VOYAGE TO SAIGON.--ARRIVAL IN COCHIN CHINA.
The voyage from Hong-kong to Saigon was neither long nor unpleasant. The
weather was fine, and the wind favored the progress of the steamer. The
Doctor explained that the north-east monsoon was blowing at that season
of the year, and it was to be relied on with such certainty that the
steamship companies arranged their time-tables with reference to it. The
boys had heard something about the monsoons before this, and Fred
determined that he would study the subject sufficiently to have a clear
understanding of it. So he questioned the Doctor, and examined all the
books he could find that had anything to say about the monsoons, and
when he thought his information was complete he proceeded to put it on
paper.
[Illustration: HURRICANE DURING THE CHANGE OF THE MONSOON.]
Here is Fred's essay on the winds of the Eastern seas:
"The word 'monsoon' comes from the Arabic _musim_, which means 'season,'
and the winds are so called because they blow in alternate seasons,
first in one direction and then in the other. On the coast of China the
wind is from the south-west from April to October, and is then called
the south-west monsoon; for the other half of the year it blows from the
north-east, and is then called the north-east monsoon. There is
generally a period of about two weeks when the winds are irregular at
each change from one monsoon to the other, and at this time the
ship-masters are very fearful of severe storms, with heavy rain and much
thunder and lightning.
[Illustration: A FAVORING MONSOON.]
"The monsoon winds are known all over the Eastern seas, from the coast
of China to the shores of Arabia. Their periods of blowing are so well
understood that the steamship captains know exactly when they may be
expected, and their voyages are arranged accordingly. On the printed
time-tables of all the steamship companies you will find 'monsoon
allowances;' and on the coast of India there are certain ports where the
ships cannot touch at all when the monsoon is unfavorable. The
Peninsular and Oriental Steam Navigation Company allows four days for
its ships between Suez and Shanghai when the monsoon is against them,
and one day on the voyage between Hong-kong and Yokohama. The French
mail steamers have the same allowances. In August, when the south-west
wind is blowing, a steamer goes from Hong-kong to Yokohama in seven
days; but in April, when the wind is the other way, she is allowed eight
days for the voyage.
"The monsoons are caused just like all other winds--by the heated air
rising and cold air rushing in to fill its place. In summer, when the
sun is over Asia and the ground becomes heated to a high degree, the air
rises, and the cooler air from the south comes to fill up the space.
This makes the south-west monsoon; and when the seasons change, and it
becomes summer in the southern hemisphere and winter in the northern,
then the air goes the other way, and the wind blows from the north-east.
This is the north-east monsoon.
[Illustration: RUNNING BEFORE THE TRADE-WIND.]
"The monsoons should not be mistaken for the trade-winds which blow in
the Atlantic and Pacific oceans, and also in the southern part of the
Indian Ocean. The monsoons change every half year, as I have explained,
but the trade-winds blow regularly all the year round in the same
direction. They are caused by the warm air rising from the vicinity of
the equator, owing to the great heat, and the cool air rushing in from
the south and from the north. The trade-winds have been so named because
they have been of great assistance to commerce; sailing-ships can
calculate their voyages with great accuracy by means of these winds, and
I have read and heard of ships in the trade-winds that sailed for twenty
or thirty days without moving a rope or altering the position of a sail.
They went along ten or twelve miles an hour, and the sailors had nothing
to do but lie around the deck or in the forecastle, and amuse themselves
in any way they liked."
Fred read his production to the Doctor and Frank as they sat on deck,
the second day of the voyage from Hong-kong. Frank wanted a copy, but
took the precaution to ask the Doctor if it was all correct. The latter
said it was entirely, so far as he knew, but it did not tell the whole
story. Thereupon Frank set at work to find something additional, and in
the course of an hour or so he offered the following post-script to the
essay of his cousin:
"In studying about the trade-winds and the monsoons, I find that they do
not blow directly north or directly south, as we might suppose they
would if they came in to fill up the vacancy caused by the rising of the
heated air. North of the equator the trade-winds blow from the
north-east, and south of it they are from the south-east. The
inclination to the east is caused by the rotary motion of the earth from
east to west. The earth slips from under the wind while turning on its
axis, and it is really the earth that makes the slope of the wind, and
not the wind itself. Something like it may be seen when a boat crosses a
river. The boatman may try to pull straight across, but if he does so
the current carries him down, and he is unable to land opposite his
starting-point. The only way he can do so is by going obliquely against
the stream.
