Rock-salt sometimes melts a little under the earth, and if that happens, the rocks above it sink, and in that way hollows have been formed.
Upon the land near these shallow salt seas lived some singular animals, unlike those of our earth in the later centuries of its history. There were remarkable reptiles belonging to the frog or Batrachian family. One of the species was the size of a small ox, with peculiar complicated teeth, and feet which left prints on the earth so exactly like the impressions of the human hand, that geologists gave it a Latin name meaning 'the beast with the hand.' Another strange creature was a sort of lizard, with a horny bill, and feet resembling those of the duck; it had somewhat the appearance of a turtle, it is supposed. Then there were some warm-blooded animals about the size of a rat, which had pouches in their cheeks, and preyed upon small insects.
PING-KWE'S DOWNFALL.
It was Ping-Kwe's fondness for a river excursion, combined with the fact of his possessing a very hasty temper, which led to his downfall. It happened in this wise.
One day it chanced that he was in a particularly bad frame of mind; he quarrelled with his wife, he heat his two little yellow-faced bairns, and after doing all that was possible to promote discord in his household, he started off on one of his favourite river trips, instead of going back to his work.
The cool, sweet evening air might perhaps have done something towards chasing Ping-Kwe's evil humour away, but alas! under the canopy of the boat, within which he seated himself, he saw two English ladies, the wife and sister of the British Consul in the district. Now Ping-Kwe hated the English like poison and he thereupon began a tirade against all foreigners, making use of as many English words as he could, for the benefit of the two ladies.
Fortunately, his knowledge of the English language was limited, or Mrs. Armstrong and Miss Heathcote might have been more alarmed than they already were at his storm of abuse.
'What do we want with them here?' he snarled in his native tongue, 'turning the place upside down? If I had my will I would throw them all overboard.'
'Calm yourself, Ping,' said one of his fellow-townsmen, Chang by name, who was sitting near. 'Take my advice and throw something-else overboard.'