From Shanghai to Hankow the voyage is performed by one of the many magnificent steamers of American type which, since the opening of the Yang-tse River to foreign trade in 1860, ply daily between those two ports, a distance of 600 miles. It was on the eve of the Chinese New Year, in the middle of February, when at midnight I rode down in a jinricshaw to Jardine's wharf, and took up my quarters on board the Tai-Wo moored alongside, preparatory to starting up-stream the following morning at daylight; but sleep was no easy matter, thousands of fire-crackers were being let off in the streets, alive with countless Chinese lanterns, and the din was deafening. Native passengers were crowding on board, and the coolies carrying their luggage were wrangling over their pay. I at length got to sleep in the early hours of the morning, and woke up to find ourselves in the sea of muddy waters which forms the lower reaches of the Great River. A thin line of brown, a shade deeper than that of the water, barely visible on the starboard hand, indicated the left bank, while in the opposite direction the muddy waste extended to the horizon. Not a stray junk moving enlivened the desolate prospect, all were in port keeping the New Year's holidays, and a dull leaden sky completed the gloom of the chill February morning.