"The monsoons get their direction in the same way as the trade-winds get
theirs; with this difference, that the south-west monsoon starts near
the equator, and not in the southern hemisphere, like the south-east
trade-wind. The rotary motion of the earth is greater at the equator
than it is in the northern latitudes, and so the wind gets a westerly
inclination instead of an easterly one, as in the case of the
trade-wind. Some of the scientific men say that the north-east monsoon
is not a monsoon at all, but only the north-east trade-wind taking its
regular course, which has been disturbed by the more powerful wind from
the south-west."
"Very good," remarked the Doctor, when Frank read what he had written.
"I am a little fearful, however, that it will not be understood by
everybody, and so we will drop the dry subject and think of something
easier."
The boys admitted that the topic was a dry one, but nevertheless it was
interesting; and they thought they would not be doing their duty in
their journey if they failed to comprehend the great winds that so
materially help or hinder the movements of ships in Asiatic waters.
On their third day from Hong-kong the boys heard with delight that land
was visible. At first it was like a dark cloud on the horizon; but, as
they approached it, the scene changed, and the cloud was resolved into a
tropical shore, backed by a line of hills in the distance. The steamer
headed for a little promontory, and by-and-by a light-house was revealed
that marked the entrance of the river which they were to ascend.
A boat came out from the mouth of the river, and a pilot boarded the
steamer. He was a weather-beaten Frenchman, who had lived more than
twenty years in Cochin China, and was thoroughly familiar with the
channel of the river, or rather of its various channels. The Mekong
empties into the China Sea, very much as the Mississippi discharges into
the Gulf of Mexico; it has several mouths, and the whole lower part of
its course is divided into canals and bayous, that are very convenient
for the natives in the matter of local navigation.
Saigon, the destination of the steamer and of our friends, is on one of
these lower branches of the Mekong, about thirty miles from the sea. The
river is not more than five or six hundred feet wide, and the channel is
very crooked. The boys were reminded of their trip up the Peiho, from
Taku to Tien-Tsin, when they were on their way to Peking, but they voted
that the present voyage was the more agreeable of the two, inasmuch as
the steamer did not follow the example of their ship on the Peiho, by
occasionally running her nose into the bank. Their progress was steady
but slow, and they had plenty of time to study the scenery of the new
country they were entering.
[Illustration: RICE-FIELDS ON THE MEKONG.]
On both banks of the river the land is quite flat, and they were told
that, in times of unusual freshets, it was overflowed for long
distances. For this reason, it is not very thickly populated, although
the soil is rich, and could be made to produce abundantly. All along the
banks there was a thick fringe of mangrove-trees, and sometimes they
appeared to extend over many square miles of land. Here and there were
rice-fields that appeared to have the most careful cultivation; and
sometimes a village, with its temple rising above the modest dwellings
of the inhabitants, was revealed to the eyes of the young wanderers.
The number of the villages increased; and by-and-by a larger collection
of houses than they had yet seen was visible. This was the last village
before Saigon, and finally the city itself came into view. The steamer
stopped in front of it, and hardly was her anchor down before she was
surrounded by a crowd of native boats. Some of them were exactly of the
model of those at Hong-kong and Canton, and others were new to the eyes
of our friends. A great many Chinese have come here from Canton, and
brought their manners and customs with them; and they have also brought
their boats, or caused the construction of some exactly similar to those
they left behind.
As soon as convenient the Doctor engaged a boat for the party, and the
three travellers went on shore. There are several hotels at Saigon not
far from the landing-place, and it was not long before the strangers
were comfortably quartered--at least comfortably for Cochin China. After
their experiences at Peking and other places, they were not inclined to
be fastidious about their lodgings.
[Illustration: A NATIVE WOMAN.]
As soon as they had arranged matters at the hotel, the party went out
for a stroll. They found Saigon was well laid out, with broad streets
that ran straight as sunbeams for long distances. Most of them were
macadamized, and shaded with double rows of trees, and they had deep
gutters to carry off the heavy rains that fall in this latitude. The
boys were greatly interested in observing the hats worn by the natives;
those of the men were conical in shape, and came down over the shoulders
like an extinguisher over a candle. The women wore hats that resembled
baskets, about six inches deep by not less than two feet across. The
hats for both men and women are made of leaves, closely plaited
together, and serve to keep off the rain as well as the sun. The hat of
the man is particularly useful as an umbrella, as the wearer need only
bring it down over his head to make his shelter very nearly complete.
