xiv 



CONTENTS. 



— Chinese play and audience — How I perform my part ! — 

 Leave the city — Charming scenes in the country — Thrown 

 silk — Silk villages and their inhabitants — Temple of Wan- 

 shew-si and its priests — Taou-chang-shan pagoda — Glorious 

 views from the pagoda hill Page 350 



CHAPTER XVIIL 



Ascend the Lun-ke river — A musical Buddhist high priest — Hoo- 

 shan monastery — Its silk-worms — Mode of feeding them — 

 General treatment — Their aversion to noise and bright light — 

 The country embanked in all directions — A farmer's explana- 

 tion of this — Town of Mei-che — Silk-worms begin to spin — 

 Method of putting them on straw — Artificial heat employed — 

 Reeling process — Machine described — Work-people — Silk 

 scenes in a monastery — Industrious Buddhist priests — Novel 

 mode of catching fish — End of silk season — Price of raw silk 

 where it is produced 365 



CHAPTER XIX. 



Leave the silk country — Adventure at Nanziang — A visit from 

 thieves — I am robbed of everything — Unsuccessful efforts to 

 trace the robbers — Astonished by another visit from them — 

 Its objects — My clothes and papers returned — Their motives 

 for this — A visit to the Nanziang mandarin — Means taken to 

 catch the robbers — Two are caught and bambooed — My visit 

 to the mandarin returned — Arrive at Shanghae — Report the 

 robbery to Her Majesty's Consul — A portion of the money 

 recovered — The remainder supposed to be kept by the man- 

 darins 379 



CHAPTER XX. 



Tea-makers from Fokien and Kiangse engaged for India — Ning- 

 chow tea country — Formerly produced green teas — Now pro- 

 duces black — How this change took place — Difficulty in getting 

 the men off — One of them arrested for debt — All on board at 

 last and sent on to Calcutta — Coast infested with pirates — 

 Ningpo missionaries robbed — Politeness of the pirates — Their 



