1842.
Topography of Chekiung
171
burden eachı.' This Loo-chung, we suppose, was the old city of Yüyáu.
Macartney and his suite,-proceeding in flat bottoned barges, sharp fore and aft, about twelve feet broad and seventy long, having cotton sails,—were seven days in reaching Chingshán. As they ad- vanced the river soon became contracted, running down through a defile between ranges of high hills, whose sides were indented by deep glens, separated from each other by narrow and parallel ridges of naked rock. "The succeeding scene exhibited the contrast of an extensive plain richly and variously cultivated on one side of the river, and on the other, mountains rising suddenly from the water, and apparently higher than any in Great Britain." They saw the excavations made in extracting the pr-tun-tse, a species of fine gra- nite, used in the manufactory of porcelain, "the same as the growan- stone of the Cornish mines."
Near their town was an unwalled villa, said to contain three thou- sand furnaces for baking porcelain, which, when all lighted at one time, gave the place the appearance of a town on fire. Along this great river, a course of less than two hundred miles traveled by the embassy, "there was no want of trees, ainong which the most com- mon were the tallow tree and the camphor, cedars, firs, and the tail and majestic arbor vitæ. Groves of oranges, citrons and lemons were abundautly interspersed in the little vales that sloped down to the brink of the river; and but few of the huts were without a small garden and plantation of tobacco. The large plains were planted with the sugar-cane. We had thus far passed through the country without having seen a single plant of the tea-shrub; but here we found it as a common plant, used for hedge-rows to divide the gardens and fruit groves, but not particularly cultivated for its leaves."
North of the Tsientang the rivers are indeed many, but scarcely deserve particular notice, excepting the Yun hò, or Grand canal which will be described in a separate article. The hills also, in the northern part of the province, so far as we know, are nowise remarkable.
The productions of Cheking are very abundant and rich, the cli- mate being mild, and the soil fertile and well-watered.
Of forest trees, there are the cypress, fir, willow, tallow tree, elm, ash, banian fig, camphor, cassia tree, ebony, maple, dryandra, mulber- ry, pali, paper tree, pine, sandalwood, varnish, &c.
Of fruit trees, there are the almond, arbutus or strawberry tree, loquat, chestnut, grapes, dates, papaya, hazle nut, orange, peach,' pear, persimmon, plum, &.c