HOUSEBOATS AND HOUSEBOATING. 123 



But if by accident you do happen to get into any altercation then Mr. Wade's advice 

 cannot be improved upon. I knew a man who once peppered a Chinese youth very severely. 

 Nobody made any trouble over it, however, and a couple of dollars made the boy 

 look as if he would like to stand up every day of his life and be shot at on the same terms. 

 It is impossible to be too careful when shooting over cultivated land with people at work 

 on it. I have had two experiences that made me feel jumpy for a minute or two, but 

 fortunately no harm was done in either case. 



It used to be a custom on returning from a shooting trip to have the houseboat 

 photographed, with the bag hanging in festoons from stem to stern. But the custom has 

 fallen into comparative desuetude since bags are not now so often on the magnificent 

 scale. 



The houseboat is not consecrated to destruction to such an extent as to preclude its use 

 from gentler purposes ; neither is its cabin necessarily the retreat of the male sex alone. 

 Very charming houseboat parties, sometimes of three or four boats, graced with the 

 presence, perhaps, of "a bevy of fair women," go away for days into the "interior" — it is 

 all up-country — with other ends in view than the compilation of bags. 



There is many a place just fitted for such outings. Closest at hand we have the 

 Feng Wang Shan, "The Hills," as we call them, where a very pleasant Saturday to Monday 

 holiday can be had. But the Hills have lost a good deal of their charm, the freedom to 

 wander where one will, since the adoption of the fence system by some owners. Further 

 afield there is Chapoo with its sandy sea, the Hangchow Bay, its lighthouse and temple 

 topped hills. Not much further South on the Bay is lovely Hai E, and then Haining where 

 the celebrated Hangchow Bore, one of the natural wonders of the world, may best be seen 

 in all its grandeur. This is a favourite outing when ladies are of the party; and the 

 Autumn weather makes excursions into the country things to be remembered. In the 

 November race week the Autumn tints on the trees are alone worth travelling hundreds of 

 miles to see. Nothing in the world, probably, except perhaps some of the American woods 

 in Autumn can beat the glory of a grove of Chinese tallow trees when the first touches of 

 coming Winter have passed over them. But for variety of scene and charm of landscape one 

 should go to the Tai Hu. Volumes might be written of the beauties of this magnificent 

 sheet of water with its hill ranges, its islands, its tributaries, its traffic, its natural beauties, 

 and its exhaustible charms. It is difficult to say whether they are more pleasing in Spring 

 or in Autumn. The climate is delightful. Oranges ripen in the open air, vegetation is rank 

 and luxuriant. In Winter the surface of the water is dotted over with companies of wildfowl. 

 They are there in tens of thousands, but as elsewhere can only be circumvented by 

 consummate skill and patience. The neighbourhood of Hangchow, too, is celebrated for 

 its beautiful scenery. But these are not all the beauty spots which offer their delights 

 to us. There are others, many others — traverse any of the numberless creeks in the 

 neighbourhood of Kashing in the early Spring and you will carry back indelible memories 

 of colour, light and shade. 



Unfortunately houseboating, if you keep your own boat, is a fairly expensive luxury, 

 and unfortunately as things go the lowdah as a rule is the most wrath-compelling, expletive 

 provoking creature under the sun. The bill that he brings into you at the end of your 



