VAENISH TREES 51' 



Having done this they left, and I had no more trouble 

 of the sort, everything going on smoothly and all the 

 collectors rejoining my service. The weather was, how- 

 ever, now beginning to get cold, with heavy rain, showing 

 plainly that the season for collecting was drawing to a 

 close, and that I should soon have to return. I decided 

 before going to make an excursion over the summit of 

 the range and into the valley beyond. When I got to the 

 ridge I saw that the country to the southward was much 

 more open, there being no forest ; the surface also was 

 more cultivated, and there were no more mountain 

 ranges near, but it was much cut up by deep ravines 

 and watercourses, which were rich in beautiful plants, 

 flowers, and ferns. It is no exaggeration to say that 

 it is quite possible to talk to a man across one of 

 these ravines when it would perhaps take two days' 

 journey to reach him, so deep and precipitous are they 

 and dangerous to traverse. The watercourses, which 

 are very numerous, form tributaries of the Etu liiver, 

 which enters the Yang-tze twenty miles below Ichang, 

 and is navigable for sampans only for some distance 

 from its mouth. Here is found the tree whose sap 

 produces vegetable varnish (Rhus vernicifera?). It 

 grows to about the size of an ordinary ash or walnut 

 on the sides of the slopes at considerable elevation. In 

 the month of May longitudinal incisions are made in 



n 2 



