74 
CHINESE CROWD. 
crowd of people assembled to see the Embassy ; and forming a 
most motley group. In front were mandarins and soldiers, tawdrily 
dressed and variously armed; behind, the mob of all classes and 
complexions, some in white robes, others quite naked, some in 
immense hats, others with parasols, many bare-headed, and all with 
long tails. This diversified mass was suddenly thrown into con- 
fusion by a party of soldiers, who, flourishing whips on all sides, 
opened a passage for a number of servants, carrying trays laden 
with all kinds of provision in profuse abundance. These formed a 
present from the Legate to the Ambassador and his train, and were 
placed in order in the fronts of the boats of the three commissioners. 
It would be impossible to particularise the different parts of this 
ostentatious supply. It comprised all sorts of dressed meat, of 
sheep roasted in halves and quarters, pigs and fowls in abundance, 
innumerable Chinese made dishes, amongst others, stewed sharks’ fins, 
stags’ sinews, birds’ nests, and sea-slugs *, pyramids of cakes and 
sweetmeats, a large quantity of pickle, and several jars of wine. A 
part of these formed our dinner ; and as it was the first time of partaking 
of Chinese fare, curiosity induced us to taste the made dishes, but 
their flavour did not tempt us to do more. The joints of mutton, 
pigs, and fowls, were so besmeared with a kind of varnish, that they 
exhibited a perfect metallic polish, and seemed so much more 
adapted to please the eye than gratify the palate, that we did not 
attempt to injure the brilliancy of their surface. 
At the close of day we went in search of our boats, and on finding 
them, discovered that no part of our personal baggage had been landed, 
* These animals, the bitch de mer of the Portuguese, are in the greatest estimation 
among the Chinese, who purchase them of the Malays, by whom they are collected 
in large quantities from the coast of New Holland. They frequent especially the Gulf of 
Carpentaria, where they find these animals in abundance. Mr. Brown observes. Annals 
of Botany, Vol. I. p. 395., “ They collect two kinds of this animal: the one black, called 
by the Chinese batoo, of double the value of the other, which is white, and called by 
them roro. A hundred pikol are a load for a prao : the price of the better kind is 
forty dollars the pikol, of the inferior, twenty.” Mr. B. supposes the animal to be a 
species of Doris. 
