laid hold of both towlines, and bodily--the water
swelling and foaming under our bows--the boat was hauled against the
torrent, and up the ledge of water that stretches across the river. We
were now in smooth water at the entrance to the Mi Tsang Gorge. Two
stupendous walls of rock, almost perpendicular, as bold and rugged as
the Mediterranean side of the Rock of Gibraltar seem folded one behind
the other across the river. "Savage cliffs are these, where not a tree
and scarcely a blade of grass can grow, and where the stream, which is
rather heard than seen, seems to be fretting in vain efforts to escape
from its dark and gloomy prison." In the gorge itself the current was
restrained, and boats could cross from bank to bank without difficulty.
It was an eerie feeling to glide over the sunless water shut in by the
stupendous sidewalls of rock. At a sandy spit to the west of the gorge
we landed and put things in order. And here I stood and watched the
junks disappear down the river one after the other, and I saw the truth
of what Hosie had written that, as their masts are always unshipped in
the down passage, the junks seem to be "passing with their human freight
into eternity."

An immensely high declivity with a precipitous face was in front of us,
which strained your eyes to look at; yet high up to the summit and to
the very edge of the precipice, little farmsteads are dotted, and every
yard of land available is under cultivation. So steep is it that the
scanty soil must be washed away, you think, at the first rains, and only
an adventurous goat could dwell there in comfort. My laoban, Enjeh,
pointing to this mighty mass, said, "_Pin su chiao_;" but whether these
words were the name of the place, or were intended to convey to me his
sense of its magnificence, or dealt with the question of the
precariousness of tenure so far above our heads, I had no means to
determine.

My laoban knew twelve words of English, and I twelve words of Chinese,
and this was the extent of our common vocabulary; it had to be carefully
eked out with signs and gestures. I knew the Chinese for rice,
flourcake, tea, egg, chopsticks, opium, bed, by-and-by, how many,
charcoal, cabbage, and customs. My laoban could say in English, or
pidgin English, chow, number one, no good, go ashore, sit down,
by-and-by, to-morrow, match, lamp, alright, one piecee, and goddam. This
last named exotic he had been led to consider as synonymous with "very
good." It