Barton County democrat. [volume] (Great Bend, Kan.) 1885-1915, 1908-12-04
DR.. Edwards Letter

e narrow window of my house
boat, upon the crumbling walls
of what is probably the oldest
and most historic city in all Chi
ma. 1t might be well, however,
before | tell about this interest
ing city, to tell how it comes that
! am on a house boat away up
We Yangste river. The house
1at is quite an institution in
hina. 1t is nothing like the
hanty boats on American rivers,
It is built for comfort of tlav-
rs, and is navigated at the
nd Of a rope drawn by a pow
launch. Foreigners in hina
We housebOating down to a
fine point, and naturally SO. for
I the country is a network of ca
mails and there is no railroad
communication between points in
the interior. The better class of
Chinese are also great users of
the house boat, and with them it
Is no new institution for they had
before the dawn of the Christian
era. The house boat of the
weather. Chinese mandarins are
most elaborate affairs, SO far as
decorations are concerned.
- Foreigners have improved the
house boats until they are COM
Portable homes, and one can hire
them for small sum. In our
party there are five of us, anf
we have a houseboat. with six
boatmen, two cooks and two boys
to wait on the table. The total
cost Of this with these men and
provisions to run us is but five
dollars, gold a day.
Ordinarily the house boat moves
along at snail pace, pulled by
men on the bank of the canal by
means of rope, but We decided to
take a trip to SoochOw and found
several other house boats going
! at the same time so we dubbed
together and employed the SER
vices Of a japanese who owns a
steam launch, and we travelled en-
train up the canal. In the four
other boats were a lot of young
foreigners, English and A,neri-
can, going to the paddy fields to
hunt, and one boat carried a
missionary and his wife, return
ing TO their work after a vaca-
tiOn in Japan.
! This picturesqueness of the
scenery seemed uncanny and un-
real. 1t was a bright moonlight
night as we came up the Yangste
river, and from every house boat
came sounds of music and merry
voices. We left Shanghai in the
afternoon and when we awoke
this morning we were at Soochow
the city that has been the cen
ter of much of Chinese history.
Here the Taipings made their
last stand in our own day; here
Chinese Gordon broke the pow
er Of the Chinese forever. in the
hlOOdiest battle in all this bloody
land; it was here that Prince Lii
lung Chang achieved favor at
We hands Of his royal master by
treacherOuSly beheading four reb.
81 kings who, under his promise
IF mercy, had surrendered.
They are very old, these walls,
so old that not even legend tells
when they were built. They wer
. old when Solomon built the tenn
pie at Jerusalem. So well have
they stood the attack of time that
they are strong today, and at
their base the children of Chris
7ql 9EqM 'GeId SeIIguo!ss!m uBp
track of the Shanghaf7Aanking
railway is but a stones throw
from their base. 1t is claimed
that within these walls eight hun
dred thousand of the inhabitants
OF SOOchOw fell victims of fire
and sword during the TAPPING re-
belhon, but the old city rapidly
recovered her loss and is today
one of the greatest marts in all
China. Her game market is with
out equal in the world, for she
stands at the edge of the most
wonderful game country to be
found anywhere. Deer, boar,
hare, rabbit, pheasant, partridges,
quail, woOdcock, snipe, plOver,
duck, and geese may be bought
at ridiculOuSly low prices and a
walk through the Soochow game
market is enough to thrill the
nerves of the most blase sports
man.
SoOchow is On the grand canal,
the oldest and greatest artific-
lal waterway in the world, and
reach it we had to pass along
one of the numerous canals in