Chap. VII. 
SHANGHAE. 
91 
CHAPTER VII. 
Shanghae visited at the end of 1843 — My Lodgings — Prejudices 
and Superstitions of the Inhabitants — The City described — 
Shops and Merchandise — Food — An important Station for 
Foreign Trade — The Exports of the Country ; Teas and Silk 
easily brought to it — The adjacent Country described — Its 
Canals — Agriculture — Tombs of the Dead — Trees and Shrubs 
— Gardens and Nurseries — Difficulty of access to them — 
Cunning and Deceit of the Chinese — A Chinese Dinner — 
Theatricals. 
Shanghae is the most northerly of the five ports at 
which foreigners are now permitted to trade with the 
Chinese. Its population is estimated at 270,000. It is 
situated about a hundred miles, in a north-west direction, 
from the island of Chusan. The city stands on the bank 
of a fine river, about twelve miles from the point where 
it joins the celebrated Yang-tse-Kiang, or "Child of the 
Ocean." The Shanghae river, as it is generally called 
by foreigners, is as wide at Shanghae as the Thames at 
London Bridge. Its main channel is deep, and easily 
navigated when known, but the river abounds in long 
mud-banks, dangerous to large foreign vessels unless 
they happen to go up with a fair wind, and manage to 
get a good pilot on board at the entrance of the river. 
I visited this place for the first time at the end 
of 1843, as soon as the port was opened by Her Majesty's 
Consul, Captain Balfour, and took up my quarters in a 
