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VOYAGE ACROSS THE BAY. Chap. XIV. 



disagreeable manner. We found the berths that 

 had been assigned ns already occupied by about a 

 dozen individuals, but upon remonstrance made we 

 got one of the berths cleared for our reception, in 

 which we had to make our beds, immediately 

 under the pigs, and in close contiguity to a dozen 

 Chinamen, who lay about on the floor one over 

 the other, almost as filthy and unceremonious as 

 the pigs themselves. The stench and heat was 

 almost unsupportable, and the horrid groaning and 

 struggling of the porcine multitude over head, 

 rendered sleep almost impossible. To increase 

 our troubles we had a contrary wind, and as the 

 navigation of the Tseen-tang (owing to the tides 

 in the Bay of Hang-chow altering the position of 

 the sands almost every day) is at all times difficult, 

 we had the additional pleasantness of a probable 

 shipwreck in a windy night, without a single boat 

 in which we could have reached the shore. By 

 Grod's good providence, however, we were pre- 

 served during the night, and in the morning found 

 ourselves only a few miles from the place where 

 we embarked, with the wind right ahead. By 

 dint of great exertion in skulling, the boatmen 

 brought the vessel to the south side of the bay 

 about midday. By this time we found that the 

 tide was just ebbing, which caused our vessel to 

 ground far from land, and made it necessary for 

 us to wait until the tide had run all out and made 

 again, before we could get at all nearer the shore. 

 In the mean time we sent a man to wade through 



