The Sun.
London, England, 1860-09-22 00:00:00

to kis pipe and his can, your true blue man-of-
war's-man loves his soap and scrubbing-brush; on
a washing-day, so replete with domestic horrors to
the landsman, he is in his glory, and a sly chance
such as this, when he can combine the pleasures of
the tub with the luxury of smoking, the indulgence
of running about en the sand in a somewhat neglige
attire, throwing stones, shouting with the full
power of his great lungs, and experiencing a
temporary sense of freedom from the galling
though necessary restraints of the quarter-
deck, is to him what a pic-nic at Richmond is to
the pent-up man of business of the City.
Leaving this scene behind me, I come at once to
the little camp of the Royal Engineers, nestling
under the shelter of the cliffs on a slightly elevated
strip of beach, and a safe distance from the angry
waves. Here Major Fisher and his sappers are in-
dustriously superintending the numerous fatigue
parties from the different ships and regiments in
sinking wells. The great scarcity of water, the
entire absence of anything worthy of the name of
stream or brook, and the excessively arid state of
the whole country, are drawbacks of rather a serious
nature in this otherwise admirable base of opera-
' tions ; the all-important labours of the diggers have
fortunately been tolerably successful, some 40 wells
and pits have already been sunk, producing in all
about 130 tons daily; but the setting in of the dry
season is reasonably regarded with considerable un-
easiness. In anticipation of the failure of the sup-
ply from natural sources, several steam condensing
vessels have been fitted out at Hong Kong, for the
sole purpose of distilling water for the transports.
The steam vessels would of course be independent,
and would even be able to assist the men-of-war in
supplying the sailing ships from their condensers.
Nothing, however, can compensate for the want of
running water, for although a sufficient quantity
may be obtained to sustain the lives of the host of
men and animals congregated here, still very great
inconvenience, if not actual suffering, must be gone
through if the wells fail from continued drought ;
and in a dusty, parched, burnt-up country, where
men have to subsist chiefly on salt provisions, and
horses and cattle on the driest of hay, straw, and
grain, the want of an abundance of this vital
element is especially distressing. Every effort has
been made by the authorities to find water else-
where, and gunboats have explored the coast in
every direction for 60 miles in vain ; and with the
exception of the roadstead of Chee-foo, the French
rendezvous, 60 miles due south of us, in the pro•
vince of Shantung, there is no known anchorage
where such a mighty fleet could lie in safety.
Quitting the little camp, and scrambling up the
steep red sides of one of the fissures of which I have
already spoken, I find myself on what, for want of
a better term, I must call the terre-plein, about a
mile and a half in breadth, which stretches away
for miles to the northward, and lies between the
steep rocky hills which encircle the harbour and
the edge of the cliffs, sloping gently down from the
foot of the former towards the water side. Poor as
this land is, the whole of it is carefully cultivated,
fences or boundary marks of any kind are unknown,
and one looks for full five miles in a straight line
over an unbroken expanse of tilled ground, with
only two small villages to break the monotonous
aspect of the scene. The soil is thin, light, and
friable, occasionally mixed with gravel and a
greyish sand, and looks in its present dried-up state
as if a good breeze would carry it all away—
miserably thin stunted crops of bearded wheat,
sweet potato, and Indian corn, and occasionally of
millet, are spread abroad as far as the view extends.
The wheat, though full blown and nearly ripe, is
scarcely six inches in height, and the parched-up
ears seldom contain more than twenty withered-up,
husky-looking grains apiece. It is sown in rows of
mathematical accuracy, about nine inches apart, and
appears to have been dibbled in. Food must in-
deed be scarce, and labour superabundant, when
such wretched produce can be worth the raising.
Indian corn seems to be the staple here, and
evidently flourishes better than anything else.
The plants are set singly, about two feet apart,• in
painfully straight lines, and at this season are about
a foot in height. The heavy dews of night must
alone be the source that supplies the moisture from
which are elaborated the juices which give them
their fresh and luxuriant appearance, for there are
' no means of artificial irrigation, and rain has not
fallen for many days. The yield appears to be good ;
the dried specimens I have seen of last year's crop
were large, full, and exceeding well-flavoured.
The sweet potato, with its little bunch of green
lily-like leaves, is seldom planted in beds by itself ;
it generally holds an economical position between
the corn stalks ; from the poverty and dryness of
the soil I should imagine that its tubers must be
few and small. A few patches of hemp may be
seen here and there in sheltered situations, where
the sweeping blasts of the monsoon are not likely
to bow down in tall stems. Hempen ropes are
more commonly used by the few junks and san-
pans I have examined than in the seaports further
south, where coir and bamboo cordage appears to
be preferred. Five minutes' walking takes us to
the village of Ching-Mew, where battered doors and
splintered shutters, and scattered remnants of broken
furniture tumbled into the streets, tell of the lawless
visits of moss-troopers from the camps or ships. At
one time there was no very scrupulous nicety observed
in searching for pigs, ducks and fowls, but the very
vigorous measures adopted by the authorities for the
suppression of looting, and the sharp and summary
disposal of two or three delinquencies detectedfla-
-91-ante clelicto, have happily resulted in the preven-
tion of the plundering and ill-usage of the people,
and the once terrified villagers are returning to their
wonted occupations, and supplies of live stock are
beginning to find their way into the barbarian
camp, in spite of all the edicts of hostile mandarins.
Rough deeply-sunk roads, often many feet below
the level of the surrounding fields, and marked with
broad ruts, afforded the first evidence of the exist-
ence of wheeled carriages, which are things un-
known in the Canton province. For full five miles
the aspect of the country was precisely the same. I
passed one other village only, which I left on my
right hand, and one dark funereal group of aged
yews overshadowing the green mounds, beneath
which rest the mortal remains of defunct head-
men or petty mandarins. With this exception, not
the ghost of a tree, bush, or shrub was within the
range of vision. The extreme scarcity of firewood
is another misfortune, and although the commis-
sariat have provided ample stores, it will sooner or
later become a source of trouble and expense. The
non-existence of woods and foliage materially ag-
gravates the wearisome and depressing influence of
the monotonous nakedness and general sterility,
while a deadly stillness reigns over the almost de-
serted fields.

