Ckap. XII. 



A DANGEROUS ROAD. 



215 



encounters with natives who had been in the towns 

 where foreigners reside. 



It was nearly dark when we reached our inn, a 

 building with accommodation for man and beast. 

 The latter title refers not to horses, but to pigs, 

 which are great favourites with the Chinese, particu- 

 larly in Fokien. The arrangements of the inn were 

 exactly like those of the last one, and therefore I 

 need not describe them. Tired with the fatigues of 

 the day, I retired early, and slept more soundly than 

 if I had been on a bed of down. 



The next day we had to cross another mountain pass, 

 not so high as the last, but presenting scenery equally 

 beautiful. Being at a lower elevation, the hill-sides 

 were clothed with trees and brushwood, and reminded 

 me of the rich tropical scenery which I had seen near 

 Batavia and Singapore. Here were some beautiful 

 forests of the lance-leaved pine (Cunninghamia 

 lanceolatd), the finest I had ever met with in China. 



The making of the road over this pass must have 

 been a gigantic undertaking. The sides of the 

 mountain, both above and below the road, were steep 

 and rugged. So dangerous had the Chinese consi- 

 dered this road, even after it was made, that they 

 had fixed in many places a massive stone rail on the 

 lower side to prevent people from falling over. Far 

 below, in a beautiful dell, a little stream was gushing 

 down amongst the rocks and trees, which was fed by 

 many waterfalls from the sides of the mountain. In 

 some places the height was so great that it made me 

 giddy to look down. 



