The last night of my journey I spent at Liu Kou, the sixth valley, and the next morning the men made tremendous efforts to hide all trace of the disaster that had befallen us on the way. I said it didn't matter, it could wait till we got to Jehol, but both Tuan and the “cartee men” were of a different opinion. Apparently they would lose face if they came to their journey's end in such a condition, and I had to wait while the cloth was taken off the back of the cart, and carefully put on in front, so that the broken wood was entirely concealed. Then, when everybody was satisfied that we were making at least a presentable appearance, we started. You see, I never appreciated the situation properly. To travel in a cart seemed to me so humble a mode of progression, that it really did not matter very much whether it were broken or not, indeed a broken cart seemed more to me like going the whole hog, and roughing it thoroughly while we were about it. But with the men it was different, a cart was a most dignified mode of conveyance, and to enter a big town in a broken one was as bad as travelling in a motor with all the evidences of a breakdown upon it, due to careless driving. And when I saw their point of view, of course I at once sat down on some steps and watched an old man draw water, and a disgusting-looking sow, who made me forswear bacon, attend to the wants of her numerous black progeny.
Tuan passed the time by having a heated argument with the landlord. The fight waxed furious, as I was afterwards told, regarding the hot water I had required for my bath, which was heated in a long pipe, like a copper drain-pipe, that was inserted in a hole by the k'ang fire. Fuel is scarce, and stern necessity has seen to it that these people get the most they possibly can out of a fire. I hope Than paid him fairly, but of course I do not know, I parted with a dollar for the night's lodging and the little drop of hot water, for otherwise we carried our own fuel—charcoal—bought our provisions and cooked for ourselves, but we left that landlord protesting at the gate that he would never put up another foreigner.
That last day's journey was, I think, the hardest day of all, or perhaps it was that I was tired out. There was a long, long mountain to be got over, the Hung Shih La, the Red Stone Rock, and we crossed it by a pass, the worst of many mountain passes we had come across. We climbed up slowly to the top and there was a tablet to the memory of the man who had repaired the road. What it was like before it was repaired I can't imagine, or perhaps it was not done very recently, say within a couple of hundred years, for the road was very bad. There is only room for one vehicle, and the carters raised their voices in a loud singsong, to warn all whom it might concern that they were occupying the road. What would happen if one cart entered at one end and another at the other I am sure I cannot imagine, for there seemed to be no place that I could see where they could pass each other, and I think it must be at least three steep miles long. I did not trust the carts. I walked. My faith in a Peking cart and mule had gone for ever, and if we had started to roll here, it seemed to me, we should not have stopped till we reached America or Siberia at least. So every step of the way I walked, and Tuan would have insisted that the carts come behind me. But here I put my foot down, etiquette or no etiquette I insisted they should go in front. I felt it would be just as bad to be crushed by a falling cart as to be upset in it, so they went on ahead, and when we met people, and we met a good many on foot, Tuan called out to them and probably explained that such was the foolish eccentricity of his Missie that, though she was rich beyond the dreams of avarice, and always travelled with two carts, she yet insisted upon walking down all the passes.
It was worth it too, for the view was glorious, the sunlight, the golden sunlight of a Chinese afternoon, fell on range after range of softly rounded hills, the air was so clear that miles and miles away I could see their folds, with here and there a purple shadow, and here and there the golden light. And over all was the arc of the blue sky. Beautiful, most beautiful it was, and I was only regretful that, like so many of the beautiful things I have seen in life, I looked on it alone. I shall never look on it again. The journey is too arduous, too difficult, but I am glad, very glad indeed, that I have seen it once.
But it was getting late. At the bottom of the pass I got into my cart, and was driven along a disused mountain torrent that occupied the bed of the valley under a line of trees just bursting into leaf. The shadows were long with the coming night, and at last we forded a shallow river and came into the dusty, dirty town of Cheng Teh Fu, an unwalled town beyond which is Jehol, the Hunting Palace of the Manchu Emperors.
Here there were thousands of soldiers, not like my “cavalry,” but modern, khaki-clad men like those in Peking, gathered together to go against the Mongols, for China was at war, and apparently was getting the worst of it, and the air was ringing with bugle calls.
And then Tuan and I had an argument. He wanted me to go to an inn. The streets were dusty, dirty, evil-smelling, I was weary to death, my dress had been rubbed into holes by the jolting of the cart, and my flesh rebelled at the very thought of a Chinese inn. But what was I to do? There were no Europeans in Jehol save the missionaries, and I was so very sure it was wasted labour to try and convert the Chinese it seemed unfair to go to the mission station.
And then I suddenly felt I must speak to someone, must hear my own tongue again, must be sympathised with, by a woman if possible, and in spite of the protests of Tuan who saw all chance of squeeze at an end, I made them turn the mules' heads to the mission.
There a sad, sweet-faced woman gave me, a total stranger, the kindest and warmest of welcomes, and I paid off the “cartee men.” For sixty dollars they had brought me two hundred and eighty miles, mostly across the mountains, they had been honest, hard-working, attentive, patient, and good-tempered, and for a cumshaw of five dollars they bowed themselves to the ground. I know they got it, because I took the precaution to pay them myself, and as I watched them go away down the street I made a solemn vow that never again would I travel in the mountains, and never, never again would I submit myself to the tender mercies of a Peking cart. It is one of the things I am glad I have done, but I am glad also it is behind me with no necessity to do again.