y smart
Yankee school-boy would improve upon. It consists of four tubs of water,
located one above the other on a wooden frame, each dripping slowly into
the one below it, the last being furnished with a float, the rise of
which is measured on a graduated scale, indicating units of time; and
such is the famous Water-clock of Canton. We were not disposed to walk
any more than was necessary in the public streets, where the foulest
odors assailed us at every step, and disgusting sights met the eye in
the form of diseased individuals of the most loathsome type. The
stranger is jostled by staggering coolies, with buckets of the vilest
contents, or importuned for alms by beggars who thrust their deformed
limbs into his very face. It is but natural to fear contagion of some
sort from contact with such creatures, and yet the crowd is so dense
that it is impossible to entirely avoid them. Underfoot the streets are
wet, muddy, tortuous, and slippery, so that one comes from them with a
feeling that a hot bath is an immediate necessity. Why some deadly
pestilence does not at once break out and sweep away the people is a
mystery. We know that the Ghetto at Rome, which forms the most filthy
part of the Eternal City, was entirely spared when the rest of the place
was decimated by cholera; but Canton generally is far dirtier than the
Roman Ghetto.

As we found it almost impossible to traverse the streets of Canton on
foot, we were carried, each person, in a palanquin, upon the shoulders
of four coolies. These vehicles can make their way through the narrow
streets, but cannot turn round in them without going to some open space
where several streets meet. The bearers trudge along, keeping step with
each other, and uttering a loud, peculiar cry to clear the way,
reminding one of the gondoliers on the canals of Venice. People were
obliged to step into shops and doorways, or flatten themselves against
buildings, in order to make room for us to pass in the palanquins, but
they did so with a good grace and took it quite as a matter of course.
Whenever we stopped for a trifling purchase or to visit some point of
interest, a small crowd was sure to collect. The narrow lanes are lined
in many sections by stores containing very attractive goods,
curiosities, silks, fine China ware, ivory, scented woods,
mother-of-pearl and carved tortoise shell, all goods of native
manufacture. The remarkable patience and imitative skill of the Chinese
enables t