The culture of rice appears to be wholly unknown,
or rather unpractised in this comparatively north-
ern region. It seems odd to speak of a place on the
same parallel of latitude as the sunny city of Pa-
lermo, in terms almost applicable to the bleak wastes
of the Arctic circle, and yet this now broiling plain,
in a few months hence, will be swept by
icy winds
from the snow-capped mountains of IVlanchouria,
the minor creeks and perhaps even the broad waters
of the great bay will be frozen in, and the climate
will be almost as severe as that of Siberia. But even
if the spring commenced sufficiently early in the
year, and the genial weather lasted long enough to
allow the rice-crops to come to maturity, the want
of water would render its cultivation impossible.
We may well rejoice that here we escape the
damp fogs and malarious fever-laden exhalations
of the reeking paddy-fields of the south. In almost
all other parts of China, liquid manure of lode-
Iscribable offensiveness appears to be a kind of
national institution. The all pervading colours
of this celestial abomination mingle with all
our thoughts, ideas, and recollections of the Flowery
Land, and I believe that a true-born Cantonese in
exile would be as deeply moved in his inmost soul
by a sniff of a high flavoured market garden in the
vicinity of Deptford as a banished Switzer by the
sound of the" Ranz des Vaches." Not only do they
saturate every square inch of field and garden wit,-
this overpowering compost, but pestiferous tp. .1
mighty dimensions stew by the high—
:
baking heats of summer, stringsns -
1.1.. ks of
itays in the
coolies beset your path an? • or bucket-beating
lanes and blind ally- nem you in the narrow
monster M°
their filthy cities, while
:...g .
tan-gran of their
of decomposing horrors

