FORMOSA THE BEAUTIFUL 



25: 



I boarded a train for 

 Taihoku, the capital 

 city, which on most 

 maps still bears its 

 old Chinese name of 

 Taipeh. 



In about ten min- 

 utes we passed 

 through a long tun- 

 nel, and when we 

 came out on the other 

 side of the mountain 

 gap the landscape was 

 flooded with sunshine. 

 Rain seemed as out 

 of place in this new 

 world as stars in the 

 broad daylight. 



The lush green rice- 

 fields, with the denser 

 green hills and purp- 

 ling mountain back of 

 them, lay glancing in 

 the sunlight with a 

 brilliancy that con- 

 trasted sharply with 

 objects but so re- 

 cently viewed through 

 the rain. 



Here and there we 

 passed the low, mud, 

 thatched dwelling of 

 some Chinese home- 

 steader with a pool of 

 water by way of front 

 yard, where huge 

 slate - colored buffa- 

 loes were taking their 

 noonday siesta, a 

 goodly number of 

 ducks and geese keep- 

 ing patrol as they slept, while on the 

 brink would waddle a black sow or two, 

 of an elongated variety, with backs that 

 sagged in the middle, their numerous off- 

 spring following grunting at their heels. 



I looked about in vain for a barn of 

 some sort to house these creatures by 

 night, but was told to my surprise that 

 they were all dearly beloved members of 

 one household and lived together most 

 amicably under the same roof with their 

 owner. 



At length we arrived at Taihoku, cov- 

 ering the distance of twenty miles in a 



a benihi tree (Chamcrcitaris formosensis mats.) 



The giant benihi of Formosa, similar to the redwood of Cali- 

 fornia, is the largest tree in the East and the second largest in the 

 world. 



little more than an hour. I was amazed 

 at the westernized appearance of the 

 city- — the broad streets, the beautiful 

 parks, and the imposing public buildings 



A JAPANESE HOUSE-CLEANING TWICE A 

 YEAR 



Japanese cities, which I had so recently 

 visited, possessed the picturesqueness of 

 the Orient, and I had expected even more 

 of this quality in what I had looked upon 

 as a most out-of-the-way corner of the 

 globe. Only the gateways of the old wall, 

 which surrounded the ancient Chinese 



