110 LUNG-CHI 
and in about a hundred days has attained a thickness 
of perhaps a quarter of an inch. 
The branches are then lopped off, and as much as 
possible of the wax is carefully scraped off and thrown 
into boiling water, from which it is skimmed as it rises 
to the surface. This is the best wax. The branches 
and twigs are then thrown into the pot, but the wax 
melted from them is darker and inferior. 
It is used for making candles or coating those made 
from inferior substance, and for giving a polish to wood- 
work, &c. 
Yang-tsun was reached at 4 p.m. and a halt made 
for the night, having travelled seventy li. 
May 22.—Started at 6.30, and, travelling through a 
very fertile valley, the small village of Lung-chi was 
reached at 9.50. From here the road ascends, and 
Hsin-chang was reached in the afternoon. Ihad a very 
bad room in the inn, but was very tired and had to put 
up with it. It was between two cesspools. 
The village inns are generally built of mud and in 
the form of a square, with rooms built facing inwards 
from the outside wall. In the centre is a court which 
is sometimes paved, and in the middle of the court is 
generally a depression or hole which is the receptacle 
for all sorts of filth. As a rule the inns are dirty in the 
extreme, especially when the village is not on a high 
