the water, the forts half-way down the mountain’s side, and the city
built on the long easy slope running into the capacious bay, where the
wharfs, docks, mooring-buoys, and the like give unmistakable evidences
of the maritime importance of the place. The men at the clubs on shore,
both English and German, will tell the traveller that Hong-Kong ranks
as the fourth port in the world in the amount of shipping that annually
passes through its waters: a few years ago this was estimated to be
above 12,000,000 tons, which, if correct, would give Hong-Kong nearly
as much as New York.
Should the traveller desire to visit China and Japan, he must
disembark at Hong-Kong. This he will do regretfully, for he has become
attached to his ship, her officers, and his messmates. He has been well
and courteously treated throughout a long and at times tedious voyage,
during which everything has been done to make him comfortable and
contented. Really, the main differences existing between the steamers
of the different companies are those of route and time. For instance,
the P. & O. lands the passenger at Hong-Kong, 44 days from London,
via Gibraltar, Malta, the Canal, Bombay, Colombo, and Singapore, a
total distance of 9,800 miles. At every main port touched en route, no
matter by what line, at least 6 hours, oftener 12 or 24 hours, can be
had on shore in which to see the place, and there are no annoyances or
vexations as to custom-house duties or inspections. The M. M. line,
which departs from Marseilles, touches at Naples, and reaches Hong-Kong
via the Canal, Aden, Colombo, Singapore, and Saigon, goes over 8,160
miles of water in 36 days. The German mail, leaving Bremen and Antwerp
and going by way of the Canal via Colombo and Singapore, traverses
10,223 miles in 43 days. The Austrian Lloyd, from Trieste via Bombay,
makes port in 50 days, after a journey of 8,345 miles.
To visit Canton the steamboat should be taken that leaves Hong-Kong
daily. The trip of 7 hours’ duration will be enlivened by the noisy
Chinese passengers on board, and by the numerous Chinese junks
constantly passed as they are going up and down the river under sails
and oars. The traveller will also encounter some Europeans, who will
gladly tell him good stories and put him up at their snug little
club-house on the Shameen, the island connected with Canton, where
the white population resides. Canton should be seen; it is a typical
Chinese city into which modern civilization has made no visible headway.
Returning to Hong-Kong, the water-front offers much that is attractive.
Thousands of junks lie in rows, anchored off the harbor, and thousands
more are moored along the sea-wall; the noise made by the crews of
these boats, beating gongs, firing crackers, singing, shouting,
and burning papers and joss-sticks to their favorite Buddhas, is
pandemonium. On shore coolies trot about in couples, with long
bamboo-poles on their shoulders, transporting chests of tea, silk,
matting, etc., from the junks to the big storehouses and from the
storehouses to the lighters to be towed alongside the steamers, where
the bales are hoisted into the holds.
[Illustration: Landing Passengers at Natal, South Africa.]
At this port the traveller will find a newly organized transpacific
service, running by way of Yokohama to Vancouver, where connection
is made with the Canadian Pacific Railway to Quebec and Halifax, and
thence to London. The line, as at present formed, consists of three
magnificent steamers, sailing monthly. The Empress of India, the
pioneer of the line, made the voyage early in 1891 from Yokohama to
Vancouver in the unprecedented time of 10 days and 15 hours.
Observing the steamers closely, the traveller will discover that one
of them is flying a different flag from those he has been accustomed
to see while on the journey along the great Indian Ocean highway: the
stars-and-stripes belong to one of the vessels of the Pacific Mail
Steamship Company of the United States.
The Pacific Mail Steamship Company was organized in 1847, at the
time of the colonization of the Pacific States, and gained notoriety
by despatching one of its first vessels, the California, from New
York, in 1848, to San Francisco by way of Cape Horn. The successful
termination of this extraordinary performance, in those early days
of steam navigation, enabled the company to inaugurate a steamship
service between Panama and San Francisco. The route thus opened was
from New York to Colon (Aspinwall), and thence across the Isthmus to
Panama, where the steamer was in waiting to run up the Mexican coast to
California. The transpacific route was commenced in 1867, soon after
the opening of the Pacific Railroad, and is now worked in conjunction
with an English line, the Oriental & Occidental.
