l down about her shoulders. Then
a man of ripe years, who seemed to exercise some authority in the house,
gravely pronounced these words by way of epilogue: "How! what!" said he,
"husband and wife fighting thus! and in presence of their children, in
presence of a crowd of travellers!" These words, repeated three or four
times, in a tone which expressed at once indignation and authority, had a
marvellous effect. Almost immediately afterwards the guests resumed
their dinner, the hostess fried cakes in nut-oil, and the host silently
smoked his pipe.

When we were about to depart, the innkeeper, in summing up our account,
coolly inserted fifty sapeks for the animals which we had tied up in the
court-yard during our meal. He had evidently an idea of making us pay
_en Tartare_. Samdadchiemba was indignant. "Do you think," asked he,
"that we Dchiahours don't know the rules of inns? Where did you ever
hear of making people pay for fastening their animals to a peg in the
wall? Tell me, master publican, how many sapeks are you going to charge
us for the comedy we've just witnessed of the innkeeper and his wife?"
The burst of laughter on the part of the bystanders which hailed this
sarcasm carried the day triumphantly for Samdadchiemba, and we departed
without paying anything beyond our personal expenses.

The road thence to Si-Ning-Fou, generally well made and well kept,
meanders through a fertile and well cultivated country, picturesquely
diversified by trees, hills, and numerous streams. Tobacco is the staple
of the district. We saw on our way several water-mills, remarkable for
their simplicity, as is the case with all Chinese works. In these mills,
the upper story is stationary, while the lower is turned by means of a
single wheel, kept in motion by the current. To work these mills, though
they are frequently of large proportions, a very small stream suffices,
as the stream plays upon the wheel in the form of a cascade, at least
twenty feet high.

On the day before arriving at Si-Ning-Fou, we passed over a road
extremely laborious, and so dangerously rugged that it suggested frequent
recommendations of ourselves to the protection of the Divine Providence.
Our course was amid enormous rocks, beside a deep, fierce current, the
tumultuous waves of which roared beneath us. There was the gulf
perpetually yawning to swallow us up, should we make but one false step;
we trembled, above all, for our camels, awkward and