Page:Through China with a camera.pdf/169

 Between Swatow and Chao-chow-fu I have met wayfarers on a hot day stripped to the skin, every article of their clothing bound around the head, and thus marching along, to all appear- ance without the slightest sense of impropriety. The higher one ascends the Han the more savage-looking are the people we encounter there, but, happily, the clan-fights had been sup- pressed and peace re-established in the province. At Chao- chow-fu I got up one morning before daybreak, to photograph an old bridge across the river there, and I fondly thought that being so early astir, I should get clear of the city mob ; but as it happened, there was a market held on the top of the bridge, and even before it was quite light, long trains of produce-laden coolies were pouring in from every side. I had just time to show myself and take a photograph, when a howling multitude came rushing down to where I stood near my boat on the shore. Amid a shower of missiles I unscrewed my camera, with the still undeveloped photograph inside, took the apparatus under my arm, and presenting my iron-pointed tripod to the rapidly approaching foe, backed into the river and scrambled on board the boat. Chao-chow-fu bridge is not unlike the one at Foo- chow, which spans the river Min, It is built of stone and contains a great many arches, or rather square spaces for the passage of boats beneath. On each side of the causeway above, a row of houses has been erected, and these project beyond the parapets and overhang the stream for as much as three- fourths of their entire depth. There seems, indeed, to be no part of each house, except the brick wall in front, which rests upon the bridge; while as to the fabric itself, it is held up by a series of long poles, which abut upon the projections of the buttresses below, and thus serve to support the dwelling like the under-props of a bracket. This was what one would call