The traveller bound from Hong-Kong for Yokohama can take either the
Canadian Pacific steamers or the Pacific Mail. If, however, he is
anxious to see the ports of China and Japan before entering on the
great thoroughfare of the Pacific Ocean, he has at his choice several
efficient lines of local and coasting steamers, that will bear him
safely to the different treaty ports and afford him all the time he
will require for sight-seeing.
Most of the European mail lines go to Shanghai, and the coasting lines
of both China and Japan make it a stopping-place. Shanghai is worth a
visit because of the different European ways of living in China. The
city is composed of sections where each nation has established its own
settlement, contiguous to, but quite distinct from, that of any other
nation. There is an American town, an English town, a French town, a
German town, and a Chinese town, each preserving its own language and
society, and as far as possible its own architecture.
The Mitsu Bishe line of steamers, the Nippon Yusen, and two or three
others, ply between the ports of Japan along the really beautiful
inland passage, and up the Japan Sea. If one be interested in Japanese
ceramics, swords, armor, and antiquities, he should take this way trip;
eventually bringing up at Yokohama, whence a railway ride of an hour
will land him in Tokio.
At Yokohama passage is secured for San Francisco, 5,000 miles to the
eastward, across the broadest part of the Pacific Ocean. This route
is one of the longest direct lines between two places that is steamed
over by the ships of any company. It is a dull and monotonous voyage;
nothing but blue water for 18 days, no land is seen, no strange sail
sighted, rarely even do gales of wind blow hard enough to make things
lively. The cabin passengers are principally Americans returning to
their native land, a few Englishmen making the round of the world,
a couple of Australians full of talk of the greatness of their own
country and sceptical as to the advance and improvement of any other;
some Japanese, curious, polite, intelligent; one or two rich Chinamen
who keep to themselves, and a sprinkling of other nationalities. This
heterogeneous crowd gets on well together, plays cards, makes pools on
each day’s run, discusses the 180th meridian question, as to why the
week is one day longer than seven, jokes, laughs, reads, smokes, and
drinks.
The steerage passengers are mostly Chinamen returning to California
after a visit home. Special accommodations are fitted for them. Not
infrequently the Chinese in large numbers take passage on the Pacific
Mail to be landed at Honolulu. This will give the traveller a day in
port, when he should go on shore to enjoy Sandwich Island hospitality,
and see the Hoola-hoola—a native dance that must be prearranged and
paid for, since it is interdicted by the Government because of its
supposed demoralizing influence—on the native. After a voyage of 2,000
miles in 7 days to the northeast, the steamer enters the Golden Gate,
and passes up to the city of San Francisco. A six-day run by railroad,
and the traveller is once again back in New York.
The whole distance travelled by the way described is, in round numbers,
23,000 miles, and the time taken to do this may have been but 80 or 90
days, or more; the longer the better, for it requires plenty of time
to enjoy a trip around the world. It also requires money. About $1,000
would be necessary for passage money alone; double this amount would
be sufficient to take the traveller in comfort and ease, and upon his
arrival home he would consider it money admirably spent.
* * * * *
The traveller reaching San Francisco by the above highway of
circumnavigation can further add to his knowledge of strange countries
by selecting a sea journey to New York, instead of a land run by
railroad across the continent. To go by sea passage must be secured
on board a Pacific Mail coasting steamer, the only line running to
Mexico, Central America, and Panama. Steaming down the beautiful coast
of California, stopping at picturesque harbors in Mexico, anchoring
off roadsteads of Central America, taking on and off a few passengers,
an Englishman, a German, an American, handling cargo—such is the rough
log of the cruise of 20 days and 3,200 miles until the splendid Bay of
Panama is reached. The eight or ten ports of call are better seen from
the ship than from the shore. The enchantment of distance gives way
upon close examination to pity and disgust, for dirt, indigence, and a
total ignorance of how to live decently are noticeable everywhere.
At Panama two widely different routes leading to the United States are
offered: the one goes over the Isthmus of Panama by rail and thence to
New York by sea; the other stretches away down the west coast of South
America, through the Straits of Magellan, and up the Atlantic highway.
By the first route the railway journey over the 45 miles of land
separating the Pacific from the Atlantic Ocean, crosses, recrosses, and
runs beside the deserted canal, affording ocular proof of the failure
of the scheme. At both Panama and Colon the same appearance of being
left is noticeable. The business of the two ports is one of transit
only, but is sufficiently great to furnish employment to some thousands
of Americans and Jamaicans.
