d smooth green slopes grew plainer and
plainer, while in the background towered the great blue mass of Victoria
Peak, at the foot of which lies Hong-Kong.

[Illustration: CHINESE FISHING FLEET OFF CANTON.]

Frank was not a little puzzled by a number of strange-looking brown
objects that lay close inshore, tumbling and bobbing about like
porpoises. But as the steamer approached, they turned out to be Chinese
"sampans" and fishing-boats, hard at work. Some had white sails
criss-crossed with strips of bamboo, others huge brown sails of woven
matting, like bats' wings; and altogether--what with the brightly
painted boats, the queer faces and gestures of the pigtailed fishermen,
the barking of the big dogs which seemed to act as sentries, the
glittering scales of the fish that came pouring out of the nets, and lay
flapping on the deck, the general bustle and activity--it was a sight
well worth seeing.

Over the after-part of each boat was an awning of straw or matting,
under which the fisherman's family could be seen at work upon their
morning meal of rice and fish, flipping it into their mouths with long
knitting-needles, which Herrick said were the famous Chinese
"chopsticks." They hardly took the trouble to look round at the steamer
as she passed, seeming to care very little whether she happened to run
them down or not.

And now larger junks began to appear, together with not a few foreign
vessels, which seemed to start out of the solid mountain, for as yet no
opening was to be seen. But all at once the _Arizona_ made a sharp turn
to port, around the elbow of a huge headland, and there, through a gap
in the cliffs, appeared the beautiful harbor of Hong-Kong, right
ahead.[2]

"Dutch Gap, by hoe-cake!" cried a tall Virginian, with a joyful grin.

"Ah! don't I jist wish it was!" muttered another, who was beginning to
feel a touch of poor Dick Calamity's complaint.

Gliding past the pretty little islet that sentinels the entrance, the
_Arizona_ ran in and dropped anchor, while the rival steamer, came
slowly up behind her.

[TO BE CONTINUED.]

FOOTNOTES:

[1] A fact.

[2] The Russian port of Balaklava, in the Crimea, has an entrance of the
same kind.

THE STORY OF A WINGED TRAMP.

BY FLETCHER READE.

Tramps, you think, are a modern invention, and a very disagreeable one,
too; but if you had chanced to live so long ago as when the earth was
young, you would know that the institution is a very old a