m that the
latter is the finest fruit in the whole world. It is about the size
of a nut, with a brown verrucous outside; the edible part is white
and tender, and the kernel black. Long-yen is somewhat smaller, but
is also white and tender, though the taste is rather watery.
Neither of these fruits struck me as very good. I do not think the
pine-apples are so sweet, or possessed of that aromatic fragrance
which distinguishes those raised in our European greenhouses,
although they are much larger.

Portuguese wines and English beer are the usual drinks--ice, broken
into small pieces, and covered up with a cloth, is offered with
each. The ice is rather a costly article, as it has to be brought
from North America. In the evening, tea is served up.

During meal-times, a large punkah is employed to diffuse an
agreeable degree of coolness through the apartment. The punkah is a
large frame, from eight to ten feet long, and three feet high,
covered with white Indian cloth, and fastened to the ceiling. A
rope communicates, through the wall, like a bell-pull, with the next
room, or the ground floor, where a servant is stationed to keep it
constantly in motion, and thus maintain a pleasing draught.

As may be seen from what I have said, the living here is very dear
for Europeans. The expense of keeping a house may be reckoned at
30,000 francs (6,000 dollars--1,200 pounds) at the lowest; a very
considerable sum, when we reflect how little it procures, neither
including a carriage nor horses. There is nothing in the way of
amusement, or places of public recreation; the only pleasure many
gentlemen indulge in, is keeping a boat, for which they pay 28s. a-
month, or they walk in the evenings in a small garden, which the
European inhabitants have laid out at their own cost. This garden
faces the factory, surrounded on three sides by a wall, and, on the
fourth, washed by the Pearl stream.

The living of the Chinese population, on the contrary, costs very
little; 60 cash, 1,200 of which make a dollar (4s.), may be reckoned
a very liberal daily allowance for each man. As a natural
consequence, wages are extremely low; a boat, for instance, may be
hired for half a dollar (2s.) a-day, and on this income, a whole
family of from six to eight persons will often exist. It is true,
the Chinese are not too particular in their food; they eat dogs,
cats, mice, and rats, the intestines of birds, and the blood of
every animal, and I