138 EXPEDITION TO JAPAN. 



carry on fheir depredations unchecked in the very teeth of the forts. When the pirates fail 

 of falling in with strangers whom they dare venture to roh, they fall out with each other, and 

 murder and plunder their friends with as little compunction as if they were strangers. Ih the 

 passage of flie Mississippi from Macao to Whampoa, the anchorage on the Canton river, one 

 of the two Chinese hoats in tow was swamped hy had steering, whereupon the other, in fear 

 of a similar catastrophe, cast off and attempted to proceed up the river. The owner, who 

 happened to he on hoard the steamer, expressed his fears that she would he overhauled hy 

 pirates before her arrival at Whampoa ; nor were his fears groundless ; she was hoarded and 

 rohhed a few hours only after she had lost sight of the Mississippi. While the steamer was at 

 Hong Kong several piracies were committed almost under the guns of the vessels-of-war. As 

 for the land pirates, they are to the full as expert at picking and stealing as the most 

 accomplished thieves and pickpockets of New York or London. One of the lieutenants of the 

 Mississippi, at early twilight one evening, just as he was stej^ping into a hired boat to return 

 to the ship, was seized amid a crowd of people, and an attempt was made to pull his watch 

 from his fob ; fortunately his Pickwickian rotundity of form saved the watch, but the chain 

 was carried off in triumph. 



From the mouth of the river to Canton the distance is about thirty-two miles, but the 

 large vessels do not proceed further than the anchorage at Whampoa, ten miles below the 

 foreign quarter of the city, with which communication is kept up by boats. The country 

 adjacent to Canton is intersected with rivers and creeks, in which fish abound, and a plentiful 

 market is daily open in the city. 



The alluvial ground south of the city is highly cultivated with rice fields and gardens. The 

 higher ground to the north and east is wooded with firs and other trees. A wall encloses a 

 portion of the city, which is subdivided by another wall running from east to west. North of 

 the latter is that part called the inner or old city, which is inhabited chiefly by the dominant 

 Tartar families, while to the south we find the new or outer city, where the inhabitants are 

 mostly composed of the descendants of the original Chinese population. The streets are narrow^ 

 tortuous, and winding, like a corkscrew, but thronged by an immense population, and so very 

 contracted that there is often barely room for two sedan chairs, the only vehicles allowed, to 

 pass each other. 



The great importance of Canton results from its being the emporium of the great trade of 

 Europe and America with China ; the annual amount of which was, some years ago, estimated 

 at eighty millions of dollars, the principal part of which is under the control of the merchants 

 of England and the United States. 



Cuslom-house, Mouth of Cantou Kiver. 



