Trans-Siberian party from Manila. Some steamer friends and other
acquaintances were at Shanghai, and the time passed pleasantly amongst
them.

I attended divine service at St. John's Cathedral on Sunday morning, and
in the evening the delayed party arrived; I was so fortunate as to have
two home friends among the number.

Monday began by a general tour of sight-seeing for the party; to a
certain extent I thus went over the ground again, taking jinrikisha
rides through a portion of the European native city, and visiting the
entire French concession. French names were on the business houses and
on many of the streets. This concession is governed by a municipality of
its own.

Four restful days were passed at Shanghai, and at ten on the evening of
May 12th, we went to our steamer, the _Tuck-Wo_, for a trip on the
celebrated Yangtse River. The steamer was large and airy, with pleasant
decks; everything wore a thoroughly homelike air. The scenery on the
lower Yangtse is rather flat and disappointing, but in the morning there
were some vegetation and many agreeable glimpses of life, with vistas of
modest homes and little patches of cultivated ground around them. The
shores were covered with tall vegetation which, we were told, grows
quite tall and is then cut, dried, and used as fuel by the natives. At
first, during our trip, there had been only a low fringe of trees in the
distant background; now mountains appeared as a striking variation, and
thus we had alternating scenes which added to the spatial interest from
this time on. There were occasional picturesque points and promontories
that jutted out into the sea; clustering around, were many large and
smaller craft; once I counted thirty-six in one place.

The steamer anchored at Chang-wang-kong on the second evening, and we
were permitted to go ashore for two hours. We had noticed a brilliantly
lighted building, four stories high, every window gleaming and
presenting an imposing appearance; we naturally expected some artistic
effect in the interior, but, when we came to visit it, the illusion
vanished, as the first and second stories were cut up into small rooms,
each filled with Chinese folk intent upon securing their evening meal;
adjacent rooms were devoted to the culinary operations. Dirt and
confusion and odors permeated everywhere, and we declined to ascend to
the upper story, where the Chinese game of fan-tan was in progress.
Certain homelike English buildings c