“You see vegetable boat come along mo’ning?”
“Yes, I saw the boat come alongside.”
“Blought Ching ’nothee lettee, allee same fliend. Say pilate boat long way uppee liver in big cleek, waitee come down along lunning water in the dalk.”
“Then you pretty well know where they are?” said Mr Brooke.
“No; far uppee liver; in cleek.”
“I suppose this is right?” said Mr Brooke to me.
“Yes, quite light. Ching likee see Queen Victolia ship killee catch pilate.”
“Give way, my men,” said Mr Brooke, and the boat shot forward, while, relieved for the moment from the task of scanning the different boats, I sat gazing at the beautiful panorama of quaint houses, narrow streets debouching on the river, and the house-boats all along the edge of the river, while smaller boats were swinging here and there wherever there was room.
It was a wonderfully interesting sight, for, in addition to the curious shapes of the buildings, there was plenty of brilliant colour, and every now and then patches of brightest blue and vivid scarlet were heightened by the glistening gilding which ornamented some particular building. Then there were temples dotted about amongst the patches of forest, which fringed the high ground at the back of the city, and away beyond them the steep scarps of rugged and jagged mountains, which stood up looking of so lovely a pinky-blue, that I could for the moment hardly believe they were natural, and was ready to ask whether it was not some wonderful piece of painting.
The house-boats took my fancy greatly, for, in endless cases, they were of a variety of bright colours, pretty in shape, and decorated with showy flowers in pots and tubs; some had cages containing brightly-plumaged birds, and in most of them quaint bald-headed little children were playing about or fishing.