My men fed on maize. The faces of the people were
pinched and wan, unpleasant to look upon, bearing unmistakable signs of
poverty and misery, and they seemed too concerned in keeping the wolf
from the door to attend to me. At Ta-kwan they treated themselves to a
_sheng_ of rice apiece--here the _sheng_ is 1.8 catties, as against 11
catties in the capital of the province.
At Wuchai, the last stage before reaching Chao-t'ong-fu, the room of the
inn had three walls only, and two of these were composed of kerosene
tins, laced together with bamboo stripping. (Probably the oil tins had
been stolen from the mission premises at Chao-t'ong.) Through the whole
night it rained as it had never rained before, but, instead of feeling
miserable, I tried to see the humor of the situation. One can get humor
from the most embarrassing circumstances, and my chief amusement arose
from a small business deal between one of my coolies, who had sublet his
contract to a poor fellow returning in the rain, who had arranged to
carry the ninety catties ninety li for a fourth of the original price
arranged between my coolie and myself. For one full hour they argued at
a terrible speed as to the rate of exchange in the Szech'wan large and
the Yuen-nan small cash, and this was only interrupted when a poor man,
deaf and dumb, and of hideous appearance, seeing the foreigner in his
contemptible town, rushed in with a carrying pole and felled his
grumbling townsman at my feet.
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