Page:Ningpo to Shanghai.djvu/25

Rh in its path, and righting to a level when in deeper water.

From Kongling, to the three hundred family village of Sang look, the distance is five miles and a third, and 2 lé further on, in the same course of S. by W. Sang chong is reached, a straggling place reported as numbering a thousand families.

From Sang chong to Hoè, a village of 300 families, the distance Sou' sou' westerly is one mile, and thence to Ching kong, a village of similar size, Sou' west 4 lē. Tea is grown in gardens bordering the road side here, and in some instances on the walls. A lofty mountain bearing S. by E. called Kou foong san attracts the traveller's attention at this place and for miles onward. Ho pè chee, the next stage, a distance of 7 lē S. S. W. is not far from its base.

In the village of Ho pè chee there are about 200 families of Wongs and 80 of Sungs. Though so short a distance from that emporium of news Ningpo, (under 25 miles) but little is known by the inhabitants of what is going on in the outer world. The fact of that place having been in the hands of the English in 1840 is not known to the common herd; and but little desire to learn of things from afar is indulged in even by the most educated. For wealthy men to tell of all they know, is to lay themselves open to the squeezing propensities of the officers of their Government, by whom the most trifling matter is made use of when the game is sure. Permission for a foreigner to reside under the same roof for more than one night, or even for that period, is sufficient cause for an extensive mulct. Taverns or Monasteries are the only sleeping quarters for travellers.  Sheong pe chee, a village of two hundred families is only a short distance from Ho pè chee. Thence to Ying kow ling, a village of 400 families, the 