He reached the river at about midday. By then the heat in the valley was excessive, and the boy thoroughly exhausted. He had been travelling day and night for several days. With the exception of the almost regal banquet he had enjoyed at the house of the tea-grower, he had had insufficient nourishment. There had been few nights when he had had more than three or four hours' sleep. He felt quite unable to progress farther on foot.
He therefore hailed a fisherman whom he observed approaching down the stream in a small _sampan_, or river-boat. The man--so soon as he understood that a bargain was afoot--drew in to the bank and undertook for an exceedingly small sum of money to take Frank down-stream to a certain large town to which he himself was going. Frank got into the boat, and lying down beneath the matted awning that sheltered the stern part from the fierce rays of the sun, he was soon fast asleep. Whilst he slept, he covered several miles of his journey. The fisherman had hoisted a sail, and the wind being from the north, and the strength of the current great, the boat travelled at a considerable velocity.
When the boy awoke, refreshed from his sleep, he found to his surprise that the sun had set. Darkness was spreading rapidly, and a thick white mist clung to the river-valley. The atmosphere, however, was exceedingly close and humid, and the air was alive with myriads of mosquitoes and gnats.
Frank asked the fisherman where they were, and the man replied, with Oriental vagueness:
"We come soon to Kwang-Chin," said he. "That is the end of my journey!"
"Very nice town," replied the man, evading the question. "Plenty cooked-dog shops. Little Kwang-Chin dogs are very good to eat, better than little Canton dogs."
Frank knew the uselessness of trying to get anything definite out of the fisherman. He therefore lay back in a comfortable attitude, and gave himself up to thoughts of the perilous situation in which he had left Mr Waldron and his uncle.
He wondered how far Men-Ching had progressed upon his journey to the coast. So far as he could guess, the rascal should be already in Canton. At the same time, though he did not know where the town of Kwang-Chin was, he believed that he himself could not be far from the great capital of Southern China. Canton was but a few hours by river steamboat from Hong-Kong. The boy had therefore completed the greater part of his journey.