Nearly a dozen steamship lines leave Colon for ports in the United
States, Europe, the West Indies, and the neighboring coasts, and by
one or two of them the traveller can run up to Greytown, where he will
have an opportunity to see the Nicaraguan Canal. This canal, when
completed, will make important changes in existing routes between the
United States and Europe at one end of the line, and the west coast of
the American Continent, China, Japan, and Australasia at the other. For
instance, the route from London to Sydney is 12,500 miles, via the Suez
Canal; by the Nicaraguan Canal the distance will be less than 12,000
miles. And if the lengths of the routes from the Atlantic seaboards
to the Pacific seaboards, both east and west, be compared with those
now followed, the great saving by the Nicaraguan gateway becomes still
more apparent. Returning to Colon, the traveller boards the north-bound
steamer, and lands in New York, 2,000 miles distant, in 8 days.
It may be, however, that the traveller decides upon proceeding by the
second route, leading from Panama to New York. If so, he books on
board a steamer belonging to the Pacific Steam Navigation Company of
England, a powerful organization having the contract for carrying the
mails, and controlling almost exclusively the Isthmian trade to and
from South America. The ships of the Company run into all the ports of
consequence on the west coast, and the lines extend from Valparaiso
by way of Magellan Straits to the river Plate and Brazil ports, and
thence to Lisbon and England. An important point for consideration in
connection with this southern trip is the probability of there being a
revolution in progress in some of the countries to be visited, which
might interfere with going on shore.
At length the steamer leaves Panama, and the passenger for the United
States begins his long journey. His companions are very few, South
Americans, principally, bound for ports along the coast, so he is left
to his own resources. He can read, and lounge, and make good friends
with the officers of the ship, who are Englishmen. At night he can
stretch out in his steamer chair and dream away the warm hours gazing
at the “majestical roof fretted with golden fire.”
From Panama to Valparaiso, some 3,100 miles, 25 ports are touched at,
which, Callao excepted, are of no special interest. Callao, the seaport
of Peru, is in itself unattractive, the town and the people are dirty;
the empty docks, the lazy inhabitants, the atmosphere of _laissez
aller_, confirm the opinion that the place and all around it have
had their day. From Callao the traveller should go to Lima, 7 miles
distant by rail, and take the Oroya Railway to the top of the Andes,
15,000 feet above the sea-level: the wonderful engineering ability
displayed in constructing this road will prove quite as impressive as
the truly magnificent mountain scenery. Two days will suffice to make
the excursion and bring him back to Lima, an old Spanish city with many
interesting corners. The cathedral should be visited; in the crypt lie
the bones of the great Pizarro. A dirty Cholo shows them. Reverently
pulling aside a ragged curtain from before a dingy stone bench, he
exclaims, “Behold the bones of Francisco Pizarro!” Their state of
perfect preservation and symmetry of arrangement might incline one to
doubt the truth of the statement.
[Illustration: The Port of Valparaiso in a Norther.]
Leaving Callao, en route for Valparaiso, the steamer makes several
ports; some of them interesting because of the recent war operations,
but otherwise they had better be viewed from the ship’s deck, for the
same low adobe dwellings and squalid existence characterize them all.
After 11 days of pleasant weather Valparaiso is reached. Valparaiso is
built on several hill slopes running to the water from a high ridge
back of the city. It is a place of great activity; the docks are piled
high with freight, the people move about with spirit, the harbor is
full of ships, and there is that general air which betokens financial
soundness and commercial prosperity. The streets are noticeably clean,
the buildings are of good architecture, the stores are inviting, and
the frequently recurring signs in English, French, and German, and
the people met, are indicative of the cosmopolitan nature of the
inhabitants.
The Bay of Valparaiso is open to the northward, from which point the
heavy gales blow, raising a long rolling sea that works considerable
damage to shipping. Steamers weigh and stand out when these blows come
on.
Valparaiso has connection, via Magellan Straits, with Montevideo, 2,750
miles distant, by means of four or five lines of good steamships. The
P. S. N.—as the Pacific Steam Navigation Company is called—runs vessels
over this route. So do the Cosmos and Hamburg Companies, German lines;
there are besides French and Italian lines.