lie in wait for the unwary passenger behind every '
angle and corner of the tortuous streets. Happily
for us the breezes here are refreshing and health-
giving, and mephitic fumes and revolting recep-
tacles of filth are for the present left behind.
Three Tillages only are built on the whole length
of the western shore from West-entry Point to the
angle of " Junk Creek," a distance of full ten
miles. Their entire populations, making the most
liberal allowance for their miraculous power of
close stowing, cannot possibly exceed fifteen hun-
dred souls, including women and children. How
this great extent of ground is cultivated by so few
labourers is a great puzzle to me.
To Kin-chew, the principal and most distant of
the thoee villages, I directed my weary steps. At
the bottom of a gorge running down from the bare
brown mountains to the north-west angle of the
bay, and further screened both from storms and ob-
servation by sundry undulations of the ground, is
a string of neat, compact, and well-built cottages,
about a quarter of a mile in length. The number
of habitations may amount to about a hundred—
completely embowered in groves of willow trees,
sheltered by rows of sumach ; and with hedges full
of blooming wild roses and trailing vines, with
flaunting hollyhocks, tiger lillies, and blood-red
roses in full blow, the air scented with sweet
flowers, and the thickets ringing with the melodious
notes of the mina, the thrush, and other singing
birds, and with rich green grass growing luxu-
riantly in the cool shade ; the tranquil beauty of
this retired and secluded hamlet is equally refresh-

ing to the eye and to the mind. The houses are
vastly superior in their construction to any I have
ever seen in any other part of China ; almost the
whole of them are of stone cemented together with
chunam, the windows glazed, as an Irishman would
say, with oiled paper, and the roofs well and neatly

