196 Miscellanies. 



" Skirting the town of Hwuytow, we proceeded in a N. N. E. di- 

 rection, at a moderate pace, for an hour and a half, when we stop- 

 ped at a temple, and refreshed ourselves with tea. Nothing could 

 be more kind or more civil than the manners of the people towards 

 us hitherto, and if we could have procured conveyances here so as 

 to have escaped walking in the heat of the day, loaded as we were 

 with heavy woollen clothes, we should have had nothing further to 

 desire : as it was, ray feet already began to feel uncomfortable from 

 swelling, and after another hour's march, 1 was obliged to pro- 

 pose a halt till the cool of the evening. Fortunately we found, 

 however, that chairs were procurable at the place', and we accord- 

 ingly engaged them at half a dollar each. They were formed in the 

 slightest manner, and carried on bamboo poles, having a cross bar at 

 the extremities, which rested on the back of the bearer's neck, ap- 

 parently a most insecure as well as inconvenient position ; but as the 

 poles were at the same time grasped by the hands, the danger of a 

 false step was lessened. We had not advanced above a mile and a 

 half before the bearers declared they must eat, and to enable them 

 to do so, they must get more money. With this impudent demand 

 we thought it best to comply, giving them an additional real each. 

 After an hour's further progress, we were set down at a town near 

 the foot of the first pass which we had to cross. There the bearers 

 clamorously insisted on an additional payment before they would 

 carry us any further. This we resisted, and by Mr. GutzlafF's elo- 

 quence gained the whole of the villagers, who crowded around us, to 

 join in exclaiming against the attempted extortion. Seeing this, the 

 rogues submitted, and again took us up. Mr. G. mentioned that 

 while we were passing through another village, the people of which 

 begged the bearers to set us down, that they might have a look at 

 us, they demanded 100 cash as the condition of compliance. The 

 country through which we passed swarmed with inhabitants, and ex- 

 hibited the highest degree of cultivation, though it was only in a few 

 spots that we saw any soil which would be deemed in Bengal tole- 

 rably good ; rice, the sweet potato, and sugar cane, were the princi- 

 pal articles of culture. We had now to ascend a barren and rugged 

 mountain, which seemed destined by nature to set the hand of man 

 at defiance ; yet even here, there was not a spot where a vegetable 

 would take root, that was not occupied by at least a dwarf pine 

 planted for the purpose of yielding fire wood, and a kind of turpen- 

 tine; and wherever a nook presented an opportunity of gaining a few 



