28 CONCERNING CHINESE ROADS 



most delicious melons 1 have ever tasted, in addition 

 to the other fruits I have mentioned. 



During the heat of the day, when the surface 

 of the road did not bristle with rocks, which 

 caused our carts to progress in a series of swaying 

 lurches and spine-shattering bumps, it was pleasant 

 to doze, for the nights were short. 



But the interest of the road was varied. A 

 taotai or some minor official travelling in tawdry 

 state ; a little Chinese girl, well and quietly dressed, 

 borne on a led donkey to visit her mother-in-law, 

 her cheeks whitened and rouged till she looked 

 like some inanimate doll ; the mails, in little 

 canvas packages tightly bound round a bamboo, 

 swinging and wagging on the bare shoulders of 

 the postman ; the '• tunk ! tunk ! t-r-rllunk ! " of 

 some old muleteer ; a deserted and tumble-down 

 temple ; the only visible sign linking one to the 

 year of grace 1911, the distorted line of telegraph 

 poles stretching haphazard into the distance. At 

 times the Yellow River — China's Sorrow — its broad, 

 shallow bed muddy, yet majestic, swung into view. 

 Tall reed-beds flanked it, in which frogs croaked 

 and little reed-birds shrilled and called. High 

 loess cliffs rose on the northern side, a thin strip of 

 unambitious bush at their base ; to the south the 

 Tsin-ling Mountains. 



Now and again we passed some high-walled 

 town, entered by the inevitable suburb. How 

 well I remember them ! A line of ramshackle 

 mud huts ; men sitting beneath thatched awnings, 

 drinking tea, or stuffing themselves by means of 

 chop-sticks ; a broken crenellated wall ; a tumbled- 

 down wooden arch ; a hooded gate frowning above 



