10 FORMOSA. [chap. 



exposed nature of the coast rendered a further stay inadvisable, 

 and we accordingly shaped our course for the port of Keelung at 

 the northern end of the island, passing Steep Island, singularly 

 bold and picturesque in outline, on our way. 



STEEP ISLAND, FORMOSA. 



Keelung is Chinese ; markedly so, indeed, as far as regards the 

 dirt and odours of the place. That it is beautiful goes, of course, 

 without saying, for it is on an island which, save for its western 

 coast, deserves an even more flattermg name than that bestowed 

 upon it by its discoverers. Its beauty is the beauty of a labyrinthine 

 mingling of sea and land, of t^e light green foliage of the feathery 

 bamboos, of quaintly situated huts, and of the still quainter 

 pinnacles and cliffs so characteristic of the limestone formation. 

 But its enchantment, as is the case in most places where the 

 Celestial has had anything to do with the landscape, is a loan from 

 distance, and a nearer acquaintance introduces one to a million 

 unsavourinesses to which the occidental barbarian is happily a 

 stranger. Fortunately, however, even the " most ancient and fish- 

 like smell " can in no way aftect the utility of a harbour, and the 

 town owes its prosperity not only to the proximity of the coal-beds, 

 but also to the fact that the port is one of the very few worthy of 

 the name throuohout the whole island. The two hundred miles of 



