Page:A wandering student in the Far East vol.1 - Zetland.djvu/294

224 problems concern himself with such mathematical puerilities as the silly rule which says that 2 + 2 are to make 4? Why, likewise, should a Yün-nan student who aspires to construct mountain railways of a highly complicated kind bother his head about such elements of road-making as levels, gradients, and curves? Why indeed—so long as it is only Celestials who are constrained to travel over them, and the goods of Sinim that they are fated to convey?

Eighty li of the switchback order took us to Lu-fêng Hsien on the evening of the 31st. The mountain-sides all round showed signs of former forest. Whole areas of pine-trees, however, have been ruthlessly cut down, and nothing but the stumps remain. These sprout and assume the appearance of small bushes, adding a somewhat curious feature to the landscape. That some improvement has taken place in the condition of the country since the close of the devastating Mohammedan rebellion in 1873 is attested by the presence of well-cultivated basins, which are to be seen from the road among the hills. My