28
Inclosure in No. 32.
Commercial Report on a Journey through the Provinces of Ssu-ch'uan, Yun-nan, Kwang-si, and Kuei-chou, from October 26, 1885, to May 5, 1886.
PART
I. Ch'ung-ch'ing Fu to Pi-chieh Hsien 15
II. Pi-chieh Hsien to Yün-nan Fu
III. Yun-nan Fu to Ssu-mao Ting 39
IV. Ssu-mao Ting to K'ai-hua Fu 73
V. K'ai-hua Fu to Nan-ning Fu
VI. Nan-ning-Fu to Kuei-yang Fu 22
VII. Kuei-yang Fu to Ch'ung-ch'ing Fu
APPENDIX
II. 13
I. Prices of Foreign Imports, La-kin, &c.
Non-Chinese Races
"
III. Explanation of Route Sketches, Atmospheric Pressure, Temperature, Latitude of Positions, &c.
Pages 28-33
Report.
PART 1.--Ch'ung-ch'ing Fu to Pi-chieh Hsien.
ON the 10th October, 1885, I received instructions from Her Majesty's Chargé d'Affaires to set out at once upon a journey through the south-western provinces of China, "to inquire into the commercial condition and communications" of that little-known region, and "into the probable effect which the trade clauses of the Treaty recently concluded between France and China will exercise upon British commerce with the inland markets of Kwang-tung, Kwang-si, and Yün-nan.” I was to go through Yün-nan Fu to P'u-êrh Fu, and then, if possible, along the Tonquin border to Nan-ning Fu, in Kwang-si, and to return to Ch'ung-ch'ing through the Provinces of Kwang-si and Kuei-chou.
On the morning of the 26th October we started from Ch'ung-ch'ing, the party consisting of thirty persons, namely: nineteen porters, whose function was to carry men and baggage; their leader, who was responsible for property, for the due carriage thereof, and for the conduct of the gang; a Chinese clerk and his servant, a Lieutenant, with his son, and two men forming an escort kindly provided by the local authorities; an official messenger and myself, and two servants.
From Ch'ung-ch'ing to Lu-chou we followed the land route on the left bank of the Yang-tzu; the country is best described as a sea of hills. As the roads cross the little cols from one valley to the next, one has the impression of being at a great height, perhaps because the horizon is cut off at a short distance in all directions by hills of the same height as that upon which one is standing, but, in reality, an horizontal section 800 feet above the level of the Yang-tzu* would have these hills beneath it. In fact, Ssu-ch'uan, between the Ch'êng-tu Plain and Kuei Fu—the Ssu-ch'uan known to commerce—is a comparatively low-lying region enclosed on north, west, and south by lofty mountains. On the west, I need give no authority; on the north, Captain Gill gives 13,148 feet as the height of the Hsueh Shan Pass, north-north-west of Ch'êng-tu; and the Chinese report the whole northern frontier to be very mountainous. On the south of this district, there runs a line of limestone buttresses forming the northern boundary of the Yün-nan Kuei-chou plateau, and coinciding roughly with the frontier between Ssu-ch'uan and Kuei-chou and Yün-nan. We shall have to cross these mountains in the sequel. This peculiarity of position perhaps accounts for the somewhat anomalous climate of Central Ssu-ch'uan, which is scorchingly hot for a short time in summer, warm in winter, and covered from November to April by clouds and mist.
There are two or three ranges between Ch'ung-ch'ing and Lu-chou with summits about 2,000 feet above the sea, but little hills and narrow valleys form the distinctive
* Mr. Baber has determined the altitude of the Yang-tzu at Ch'ung-ch'ing to be 620 feet, and that of his house in the city to be 845 feet above the sea-level (see Royal Geographical Society's Supplementary Papers, vol. i, Part I, p. 145). The difference between Captain Gill's altitudes of Ch'ung-ch'ing and Ch'êng-tu is 454 feet, which gives the Ch'êng-tu Plain an altitude of 1,300 feet (see "River of Golden Sand," vol. ii, p. 417).