THE NAY VOF THE YANGTSE

Waipa Post, Volume 32, Issue 1929, 2 November 1926, Page 2

THE NAY VOF THE YANGTSE

WITH THE BRITISH FJjEET UN CHINA. Of Ithjd Britislh fleet .in China, which' ranks next to It he/ Mediterranean as the .most important fioireign naval starition, the Yangtse Patrol iforms no inconsiderable .paiit. It consists of 15 :|'Jnboats, half a .dozen armed river siteamers, and a numil|sir of launches, mjamnelJi in all by about a /thousand officers .and itieln. The nine largest gunboats, known as the "linsect" class were 'built during the war to fight Austrian mianitors on the Danube, but Fate derailed ithjcim thi s high advenlture, and Ith-eiy lhave since proved uncommonly useful for service in a very different sphere ('wlrites Mr Oec|tor C. Bywater in the London Daily News). llhose who have not seen the Yangtse (which the Chlinejse always call "'Chang Kiang," meaning "Great River ") can form no adequate conception of this wonderful artery. iFlrom l.s source in the mystericluß highlands of Tibet to the sea is a distance of at leapt 3000 miles. Ills volume of water has been esifcim/ated at 246 Mimes -tlh-at of the Thames at London Bridge, lit kravarses seven great provinces, and •the population o'£ its 'basin approaches 2001,000,000. Travelling up from. Shanghai you may cover 600 miles bte,for|e! the banks begin to narrow, - ©aid even then Ithey •are a mile apart. Fifteen hundred miles from the .s'eia the river is sltill half a miKei wid'e), and lit Continues to be navigable as far as Pragsban, in the hearfc off Szechuan. jWell may the OL'inese exclaim, " Lo, this, mighty current hastens fto its imperial audience with! Ithe ocean ! " oi For the. firslt 1200 milfe's or so Blsvigat'ion lils easy, even for large vessels. Great ocean-going steamers can reach, tihe wharves of Hankow, " th|» miilionpeopledl cUty," 600 miles from, the coast. 'But above Hchang, where the cotton

and other produce wbich have been brought down from the far interior by junks and transhipp|gd into cargo steamers, the turgid yellow stream becomes a paging torrent .infested wiUh. .rocks and rapids, where none bu(t the most boatmen can .pass without extreme peril. The/ pandrama of shiipping baffles description. Big ocean freighters are .seen ch£|2k by jowil witlh double-decked Mandarin junks, each poled or tugged by its regiment'of boatmen save when the wind is dead astern. Small passenger junks, wbich ,can s ail a(s near this- wind as a Wherry, sampans, cormorant boats, lorchas, and nondescript vessels down ]to rafts form an /unending and bewildering procession. And h'eire and Ithere may be seen the low, white-ptalinted bull of a Bfriltish gunboat, moving sedately among the thronging traffic, always ready to bear a hand to vessels in distress, and keeping an unobtrusive but vigilant eye on certain craft which, "from information received," are suspected of using l.lhe river for sinister purposes of their own. Ouir naval men of the Yangtse Patrol do not find life dulft Even in normal times it is no infreiqufeint experience to be fusiladed from the bank by brigands or prowling soldiery, to whom a forelign ensign lis an irresistible target. But save in exceptional •cireumy|tanc|e's our gunboatis do not reply. They 'are there for police work,' and may not fight except as a last resort. Impressiive && it looks on paper, the Yangtse flotilla is small enough fior the work it has} Ito do. Each gunboat (has a " beat" of somja: 150 miles, and even 'when they patrol in couplets they sometimes find 1 Ithemselves in a tight ■jorner, as the Cockchafer and the Widgeon did recently. Our Yangtse gunboat officers have to be diplomats first and fighlting men afterwards. They m)u(st kmow how to soothe the ruffled dignitiy <of a local Podh-Bah,

and when Ito make graceful 'concessions wi'thoult loss of "(face." The iron hand is Rfh-ei-fei beneath the velvet •glove, but lit must be shown only in the last extremity. Other IPowers, it is itrue, maintain their own gunboats on the riv'elr, but tlhere is sample proof that upon our Yangtss Pato'rol diependls in veiry large inieasure the safety oif peaceful traffic along the greatest commercial waiterway of the world.