Entrance to Hades 1 1 9 



all a single gigantic stern-sweep. Walking towards Chung- 

 chow yesterday morning, it being market-day, numbers of 

 country people were making their way into the town, and 

 ferry-boats, some containing cattle, were stationed five and 

 six miles below the city. I was induced to enter one of 

 these, on the assurance that there were none higher up 

 (which proved to be false), for the stipulated fare of sixteen 

 cash (three farthings), when my own boat, which I thought 

 must have crossed over below, turned up. A pleasant 

 feature in these parts is the carrying of everything in and 

 on baskets, called Pei tsz, attached to the back, with plaited 

 bamboo straps round the shoulder. The eternal bamboo 

 carrying-pole, with the weights dangling at each end, and its 

 accompanying " Hee-haw, Ah-oo ! " no longer mars the 

 scene. Frogs croaked steadily through the night for the 

 first time this year. 



Day's run, eighty li (twenty miles); total from Ichang, 

 323 miles. 



Tuesday , April 2,rd. — Fine warm day; light south-westerly 

 wind still ahead. We were off at 5.30 a.m. I landed at 

 seven at the foot of the " T'ien tze Shan," " Mountain of the 

 Son of Heaven," which is situated on the left bank below 

 and immediately adjoining the walled city of " Feng tu," i.e. 

 " The Abundant Capital," commonly called " Feng-tu-Cheng. 

 This is one of the many steep, isolated hills aboimding in 

 this level sandstone district. Being a sacred mount, it is 

 wooded to the summit, upon which is a collection of ancient, 

 solidly-built, but now ruinous, temples, said to date from 

 before the Tang dynasty, at which period (eighth and ninth 

 centuries), however, the existing buildings — with wood 

 pillars supporting tiled roofs — were erected. This temple 

 is dedicated to the Emperor of the " Yin," or Dead, as the 

 Imperial palace at Peking is to the Emperor of the " Yang," 



