18 WITH BOAT AND GUN IN THE YANGTZE VALLEY. 



pheasants which find a safe asylum in the closely planted mulberry groves. To the North 

 of the City a large canal creek runs up to Kiangyin on the Yangtze, and through a country 

 once reported to be a good sporting one, but now rarely visited. 



Shu-se-kwan (^ g p). " Shu's Barrier." 



Shusekwan, 80 // South of Wusieh, and 20 // North of Soochow, is rather a pretty 

 district. To the North-West of the town are some well-wooded hills from whose tops a 

 good view of the Taihu may be obtained. Shooting hereabouts generally results in a mixed, 

 though probably a small, bag — pheasants, deer, hares, often a woodcock or two, and 

 occasionally a wildfowl that has dropped in from the great lake. On the East bank of the 

 Canal, from the town to Fungchow, there is capital cover, especially in the well-planted 

 grave-yards lying all round the hill on which the big, slanting Pagoda stands. Fungchow is 

 the limit of the North-West suburbs of Soochow and is conspicuous by its large stone 

 barracks. 



Soochow (H| j^). 



Soochow, the capital of this province of Kiangsu, is situate on the Grand Canal, 252 

 //■ in a West-North-West direction from Shanghai. It is approached on the South-East 

 side by a series of lakes ; on the East by a long, straight and wide creek, stone-faced on 

 the North bank, and stone-dyked for some miles on the South. The city walls and the 

 city itself are in a splendid state of preservation ; but the immediately outlying country 

 only gives too evident proof of the frightful devastations of the Taiping Rebellion. Very 

 few shooting men think Soochow worth stopping at as a place likely to afford sport, while 

 the number of Shanghai residents who visited Kiangsu's capital before the railway was 

 completed might almost be told on the hands. That there is much worth seeing. Dr. Du 

 Bose's admirable notes show clearly enough. 



Though the shooting around Soochow has fallen off it is yet a great depot for the 

 Shanghai game market. It is said that the country lying to the North of the city up to the 

 Yangtze teems with game, but the tidal creeks quite preclude any but the smallest native 

 craft from exploring them, for at flood tide large boats are unable to pass beneath the 

 bridges, while ebb tide will certainly find them aground. 



On the South and South-East of the city are some very snipey-looking patches, while 

 on the West side, in easy sight of the city walls, is as likely a country as one could imagine. 

 Large graves, covered with luxuriant grass ; copses of manageable size, ponds and creeks 

 innumerable, and perfect banks for the birds to sun themselves on, combine to suggest that 

 this is a region even at this day not to be lightly passed by. In fact, the whole of the 

 country to Mootoo (24 //), and thence to Kwang-foong, is not only very pretty, but is said by the 

 natives to hold a lot of game. Moreover, being quite close to the Taihu, a cold snap 

 generally brings in the wildfowl from the open waters of the lake. There is a capital daily 

 service of native-owned steam-launches, which make the run up to Soochow in 12 or 14 

 hours, towing three or four boats ; leaving Shanghai at 6 p.m., one can easily be on one's 

 shooting ground by 9 o'clock next morning, at the very moderate outlay of $9 for the 

 tow. Since the opening of the Shanghai-Nanking Railway trains make the run in a couple 

 of hours, so that a day's shooting in Soochow's lovelj' surroundings is now within reach of 

 the many. 



