Pack-horses, laden clumsily with their heavy loads of Puerh tea,
Manchester goods, oil and native exports from Yuen-nan province, passed
us on the mountain-side, and sometimes numbers of these willing but
ill-treated animals were seen grazing in the hollows, by the wayside,
their backs in almost every instance cruelly lacerated by the continuous
rubbing of the wooden frames on which their loads were strapped. For
cruelty to animals China stands an easy first; love of animals does not
enter into their sympathies at all. I found this not to be the case
among the Miao and the I-pien, however; and the tribes across the
Yangtze below Chao-t'ong, locally called the Pa-pu, are, as a matter of
fact, fond of horses, and some of them capable horsemen.
The journey across these mountains has no perils. One may step aside a
few feet with no fear of falling a few thousand, a danger so common in
most of the country from Sui-fu downwards. The scenery is
magnificent--range after range of mountains in whatever direction you
look, nothing but mountains of varying altitudes. And the patches of
wooded slopes, alternating with the red earth and more fertile green
plots through which streams flow, with rolling waterfalls, picturesque
nooks and winding pathways, make pictures to which only the gifted
artist's brush could do justice.
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