Since leaving Panama, 21 days ago, the weather along the Pacific
highway has been uniformly pleasant—for northers are infrequent—the
breezes have been light and warm from the southward, the sea long
and smooth, and the ship seldom out of sight of the bare sandy hills
running along the shore, or the towering Andes stretching away in the
background. To the south from Valparaiso, however, this changes. It
grows colder, the sea gets rougher, and by the time the Gulf of Peñas,
the entrance to the inside passage, is reached, the chances are it
will be thick and unsettled, with every prospect of a foul gale. When
the storm breaks it is tremendous; in no other part of the world do
winds blow harder or seas rise higher; lofty ships carry low sails
hereabouts, and steamers frequently have to lie to.
The mad ocean is left astern when the ship enters the inside passage
leading along the coast of Patagonia and the Straits of Magellan. Here
the scene is one of unparalleled magnificence. High bare walls of
stone, towering barren cliffs, lofty snow-capped peaks, weather-scarred
mountains down whose furrowed sides extend steel-blue glaciers—all
reveal nature in her most majestic and awe-inspiring form.
From Sandy Point, a small settlement midway in the strait, where coal
can be obtained, to Cape Virgins, 150 miles beyond, the lay of the land
is less varied and attractive. At the Cape the ship enters on the
tempestuous Atlantic highway, and heads northward for Montevideo, 1,300
miles away. Five days later the anchor is let go about 3 miles off the
city. The traveller must remember, when going on shore at Montevideo,
that pamperos blow frequently, raising a nasty cross-sea which makes
boating very uncertain. Several well-known lines of foreign vessels
make Montevideo a port of call; among them the Messageries Maritimes;
the North German Lloyds, the Austro-Hungarian Lloyds, and the Italian
Mail. Of the many other lines, English, French, German, Italian,
Spanish, and Brazilian, to be seen in the harbor, none is of more
importance than the Royal Mail Steam Packet Company, of Southampton.
In 1842 this steamship company was the first that carried mails to the
West Indies from Europe. It began the Brazilian and River Plate (Rio
de la Plata) mail service in 1850. To-day its routes include the West
India Islands, Mexico, and Central and South America.
The regular liners to Montevideo, and the several local and coasting
steamers, come to off Buenos Ayres, 100 miles to the southeastward. The
extensive harbor works, for the purpose of making the city a deep-water
port, at once excite admiration. Both Montevideo and Buenos Ayres
are attractive cities of regular streets, many substantial houses,
public buildings with Italian marble façades, Spanish cathedrals,
and extensive suburbs of handsome residences surrounded by beautiful
gardens. The mean temperature of the two places, 63°, corresponds with
that of Palermo and Rome. The business of Montevideo is good, the
imports of merchandise, machinery, and manufactured articles exceeding
$22,000,000, and the exports of hides, horns, wool, and beef being
valued at $15,000,000. The trade of Buenos Ayres is much larger, the
imports being valued at $88,000,000, the exports at $65,000,000.
The traveller for Rio Janeiro can take a coasting line if he desires
to visit southern Brazil; otherwise, any one of the big mail ships
will make the run of 1,150 miles in 6 days. The port of Rio, large,
deep, and the most beautiful in the world, is entered by a channel a
mile and a half wide, defended by forts. Inside the bay is 17 miles
long by 10 miles broad. The town is most attractive from the water.
It is especially picturesque at night, when the arrangement of the
innumerable gas-lights distinctly outlines the entire city, built on
a gentle incline toward the bay. The streets are narrow, badly paved,
and not over-clean. The traveller will find that he can get on well
enough if he talk French, for there is a certain French air about
the community. Many of the stores have French signs, nearly all the
shopkeepers speak French, it is the language of the hotel clerks, the
opera bouffe sings it, and the black-eyed señoritas murmur it.
