the wharf, until the
wet work is done.

But we are forgetting Lin, who has carried his fish up into the town
to sell. Here is a whole street where nothing is sold but food. I
should call it Market Street, and I dare say they do the same in a way
of their own.

What will all these busy people have for dinner to-day? Fat
bears'-paws, brought from the dark forest fifty miles away,--these
will do for that comfortable-looking mandarin with the red ball on
the top of his cap. I think he has eaten something of the same kind
before. A birds'-nest soup for my lady in the great house on the hill;
birds' nests brought from the rocks where the waves dash, and the
birds feel themselves very safe. But "Such a delicious soup!" said
Madam Faw-Choo, and Yang-lo, her son, sent the fisherman again to the
black rocks for more.

What will the soldiers have,--the officer who wears thick satin boots,
and doesn't look much like fighting in his gay silk dress? A stew of
fat puppies for him, and only boiled rats for the porter who carries
the heavy tea-boxes. But there is tea for all, and rice, too, as much
as they desire; and, although I shouldn't care to be invited to dine
with any of them, I don't doubt they enjoy the food very much.

In the midst of all this buying and selling Lin sells his fish, some
to the English gentleman, and some to the grave-faced man in the blue
gown; and he goes happily home to his own dinner in the boat. Rice
again, and fried mice, and the merry face and small, slanting black
eyes of his little sister to greet him. After dinner his father has
a pipe to smoke, before he goes again to his work. After all, why not
eat puppies and mice as well as calves and turtles and oysters? And as
for birds'-nest soup, I should think it quite as good as chicken pie.
It is only custom that makes any difference.

So pass the days of our child Pen-se, who lives on the great river
which men call the child of the ocean. But it was not always so.
She was born among the hills where the tea grows with its glossy,
myrtle-like leaves, and white, fragrant blossoms. When the tea-plants
were in bloom, Pen-se first saw the light; and when she was hardly
more than a baby she trotted behind her father, while he gathered the
leaves, dried and rolled them, and then packed them in square boxes to
come in ships across the ocean for your papa and mine to drink.

Here, too, grew the mulberry-trees, with their purple fruit and white;
and Pen-se