thatched with straw. The streets are wide and
clean, and every cottage has its walled garden ; the
latter contains onions, a kind of lettuce, hemp, and
a few roses and flowers, and the shady orchards are
stocked with almond trees, pear trees, loquots, and
a kind of peach. The people are said to be (with
the exception of a few immigrants from the Shan-
tung district) pure Manchoos, and speak the man-
darin or court dialect with a tolerably correct accent.
They are a fine, manly, athletic race, with nothing
servile in their bearing; and some of our freebooters
who have tried to appropriate their fowls and pigs
have found to their cost that they do not want for
courage. Their features are very different to those
of the genuine Chinese ; their noses are high and
aquiline, the cheek-bones less prominent, the eyes
less oblique and almond-shaped, and their skins very
much darker than those of the latter people. The
complexion of some of the men is as swarthy as that
of the darkest of our gipsies ; of the fair sex I have
had no opportunity of forming an opinion, for, with
the exception of a few hideous unearthly looking
old crones, the whole of the women, together with
the children, cattle, and goods and chattels gene-
rally, have been removed to some place of refuge
beyond the mountains.
On our first arrival it was almost impossible to
obtain supplies or provisions of any kind. The
people positively refused to receive our money or
to hold any dealings with us ; they were friendly
snd civil, but gave us to understand by their signs I
that if they trafficked with us they would lose their
heads, After the encamping of the troops com-
menced, however, and the provost-marshal had esta-
blished his sway, and every possible protection
against violence or unfair dealing was afforded to
them by the authorities, pigs and poultry were
brought in in sufficient quantities to supply the
officers' messes; but such an invasion of hungry
locusts has used up the resources of this thinly-
peopled neighbourhood. There is a scarcity of live
stock at present ; and with the exception of the not
very frequent issues of commissariat bullocks, all
ranks and classes may be said to be roughing it on
her Majesty's salt rations.
On Monday, 2d inst., a court-martial, of which
Rear-Admiral Jones, C. 8., was president, assembled
on board her Majesty's Imperieuse, in Odin's Bay,
for the trial of Commander Balfour, R.N., and the
officers and crew of her Majesty's late steam troop-
ship Assistance, which was lost on a rock near Deep
Bay, at the back of the island of Hong Kong, a few
hours after she had left the roadstead on Ist Juno,
en mute for this place. Tho news and particulars of
her loss will of course have reached England long
before you receive this. A dense fog appears to
have prevailed at the time that she struck, and the
rock is not laid down in the charts ; soundings of
ten fathoms are given in them on the spot on which
she came to her untimely end. Commander Bal-
four was slightly blamed by the court for being too
near the land in such hazy weather, and a repri-
mand was passed upon him accordingly. The great-
est credit is due to all concerned for the manner in
which the crew and passengers were saved, and a
general feeling of satisfaction pervades the whole
of the naval force here that no imputation has been
thrown upon the professional reputation of a gal-
lant officer, who is universally respected and es-
teemed, and whose kindness and courtesy to all who
have been passengers in his late ship have become
proverbial. The warmest sympathy was also dis-
played towards her veteran master, Mr. Louttid
(who appeared to feel deeply the painful position
he was unfortunately placed in after a continuous
and honourable service of 32 years in the Royal
Navy). It is much to be regretted that a greater
number of surveying vessels are not employed by
the Admiralty in these seas, now so greatly tra-
versed by our augmented fleet and our rapidly in-
creasing trade. This is the second large and costly
vessel that has been lost to the nation within the
last three years from the defective charts. In April,
1857, her Majesty's 50-gun frigate Raleigh was
similarly lost, on her way to Macao, by striking on
a rock not laid down. This is an expensive sys•
tern of ascertaining the position of reefs and shoals;
and these two discoveries alone must have cost the
public about £300,000, to say nothing of the im-
perilling► of the lives of many hundreds of our brave
seamen in the mercantile as well as in the royal
navy. The Assistance, in addition to 800 coolies,
carried 60 days' provision for 3,000 men, the loss
of which at such a critical time, independently of
its money value, might have been attended with the
most calamitous result. The cost of these two ill-
fated ships would have paid for a perfect flotilla of
surveying crafts for years, and might have been
advantageously expended in increasing our ac-
quaintance with the intricacies and difficulties of

these little known though much navigated seas.
The paddle sloop Centaur appears to have been
sent out from England with her boilers in a very
defective state: after an endless amount of patching
and tinkering at the factory of Hong Kong she is
unable to bear the proper pressure of steam. That
so fine a vessel should have been sent to a station
15,000 miles from home in so bad a condition seems
strange, to say the least. The engines of the Adven-
ture are also said to be nearly worn out ; but her
case is different. She has been three years and a
half in commission, and has performed an immense
amount of hard work; and although the framing
and many other heavy parts of her machinery are
broken or crippled, she still continues terender
good service, which speaks well for the energy of
her officers. A floating factory is sadly wanted on
this distant and wide-spreading station, on which
some 70 sets of men-of-war engines of various
powers are perpetually being severely tested by the
heavy monsoons and formidable gales of these broad
eastern waters.

I have been amused by the impression made upon
some of the newspapers recently received from home
by the abominably absurd report they had received
of the destruction of the Algerine and Dove gun-
boats by the forts of Taku. Stories resting upon
no tangible foundation whatever are spread about
that the Board of Ordnance of Pekin have re-
cently adopted the same calabres for their guns as
those in 1190 in the Russian artillery, and that a
shipload of guns, powder, shot, and shell, from the
Amor,
has been sent as a present to Prince Sung-
-111:-iin-sin, the Mongolian Captain-General at Taku.
Such fables accidentally finding their way into the
columns of influential journals may excite much
unnecessary ill-feeling and groundless uneasiness.
I hear from reliable sources that great apprehen-
sion of an attack by the rebels is felt by the Chi-
nese traders of Shanghai, notwithstanding the pre-0
sense of a British garrison, consisting of the left