CHAPTER IX 



CUSTOMS. 



If there be one custom which is gene- 

 ral in China it is what the westerner would 

 call the custom of living in discomfort. 

 Probably no people in the world can offer 

 fewer comforts to a traveller from the west 

 than the Chinese, and the shooter who 

 leaves an open port with the expectation of 

 finding accomodation in native houses will 

 soon learn that he has wholly miscalculated. 

 It sometimes happens that during a day's 

 shoot one is overtaken by night when some 

 distance from his houseboat, and it would 

 be restful to stop at a native house in order 

 to be on the shooting ground early the 

 following morning, but such an idea had 

 better not be entertained. However far the 

 shooter may be from his houseboat when so 

 overtaken it will be invariably necessary for 

 him to return for refreshment and sleep or 

 shoot the next day with unsteady nerves. It 

 is therefore supposed that when the shooter 

 gets aboard his houseboat and points her 

 bow towards the interior he understands 

 that he has left domestic and social comforts 



