LOLUROUS AND BEAUTIFUL, SZECHUAN 
1105 
ce cal 
Photo by Roilin T. Chamberlin 
A STREET SCENE IN CHENGTU: THE GROOVES IN THE PAVEMENT WERE WORN BY THE 
WHEELBARROWS 
scattered over the fields; they move in 
steady processions along the main roads: 
they swarm in the numerous villages. 
The people in the fields labor long and 
hard, but their lot looks easier than that 
of the coolies on the roadways, who toil 
along all day under heavy loads, or push 
heavily laden, squeaky wheelbarrows on 
dusty highways. The Chinese wheelbar- 
row is the local transportation specialty 
for passenger and freight alike. It is 
not the lower classes of Chinese who 
are pushed along these dusty roads in 
the squeaky wheelbarrows. The lower 
classes walk. It is the leading citizen 
and the bespectacled scholar who travels 
in this noisy, dusty, and undignified style. 
The freight traffic on the roadways 
leading into Chengtu is heavy. Produce 
from the various farm districts is 
wheeled into the capital by perspiring 
coolies. Other coolies carry their bur- 
dens in baskets suspended from the ends 
of a flat pole balanced upon the shoulder. 
The latter method is almost universal in 
south and central China. Equipped in 
this way, a coolie will walk all day long 
under a load of 40 pounds in each of his 
two baskets and cover 25 or 30 miles of 
mountainous road without apparent fa- 
tigue. Ona journey he will keep this up 
for several weeks at a stretch. Though 
generally not large of frame, these men 
are marvels of physical endurance. 
CHENCTU IS ONE OF THE FINEST OF 
CHINA'S CITIES 
Chengtu, the metropolis of this plain 
and likewise the capital of the province, 
is, with the possible exception of Peking, 
perhaps the finest city of China. At one 
time it was one of the three capitals of 
the Empire. And it is now the seat of a 
viceroy, for Szechuan, on account of its 
size and importance, has a viceroy all to 
itself. Chihli, in which the two great 
cities of Peking and Tientsin are located, 
is the only other single province so fa- 
vored. 
The city itself, inclosed by a massive 
