SATURDAY, December 7.

To-day we walked through the fish and vegetable markets. It was funny to see the people making their purchases. Each one carries a small stick with a weight attached to it. This serves as a weighing-beam, and every fowl, fish, and vegetable is carefully weighed by the customer. No cheating of a brother Celestial by the seller. We pass now and then a shop where nothing is dealt in but Joss-money; hundreds in every place are engaged in its manufacture. It is made out of thin gold and silver paper, in the horseshoe ingot form of genuine "sice." I bought a box containing eight pieces for thirty cents. Some of it also is made in imitation of silver dollars. This bogus money is laid upon the altars of the temples as offerings to the gods, who are supposed to find as much use for it as if it were genuine; and no doubt this is the case. It would therefore be a great pity, says the Heathen Chinee, to waste the real article, although I doubt not the priests would infinitely prefer it.

We attended a "paper-hunt" in the afternoon. Between forty and fifty riders, all Europeans, on small horses, started across country, the route having been previously laid down by means of small pieces of white paper scattered at every point where one of the innumerable little creeks was to be crossed. The finish was a rare sight. The banks of the creeks were very muddy, falls were numerous, and several of the riders came in besmirched from head to foot. Europeans take to horses here, and a race-course is maintained. The animals are a small breed from the north, which are now known as Shanghai ponies. I do not think I could enjoy the sport of paper-hunting here. The exposed coffins and graves one has to gallop over from end to end of the hunt are not calculated to enhance one's pleasure; but perhaps one would in time get used even to them, though I doubt it.

It was sad to see the roadway which had been prepared for the railroad from Woosung, at the mouth of the river, to this city, a distance of about twelve miles. The rails had actually been laid in some places when a decree from Peking ordered their removal. No better location in the empire could have been found to prove the advantages of railway travel, and I believe, if it had been finished, the Chinese would have quickly appreciated the benefits to be derived from it. Britain will some day find in China its best field for railway enterprise. By the time we next visit Shanghai we expect to see not only the rails restored to this line, but also many other miles in successful operation.

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