24 FORMOSA. [chap. 



Customs at Tamsui. But tliere are other far more important 

 articles of export than either camphor or tea. Enormous quan- 

 tities of rice are grown in the plain country, and sugar is produced 

 in abundance in the same district. Jute, indigo, tobacco, grasscloth 

 fibre, rattans, and rice paper are other products in which a con- 

 siderable trade is carried on. The last named, with which we are all 

 familiar as the substance used by the Chinese for painting on, is 

 the pith of Aralia papyrifera, a plant peculiar to Formosa, growing 

 wild in many parts of the island. It is pared concentrically by 

 hand, and the thin sheets produced are moistened and joined at 

 the edges, and finally pressed and dried, when it is ready for the 

 Chinese artist to depict upon it the discords in red and green he 

 so generally affects. 



Formosa, without being in the strictest sense of the word a 

 tropical island, is nevertheless extremely hot, and, although during 

 the winter months wheat is grown in considerable quantities in 

 the Tamsui district, and is of better quality than that of the 

 mainland, the average temperature is high as compared with that 

 of the same latitude on the coast of China. The rainfall in the 

 northern and eastern parts of the island is very heavy during the 

 prevalence of the North-east monsoon. Thus from November to 

 the end of April, over one hundred inches fall at Tamsui. This 

 is, without doubt, due to the eastern homologue of the Gulf Stream 

 — the Kurosiw^o or Japanese current. The monsoon blowing over 

 its heated waters, and coming in contact with the great mountain 

 ranges in the north and centre of the island at once precipitates 

 its surcharge of moisture.-^ Formosa thus acts as a sort of umbrella 

 for the eastern coasts of China, and the winter and spring are, 

 consequently, a period of almost uninterrupted sunshine in the 

 latter region. 



During our visit to Formosa, the " typhoon season " had not 

 fairly set in, and the Marchesa, though destined later to come in 

 for the full strength of one of those extremely unpleasant natural 



^ "China Sea Directory," vol. iii. p. 250. 



