commander opened upon them
with a talk about Formosa: "The name of the island in Chinese is Taiwan;
and it is off the province of Fu-chien, and from ninety to two hundred
and twenty miles from it. It has an area of 14,978 square miles, or
about the size of the States of Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and
Connecticut put together. It has a chain of mountains through it, the
highest peak of which"--and the speaker looked at his memoranda--"is
12,847 feet high.

"The number of inhabitants is estimated at about 2,000,000, mostly
immigrants from China, with the original natives. The island is
exceedingly rich in its vegetation, and the plants are about the same as
those of the main land. Rice paper is made of the pith of a tree found
only in Formosa. In the south sugar and turmeric are the staples. The
latter is a plant whose root is bright yellow, used in dyeing silk.
Formosa tea has become well known at home as of excellent quality. Other
productions are about the same as in southern China.

"There are plenty of birds there, but no wild animals of any consequence
that are game for the Nimrods. A great deal more might be said about the
island, but you have more now than you are likely to remember. You can
see many junks now, and the trade with China is mostly carried on in
them; and some of them are pirates in these seas, even to the south of
Hainan, for a trading-junk turns into a pirate when her captain can make
some money by it."

After lunch the Blanche's people came on board, and all hands had the
usual frolic during the afternoon and evening. The next morning the
captain told his passengers that they had passed out of the China Sea
the day before, and that they were on the Tung-hai, or Eastern Sea,
outside of which was the broad Pacific Ocean. On the third morning from
Hong-Kong, when the company came on deck, they found the Guardian-Mother
at anchor, but just getting under way with an English pilot on board,
who had been taken late the evening before.

"Where are we now, Captain Ringgold?" asked Mr. Woolridge, when the
party had seated themselves on the promenade to see what was to be
seen.

"We are at the mouth of the great river Yang-tsze-Chiang; but we shall
soon pass into a branch of it called the Woo-Sung, and find Shang-hai,
for it is correctly written with a hyphen between the syllables,"
replied the commander. "But the tide is right; and we can go over the
bar without any delay, the pilot says. It is abo