"To the river," replied Nicholas, not knowing where else to say.
Then conducting them to the back of the house, where stood several sedan chairs that her husband let out for hire, the woman told them to jump into one of them, gave instructions to two Coolies who were waiting for a job, wished them a prosperous journey, drew the curtains, and thus, in about an hour's time, the boys were set down upon the banks of the great Yang-tse, when, having rewarded the Coolies for their trouble, they walked leisurely along in search of a boatmen to carry them to the opposite side.
"Truly, O Chow, thou wert born in an unfortunate hour," said Nicholas.
"My master's words are true; still, the hundred families' lock must have been hung around thy servant's neck, or he could not have escaped so great a danger as this."
"Open thy lips to a good purpose, and say how this matter happened," said Nicholas, laughing.
"Well, having made the purchases, I came to the quay where the passage-boats discharge their passengers, when, may I be punished for forgetting my masters affair, I could think of nothing but the villain who slew my noble parent, and who, I thought, might possibly be among the soldiers who had just arrived from Pekin, and were embarking to go to Nankin, which, they say, is even now besieged by the rebels. The notion, fit only as it was for the head of a goose, could not be helped, and I stood gazing at the war-tigers. Well, thy servant had not been long looking, when an old gentleman seized him by the arm, saying, 'Thou dog, thou stolest both my patient and my gen-seng;' and, seeing that it was the physician, I jerked off his hand, took to my heels, and, fearing for the safety of my master should the crowd stop me, I frightened them by calling out, 'Beware, my brethren, of the madman,' and as that made the frightened people stand aside, I was enabled to reach the inn in safety."
"Truly this was well done," said Nicholas; but as, at that moment, they had arrived at a great swamp of paddy, or rice-fields, which stretched for miles inland down to the very edge of the river, and was covered with water of sufficient depth to enable the shallow boats to sail for miles into the interior, their progress was stopped, when Nicholas said, as he pointed to a multitude of men, women, and children, who, at some little distance, with their trousers tucked up to the knees, appeared to be amusing themselves with paddling about in the water, "Let us catch the eyeballs of one of yonder shrimp hunters."
These people were a species of jacks-in-the-water, who, as they stalked about every now and then pulled their legs out of the mud, and taking something from it, deposited it in a small bag which they had by their sides. They were mud fishers in search for prawn, shrimps, and other small fish, which, when felt by the foot, they dexterously seized between the toes. This is only one instance in which these poor people show themselves as clever with the foot as the hand and another proof of the old axiom, that necessity is the mother of invention.
For some time they endeavored to call the attention of one of these people without avail; then, holding up a copper coin and shouting, a man came to them, and soon after fetched a boatman, who, for a small sum, engaged to row them in search of a ferry-boat.
The little boat paddled through the fields, past men engaged in wild geese catching, and huge duck boats, from the sides of which, down inclined boards, hundreds of those birds were waddling into the fields, as industriously earning their living among the rice stubble as the mud fishers.