THE YANCTSE

Evening Post, Volume CXIII, Issue 141, 18 June 1927, Page 20

THE YANCTSE

THE RIVJ3R OF FRAGKA^T TEA^ -.'.' .V", „;,:;"' FIELDS.;' „...■■■'.. :

•It gives one asensation of grandeur and force. No other river can equal it in its majesty./ It is the artery of a continent, and all the immensity of l>h)na is revealed -in its proportions. Long after the boat leaves Shanghai one still believes oneself at sea, Tbo banks are jn visible on either side, and only the colour of the water, thick with alluvial slime, betrays the. river, the god whq for thousands of years has nourished tho swarms of yellow humanity. £uch is the Yangtsc. Tho Chineso know it by many fond names, but tho eweetest appellation is that of the river of fragrant tea fleWs. When the narrower bed is reached and the earth and mountains appear, its stronger pnrrent, its incalculable volume impress as much (writes T.M. in the "Melbourne Ago"). The valley of tho Yangtse is another Holland, only vaster, more intimately happy, a tableau of exquisite enchantment which is never dimmed, On ejther side stretches the incomparable verdant land, gift of tho wators, -rich in products, a big, uninterrupted garden. JJoyer were there fields of such emorald green. A humid light is caressing the landscape. A subtle haze of vaporous air enwraps everything and rives an inexhaustible charm to the most conr|tnonplace objects. Never was . there "such a silvery translucency of atmosphere. Willows are rippling in the wind, the grey sky is ■limned with shifting tints, the grey magically shaded, tinged, with blue and rose and primrose, There are no crude huos.' Anyone who has had the pleasure of examining old Chinese porcelain must bo impressed with the .harmony subtlety, and exquisiteness of its colouring. In the sldesabovo the Yangtse ono finds the same colours. Might not the old Chinese potters havo marvelled at the cplours ipf those skies, loved them so^ well, taken pleasure in studying them, as. an astronomer studies stars and filched Ishbse very colours and inado' them liya again in their.porcelain? . I have heard artfsts give impression to such n view, and, having seen Chineso porcelain and knowing the beauty of the Yangtse sky, I, too, must subscribe ! to that theory, . Tho exact length of the Yangtso has never be.en gome say it is 3000 miles,: others put it at 2500. Its source is in the far-away mountains of Tibet, and, following tho melting of the snows in the spring of the year, the turbulence of the river is unpar'alled. The Yangtso is far above the Amazon in importance. The ocean tide flows up the river for 300 miles, and it is navigable for ?000 miles. Many quaint p]d. towns and quainter villages nestle on -its shores, and ever and anon ono chances upon temples and pagodas towering on the rocks above its banks. Dangerous rapids are encpnntered at several places, but the Chinese fisherman js as capable in shooting rapids as the Red Indian. The menace of floods on the yangtse is ever present. Hankow in particular is always menaced. Colossal dykes hav.e-been- erected but the ri^er refused to -be" bridled! Ten times in r twenty-five centuries it has changed its course, and brought death to millions. Tho floods of the Mississippi, even cannot be compared with those of tho Yangtse. . ■ -. In tho immense plain of the Yangtse the heart of. China beats.. The flowery land, the wondrous sky, the broad river all combine to make it *?a laud of the blest." Time there was wheD this huge garden was alive with peace-loving peasants, whose only pleasure was the cultivating of their crops, who never wandered far from their fields, and lived and died near, ..very, near, to the heart of Nature. The most beautiful and fruitful garden in the world has now become a wilderness. The peasants hare been plundered .by marauding: soldiery, or forced into the ranks of. the various factions. Junks, With 'their picturesque- sails, are seldom seen. Foreign warships have taken their posts on the l-vier, Nothing is as it was except the dreaming sky, with its shifting tints, whence old Chinese potters took the »bionFs for their •jiorselarn.