the bantling's falling
overboard, chats sociably, occasionally enforcing a mild reproof to a
vagabond son by a tap on the head with her chopstick. There is but one
dish, rice, of a very ordinary sort and of a pink color, but all seem to
thrive upon it. The meal over, the men smoke their pipes, and the wife
washes her cooking utensils with water drawn from the muddy river, and
then, strapping her infant to her back, overhauls the scanty wardrobe
and mends the ragged garments.

It is interesting to mark how accurately the chop-boat is brought
alongside of the ship for which it is destined. No matter how strong the
wind blows or the tide runs, the sails are trimmed as occasion requires,
and the big scull does its offices without ever the least mistake. The
boat running under the quarter scrapes along the edge, the ropes are
thrown, caught, and belayed, and the crew prepare for passing the cargo
into the vessel's hold. The stevedores who load the ships are very
active men. They have also good heads, and, measuring the length,
breadth, and height of the hold, calculate pretty accurately how many
chests the ship will carry, and the number of small boxes to be squeezed
into narrow places. When the hold is full the hatch is fastened down and
caulked, as exposure to the salt air injures the teas. The finest kinds
are so delicate, indeed, that they cannot be exported by sea; for,
however tightly sealed, they would deteriorate during the voyage. The
very superior flavor noticed by travellers in the tea used at St.
Petersburg is doubtless to be attributed in an important measure to its
overland transportation, and its consequent escape from dampness; the
large quantities consumed in Russia being, as before observed, all
carried from the northwest of China to Kiakhta, whence it is distributed
over the empire.

One of the most remarkable and interesting facts in the history of
commerce is the comparatively recent origin of the tea trade. The leaves
of the tea-plant were extensively used by the people of China and Japan
centuries before it was known to Western nations. This is the more
singular from the fact that the silks of China found their way to the
West at a very early period,--as early, at least, as the first century
of the Christian era,--while the use of tea in Europe dates back
only about two hundred years. The earliest notices of its use in the
countries where it is indigenous are found in the writings of the
Moorish his