48 A NATURALIST IN WESTERN CHINA 



Chinese medicine. The people declare the valley too cold for 

 wheat or barley ! 



On the occasion of my first visit to this place in 1901, I had 

 to retrace my steps owing to dearth of supplies. Since that 

 date no white man had visited this region. In the direction in 

 which we were bound these are the last inhabited houses for 

 over a hundred li. 



I took a photograph of the hostel on my arrival, but what 

 I should have liked to photograph was the interior. This was 

 impossible, since, even at midday, a light was necessary to see 

 into the farthest corners. Dirt and filth in many forms 

 abounded, and although plenty of timber is to be had for the 

 felling, the house, through the idleness of its keeper, has been 

 allowed to fall into a most ruinous state. Of one low story, 

 the house is bisected into four compartments, and is provided 

 with no outlet for the smoke or for the ingress of light, save 

 through the doorway and holes in the roof ; the floor, of course, 

 is mother earth. Pigs were quartered in one section, into which 

 our arrival also forced the owners. Cows and goats occupied 

 a hovel 6 feet from the door, the iloor of which was fully a 

 foot deep in filth. Luckily, the weather continued gloriously 

 fine, and the miserable surroundings were less evident in con- 

 sequence. (In passing, I might record the fact that this was 

 the only occasion on which I enjoyed fine weather in this place. 

 Twice previously I had been marooned here for days, and either 

 stayed in bed or shivered by the doorway watching the rain.) 



Bee-keeping is one of the principal industries of the peasants 

 in these wilds, and around this hostel are scores of bee- 

 hives. The hives are hollowed-out logs of Silver Fir, about 

 3 feet 6 inches long by i foot wide, two pieces of wood are fixed 

 crosswise in the centre, and opposite these three or four holes 

 are bored to allow the bees ingress and egress. Rude boxes 

 often take the place of these logs. The beeswax is not separ- 

 ated from the honey, the honeycomb being eaten as removed 

 from the hives. Though the climate is rigorous, the bees are 

 healthy and strong, and disease is unknown among them. 



The morning following our arrival we ascended the Sha- 

 mu-jen range behind our lodgings. The first 500 feet was 

 steep going, but afterwards the climb was easy. At about 



