In spite of its mean appearance there is sufficient trade carried on at Chihfu to induce some seventy Europeans to reside there. It is, moreover, likely to become popular as a sea-bathing resort and sanatorium.
In former days it was a great port for the junks, and there are still many of them running there; but the junk trade has been very much knocked on the head by foreign ships and steamers, which the Chinese see the advantage of chartering, although they continue to build their own clumsy and unwieldy craft. The principal exports of Chihfu are peas and bean cake, and a little manufactured silk; there is besides a small import trade of shirtings and opium.
17th May.
The best part of Monday was occupied in discharging our cargo, and we did not get up steam until five o’clock. A strong wind had sprung up from the north-west, and the harbour, which is very much exposed on that side, gave signs and tokens which led us to expect a very squally night outside; however, the wind dropped suddenly and gave place to a thick fog, so we escaped being tossed about, at the expense of a few alarms of running on to the rocks; which is not at all a pleasant look-out, for even if our lives would not have been in actual danger, there was the certainty that if we had struck a rock we should have lost all our baggage, and passed a very uncomfortable night. We took up another passenger at Chihfu, an interpreter, bound for Tientsing—apparently a very popular gentleman, for the captain had to turn out neck and crop a company of friends who had come to see him off, and who were inclined to prolong that ceremony, which involves much sherry and brandy drinking, until long past the hour fixed for our departure.
On Tuesday morning we took up our pilot for the Peiho River. He reported having come across a junk wrecked and without masts—all hands had evidently been lost; and on fishing about the cabin with a boat-hook in order to get the papers if possible, he found two or three dead bodies in a fearful state of decomposition. It is supposed that she must have been wrecked more than a month ago.
We are absolutely suffering from cold here. The thermometer is 55° in my cabin—a serious contrast after the 90° and 95° I have been accustomed to. My warmer clothes are in the hold, so I am forced to wear a greatcoat. We expect to find it warmer at Tientsing.
It was late in the afternoon on Tuesday when we arrived at the entrance of the River Peiho.
Here are the famous Taku Forts, the scene of the disaster of 1859, when Sir Frederick Bruce went up to get the treaty ratified, and our vessels were beaten back with the loss of two gunboats, which were sunk. The two forts stand on either side of the mouth of the river, and are occupied—that on the north by the French, and that on the south by the English. A company of infantry suffices to garrison each. They are about to be evacuated. A little to the east of the British Fort there still lies one of our sunken gunboats; the Chinese have recovered and appropriated her guns. I cannot conceive a more dismal lot than that of garrisoning Taku. Besides the forts, which in themselves are dreary enough, there are but a few Chinese mud huts and an hotel, principally patronised by pilots; and the French are cut off even from these by the Peiho, than which no more filthy little stream ever defiled a sea. Its banks at the mouth are vast plains of mud, lying flush with the water, and so bleak and sad-looking that one almost wonders that the very wild-fowl should be induced to stop there. Mud forts, mud houses, mud fields, and muddy river—everything is mud.
Higher up stream, although the banks are very flat and uninteresting, there is no lack of verdure. The trees are insignificant, but there are green fields and gardens cultivated with vegetables and fruit-trees. The neighbourhood of Tientsing is said to be the garden of China, and in the season a peach only fetches three cash, of which one thousand or more, according to the exchange, go to make up the dollar.
We soon had an experience of the difficulty of navigating the Peiho, which is no broader than the Thames at Eton, and as tortuous as Cuckoo weir. Over and over again we were on the point of running aground, and when on one occasion we did stick, it was a labour of great difficulty to get off again. A boat’s crew had to be landed, and a line fastened to a stout tree on the bank, by which means and by backing with all our force we floated off, the sailors on shore improving the occasion by stealing onions and vegetables from the gardens on the bank. Nor was the shallowness of the water our only impediment, for we did not reach Tientsing without several brushes and collisions with junks, in one of which our screw was broken.