are obliged to stop till it clears.  Our pilot went ashore last night at Tunglow, and has returned with the front part of his head cleanly shaved.  I asked him what the people had thought of our appearance.  He answered that they were greatly afraid lest we should fire upon them, and their hearts at first went pit-a-pat; but when they heard from him how well we treated him, and that we were no friends to the Rebels, they said ‘Poussa’ (’that’s Buddha’s doing’ or ’thank God’).

[Sidenote:  Sand storm.]

November 28th.—­Eleven A.M.—­The morning began as usual:  calm, fair, and hazy.  At about nine it began to blow, and gradually rose to a gale, causing our river ripple to mimic ocean waves, and the dust and sand to fly before us in clouds, obscuring earth and sky.  About ten we approached a mountain range, which had been for some time looming on the horizon.  We found we had to pass through a channel of about a quarter of a mile wide; on our left, a series of barren hills, bold and majestic-looking in the mist; on the right, a solitary rock, steep, conical-shaped, and about 300 feet high.  On the side of it a Buddhist temple, perched like a nest.  The hills on the left were crowned by walls and fortifications built some time ago by the Rebels, and running over them in all manner of zigzag and fantastic directions.  I have seldom seen a more striking bit of scenery.  When we had passed through we found more hills, with intervals of plains, in one of which lay the district city of Tongtze, enclosed by walls which run along the top of the hills surrounding it.  The inhabitants crowded to the shore to witness the strange apparition of foreign vessels.

[Sidenote:  The ‘Hen Barrier.’]

I mentioned a rocky passage through which we passed on the morning of the 26th.  Ellis, in his account of Lord Amherst’s Embassy, speaks of it as a place of great difficulty.  A series of rocks like stepping- stones run over a great part, and the passage is obtained by sticking close to the left bank.  Our pilot tells us that it is named the ’Hen Barrier,’ and for the following reason:  Once on a time, there dwelt on the right bank an evil spirit, in the guise of a rock, shaped like a hen.  This evil spirit coveted some of the good land on the opposite side, and proceeded to cross, blocking up the stream on her way.  The good spirits, in consternation, applied to a bonze, who, after some reflection, bethought himself of a plan for arresting the mischief.  He set to work to crow like a cock.  The hen rock, supposing that it was the voice of her mate, turned round to look.  The spell was instantly broken.  She dropped into the stream, and the natives, indignant at her misdeeds, proceeded into it and cut off her head!

    I have been skimming over a Chinese book, translated by Stanislas
    Julien:  the travels of a Buddhist.  It is full of legends of the
    character of that which I have now narrated.