he children look healthy and
happy too, in spite of these apparent drawbacks, and notwithstanding
the fact that in many cases their poor little feet must be cruelly
tortured by the practice of bandaging them tightly to make them small.

When we got back to Shameen there was time for a stroll along the
Bund. It is very pleasant, for the river runs close under the parapet,
and its surface is always covered with junks, sampans, and boats and
ships, going swiftly up or down with the strong tide. The walk is
shaded with trees, and seats stand at intervals all along it.

An agreeable saunter was followed by a quiet, pleasant little dinner,
and though we have been here only a few days we feel quite sorry that
this is to be our last night in Canton, so kind has everybody been to
us.

[Illustration: Chinese Foot and boot.]

_Monday, March 5th_.--I was awake and writing from half-past four this
morning, but before I got up, a woman who comes here every day to work
brought me some small ordinary shoes which I had purchased as
curiosities, and took the opportunity of showing me her feet. It
really made me shudder to look at them, so deformed and cramped up
were they, and, as far as I could make out, she must have suffered
greatly in the process of reducing them to their present diminutive
size. She took off her own shoes and tottered about the room in those
she had brought, and then asked me to show her one of mine. Having
most minutely examined it, she observed, with a melancholy shake of
the head, 'Missisy foot much more good, do much walky, walky; mine
much bad, no good for walky.'

Having said farewell to our kind hostess, we went off in the
house-boat to the steamer. There was a great crowd on the lower
deck--at least 900 Chinamen--to struggle through in order to reach the
European quarters. We found other friends on board, who had come to
see us off.

A few minutes before nine o'clock the bell rang as a signal for our
friends' departure, and we steamed ahead, among such a crowd of
sampans and junks that it was more like moving through a town than
along a river. No accident, however, occurred, though one junk and one
sampan had the very narrowest escape.

The voyage down took much longer than our voyage up, on account of the
tide being against us, and in consequence we did not reach Hongkong
until 3.30 p.m., when the gig with the children was soon alongside. We
got off as soon as we could, for we expected some friends