When walking on the road, he must keep it well tilted up in front in
order to enable him to see his way.
As they walked along, the Doctor explained that the most of the people
they met were not the original inhabitants of the country. Saigon was a
small fishing-village in 1861, when it was captured by the French and
occupied as a military post. The captors determined to make it a city of
consequence, and the French government has expended a great deal of
money in this endeavor. They have constructed roads and streets on the
same scale that the English have adopted at Shanghai, and they have
built dock-yards where ships can be repaired. They have maintained a
large garrison of soldiers, and several times have been called on to
suppress insurrections that cost a great deal of money and blood.
"Now," said the Doctor, "when the French established themselves here,
they opened the port for anybody to come and live in Saigon, as they
wanted to build up its trade as fast as possible. A great many Chinese
came here from Canton and Singapore, and the result was that the place
grew very rapidly. The Chinese came much faster than the emigrants from
France and other European countries, and also faster than the natives of
Cochin China from other parts of the conquered provinces. Consequently,
here is a French city with a foreign population greater than the native
one, and greater than that from France itself.
"Nearly all the business of Saigon is in the hands of the Chinese," the
Doctor continued, "and they have managed to drive out most of the
foreigners who were established here. They can live so much more
cheaply, and transact business for a smaller profit, that the foreigner
cannot compete with them. The number of foreign houses in Saigon is
diminishing every year, and it looks as though the Chinese would have it
pretty nearly all to themselves by the end of another ten years."
[Illustration: STREET IN THE CHINESE QUARTER.]
They found some parts of Saigon so much Chinese in character that they
seemed to be carried back to Canton or Shanghai. Chinese signs abounded;
Chinese shops were open, and the men doing business both behind and
before the counters were Chinese. Chinese eyes were upon them, and
frequently Chinese peddlers approached them with articles for sale.
Chinese were at worship in the temples, walking, talking, trading, and
pursuing their ordinary avocations, and for every foreigner the boys
encountered they met a hundred inhabitants of the Flowery Kingdom.
The roads were dry and dusty, and after a walk of a couple of hours our
friends returned to the hotel. Late in the afternoon they went out again
to hear one of the military bands play, and to see the people on their
daily promenade. The band plays at a stand on the street parallel to
the river, and everybody who can come out to see and be seen is sure to
be there.
Frank found the crowd so variegated that he suggested to Fred that it
was like looking through a kaleidoscope. There were Frenchmen, Germans,
Englishmen, Spaniards, and Portuguese among the foreigners; while the
Asiatics included Chinese, Anamese, Cambodians, Malays, Siamese, and a
variety of other nationalities the boys were unable to determine. In
fact, they would not have been able to recognize all the people
mentioned above if it had not been for the assistance of the Doctor, who
was skilled in the study of faces and the sound of languages. Fred
thought that the confusion of tongues was enough to give one a faint
idea of what the Tower of Babel must have been at the time the builders
suspended work.
[Illustration: PLANTS IN THE BOTANICAL GARDEN.]
They finished their explorations of the day with a visit to the
botanical garden, just as the sun was sinking in the west. The garden
contains a good variety of the tropical plants peculiar to the country,
and also some that the French have imported, with a view to distributing
them through the province in case the cultivation should prove
advantageous. There are also some wild animals carefully kept in cages,
with the exception of the elephants, which have no greater restriction
than being fastened with chains. The most interesting of these animals,
in the eyes of the boys, were some tigers which came from the upper
regions of the Mekong River, and were larger than any they had ever seen
in America.
[Illustration: A NEW ACQUAINTANCE.]
The evening was devoted to a study of the geography and history of the
country they were in, and before the boys went to bed they had a pretty
clear idea of Cochin China and the regions that surround it. In the
morning they complained of numerous visits from the mosquitoes that
abound in Saigon the entire year, and are as attentive as the mosquitoes
of the United States or any other country.
[Illustration: A MOSQUITO OF SAIGON.]