreign residents on the Yaugtse are too well acquainted with 

 the craft to need any description. 



The Kan-chow boats, or yu-miao-chuan (spawn-boats), are of much 

 larger carrying capacity, and measure about 78 feet long, 15 feet beam, 

 11 feet from bottom to top of mat-cover, and draw, when loaded, from 3 

 to 4 feet. They are built in water-tight compartments, and are pro- 

 pelled by sails, tracking, or yuloeing — that is, by long sculls rigged out 

 about 18 inches or two feet from either side of the boat, on outriggers, 

 forward of the mainmast, and worked parallel to the side of the boat 

 by four or six men at each scull. About twenty men comprise the 

 boat's crew, who also attend to the fish in turns, their wages averaging 

 2,000 cash (equal 6s. Sd.) per month, with food. The boats are worth 

 from 450 to 500 taels each (£150 to £167). Their cargoes brought to this 

 port consist chiefly of timber (hewn as if for railway sleepers), wood 

 for making coffins, planks, water-chestnuts, water-chestnut flour, grass- 

 cloth, and sundry sweet-smelliug flowers ; probably small speculations 

 of the crew, such as Knei hua (Oleafragrans), Moli-liua (Jasminum), Lan- 

 hua (Epideiidruni), and Taylaihsiang (Stephanotis), &c, which fetch a 

 good price here. 



But as several of these boats are nearly laden, it will be curious to 

 see how they stow their freight. From the bottom boards of the boat 

 to the level of the gunwale we find the holes filled with red earthen- 

 ware jars (made of flower-pot clay), each measuring 18 inches in diam- 

 eter and 12 inches deep, arranged in tiers, one above the other, five 

 high, and as we counted eleven jars on the top row amidships of the 

 two tiers put into a compartment, between which room is left for a man 

 to pass, we may roughly estimate one hundred jars in each compart- 

 ment, or five hundred jars in the five sections into which the hold is 

 divided. A stout plank, about 5 inches broad, is laid across the wide- 

 mouthed jars to support the upper ones, and to spread the weight more 

 evenly, but the plank is not so wide as to interfere with the bailing out 

 of the vessels. The jars are fastened to the sides of the compartmeut 

 by a little splint of bamboo, made fast to an eye in the bulk-head, and 

 which is made to catch under the unturned rim of the jar, on the same 

 principle that a small-mouthed vessel is lifted by a piece of wood being 

 put crosswise into the opening. To strengthen the rim, it is sometimes 

 bound round with a bamboo hoop. On the upper row of jars another 

 plank is laid to receive the water-tight baskets, which, being much 

 lighter than the jars, are placed on the top, and piled up from the level 

 of the gunwale to the roof of the boat. The baskets are securely 

 lashed to poles braced athwart the boat to prevent their sliding out of 

 position, as at such a height a slight knock would capsize them, although 

 they are placed in a wicker-stand to steady them and ease the strain on 

 the sides of the baskets. 



As the number of these baskets appears to be about the same as that 

 of the jars, we have a total of say one thousand jars and baskets of 

 35 f 



