io8 Through the Yang-tse Gorges 



Dryanda village embowered in its rich spring foliage and 

 flowers, we passed up the " Fuh t'an," a rapid formed by 

 immense masses of projecting rocks, but dangerous only in 

 the summer floods. The sun was most oppressive, and at 

 ten o'clock I returned to the boat, and sat there in pyjamas 

 till sunset, when I got another hour's walk across one of the 

 interminable boulder banks which are the common feature 

 of this section of the river. All these spits are covered with 

 the deserted piles of stones left by the gold-washers who have 

 been driven off by the rising water. Brought up at seven 

 p.m. at Wu-ling chi, a steep point, on which is a busy town 

 of blacksmiths, working Yun-Yang iron with excellent local, 

 bituminous coal. Forest fires were visible on a distant range. 



Distance run, ninety li (twenty-two miles); total, 256 

 miles. 



Saturday, March 31^. — Our voyage continued through 

 beautiful and characteristic Szechuan scenery. Steep, culti- 

 vated hills, well wooded round the villages, flat-topped sand- 

 stone cliflFs forming their summits; the wheat, barley, rape, 

 and poppy fields covering the talus. At their foot lie big 

 rocks, the debris of these" ancient mountains, which obstruct 

 the river channel and form a succession of small rapids, the 

 average speed of the current being barely four knots. Behind 

 the hills on the right bank runs a range of mountains of 

 about 5000 feet, of even height, and, from their appearance, 

 probably of limestone, in a direct Une N.N.E. and S.S.W., 

 like all the main ranges through which the river forces its 

 way between this and Ichang. The windings of the river 

 among the sandstone hills now approach, now recede, from 

 this range, through which it cuts its way in the gorge below 

 Wan Hsien. I landed early, and walked across one of the 

 interminable, boulder-covered flats which here alternate with 

 the sandbanks, sprinkled with great, angular, unrolled rocks, 