Rio is connected with Europe by 12 regular lines of steamships, and
with the United States by 3. New York being the traveller’s objective
port, he should take passage on board one of the vessels of the United
States & Brazil Mail Steamship Company, flying the American flag. Since
leaving Panama, 40 odd days ago, the tourist has steamed over 7,000
miles of ocean highway, yet throughout all this time and distance, he
has never once seen the stars-and-stripes. The ships of the United
States & Brazil Mail Steamship Company are despatched monthly from Rio,
making stops at Bahia, Pernambuco, Maranham, and Para in Brazil. At
Para a most interesting route is offered by regular steamers running
up the Amazon to Manaos, 1,000 miles away; thence, irregular vessels
go 2,000 miles farther. From Para the United States & Brazil Company
makes Barbadoes, of the Windward Isles, in 5 days—a healthy, delightful
winter resort, where a mean daily temperature of 80° is tempered by the
steady northeast trade-winds.
The weather along the Atlantic highway, from the river Plate to the
Windward Islands, is for the most part fine, clear, and warm, with
occasional rain-squalls when on the line, and possibly a stiff blow
when rounding Cape St. Roque. Excepting the pleasure incident to being
at sea, there is little to excite the traveller, for the passengers
are few, Americans and South Americans, and are not addicted to
much amusement. Lounging, reading, smoking, and walking the deck,
conversation and cards pass the time.
At Barbadoes the traveller enters the waters of the West India Islands.
These islands present a great contrast to South America, not only in
physical features, but in weather and population. During the winter
months the northeast trades blow at times with force enough to raise a
rough sea. During the summer season hurricanes are to be feared. The
differences of race characteristics are more noticeable than those of
the weather. Instead of the lazy, polite, cruel South Americans, the
traveller encounters the ubiquitous West Indian darky, celebrated for
his insolence, chaff, and annoying persistence.
From Barbadoes the steamer shapes her course for the Island of St.
Thomas, a day’s run of 300 miles. St. Thomas is a place of great
shipping activity. It communicates with Europe by lines running to
England, France, Germany, and Spain. It is the West India head-quarters
of the Royal Mail Steam Packet Company, and the central point from
which branch lines radiate that will take the traveller to any or all
of the islands, as he desires.
Now that the West Indies, the Bahamas, and Cuba are growing in favor as
winter resorts, the lines and routes of steamers from the West Indies
are many and various. For instance, to reach New York the Clyde and
Atlas lines sail from Hayti; the New York Cuba line from Cuba and the
Bahamas; the New York & Porto Rico line from St. Johns; the Red D line
from Curaçao and Colombian ports; the Quebec Steamship Company from St.
Kitts and other Windward Islands and Bermuda; the Atlas, Honduras, &
Central America and Wessels lines from Jamaica, and the Trinidad line
from Port of Spain, Grenada, and Guiana. The Plant line from Jamaica
lands the traveller in Tampa, Fla., a place in communication with
Havana, as is New Orleans.
If, however, the traveller has taken none of these minor routes, but
stayed by the United States & Brazil steamer at St. Thomas, he is
landed in New York, 1,450 miles distant, in 6 days.
The whole voyage from San Francisco around the American continent to
New York, along the ocean highways commonly navigated by the larger
steamships, is 16,500 miles long. The time taken to make this distance
is about 100 days. The cost of the journey for tickets, transfers, and
unavoidable delays is $1,000; $2,000 will enable the passenger to do it
comfortably.
[Illustration: Steamer at Anchor, Simon’s Bay, Cape of Good Hope.]
The traveller from New York has been gone from start to finish, by the
ocean highways to Europe, India, China, San Francisco, South America,
and back to New York, nearly 200 days; has steamed over about 40,000
miles of water, and has spent $4,000. He has learned that there are
other lands and other peoples than his own worthy his admiration and
study. Let him take a year and $5,000 for this rounding the world, and
he will be better satisfied and better informed, and appreciate more
fully that “going to sea clears a man’s head of much nonsense of his
wigwam.”
* * * * *
The fourth great ocean thoroughfare, the route around the Cape of Good
Hope to Africa, Australia, and the East, is traversed by many fine
steamers. The way lies from Europe via Madeira, Cape Verd, St. Helena,
West Africa, and Cape Town, thence to East Africa via Mauritius to
Australia, whence the Occident line leaves for New Zealand, Samoa,
Sandwich Islands, and San Francisco. This long route covers 30,000
miles. To reach the Cape, 6,000 miles from England, the two well-known
English mail lines, the Union Steamship Company and the Castle Mail
Packets Company offer the most attractive routes; the steamer service
of both is of the highest order. The time out is 18 days, the fare
about $180.