384 SPORTING IN BOTH HEMISPHERES. 



dark recesses of the hold. A whole armoury of guns and 

 plenty of ammunition were not forgotten. Some intelligent 

 Chinese servants, who spoke English, accompanied us, 

 amongst whom was an accomplished chef de cuisine, and 

 in the middle of the month of June, 1856, we commenced 

 our voyage from Shanghai into the interior, by the route of 

 the Sou-Cheou creek or canal. 



Our motion was exceedingly slow ; not more than two or 

 three miles an hour, except when the wind was in our favour, 

 or rather right aft, not being able to hoist the sail under 

 other circumstances, as, from the boat's flat bottom and the 

 great top gear she carried, she was very apt to upset or 

 topple over, a by no means pleasant occurrence to the inside 

 passengers. On other occasions our movement was effected 

 either by six men towing us from the embankment of the 

 canal, or by sculling with an immense scull or oar, worked 

 by several boatmen. Our course lay through a perfectly 

 level country, covered with every kind of grain crops, many 

 of them nearly ripe, as far as the eye could reach. At first 

 few trees were visible, except the dwarf bamboos that are 

 always planted in the vicinity of cottages and villages, and 

 the tender roots of which form a great article of food amongst 

 the population, and are, indeed, a very palatable vegetable. 

 We seated ourselves on the low roof of the cabin, which pro- 

 jected about six feet above the deck, and with our guns and 

 a fine retriever dog, belonging to my companion, awaited the 

 appearance of any description of game that might present 

 itself. We were generally able to land on either side of the 

 canal by jumping from the deck of our boat, but if that was 

 impracticable, from the shallowness of the water, we had 

 always a small sampan in readiness for our conveyance to 

 and fro. After having progressed in the above manner some 

 thirty miles during the day, we always anchored at night 

 near some village, the Chinese boatmen having a most super- 



