Oh. v.] INDUSTEY OP THE PEOPLE. 81 



of the island appears to be — nowhere could we go without 

 meeting Chinese in some form or other : in the quietest and 

 most retired spots a cottage might often be descried upon 

 close inspection. If we wished to sKoot a bird among the 

 brushwood, w,e were most likely to find a group of women 

 and children peering at us from behind ; if it were on the 

 bank, some fishermen at work, or lads wading in the mud 

 for shell-fish, or women washing iu the stream, were sure to 

 be there, so that it was never safe to shoot, except at the 

 upper part of the trees. Ferries were numerous, and 

 generally at work as we passed ; water-wheels were met with 

 at every turn, generally worked by three men, or two sets of 

 three ; children leading water-buffaloes on the bank were 

 frequently seen, and the unwieldy heads of these animals 

 often peered at us above the water with a mingled expres- 

 sion of curiosity and stupidity ; and even in the midst of the 

 stream were Chinamen and boys, sometimes stark naked, 

 but more frequently with something about the loins, dredg- 

 ing for sheU-fish and crabs in the river. The shell most 

 commonly obtained in these situations was a dark costate 

 species of Cyrena ; but in the markets two other species 

 were equally abundant as articles of food, viz. Cythersea 

 petechiana, and a species of Tapes. A long black Modiola 

 (M. teres) was also largely eaten. But everything is fish 

 that comes to the Chinaman's net, and he is always at 

 work, even in the most unpromising situations, to earn a 

 livelihood in a mud-bank, or a sand-flat, or up to his neck 

 in water in a river. Population teemed everywhere, and, 

 while in England we might have walked for miles without 

 meeting an individual, we were scarcely ever out of sight of 

 some human being in this part of Formosa. 



The houses were built of mud and thatched, occasionally 



