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Houseboat Train.
177

tions six inches high. In these sections passengers spread their beds, sleeping heads together, separated only by a headboard six inches high. The awning was only sufficiently high to permit passengers to sit erect. Ventilation was ample but privacy was nil. Curtains could be dropped around the sides in stormy weather.

Meals were served to each passenger wherever he might be. Dinner consisted of hot steamed rice brought in very heavy porcelain bowls set inside a covered, wet, steaming hot wooden case. With the rice were tiny dishes, butter-chip size, of green clover, nicely cooked and seasoned; of cooked bean curd served with shredded bamboo sprouts; of tiny pork strips with bean curd ; of small bits of liver with bamboo sprouts ; of greens, and hot water for tea. If the appetite is good one may have a second helping of rice and as much hot water for tea as desired. There was no table linen, no napkins and everything but the tea had to be negotiated with chop sticks, or, these failing, with the fingers. When the meal was finished the table was cleared and water, hot if desired, was brought for your hand basin, which with tea, teacup and bedding, constitute part of the traveler's outfit. At frequent intervals, up to ten P. M., a crier walked about the deck with hot water for those who might desire an extra cup of tea, and again in the early morning.

At this season of the year Chinese incubators were being run to their full capacity and it was our good fortune to visit one of these, escorted by Rev. R. A. Haden, who also acted as interpreter. The art of incubation is very old and very extensively practiced in China. An interior view of one of these establishments is shown in Fig. 96, where the family were hatching the eggs of hens, ducks and geese, purchasing the eggs and selling the young as hatched. As in the case of so many trades in China, this family was the last generation of a long line whose lives had been spent in the same work. We entered through their store, opening on the street of the narrow village seen in Fig. 10. In the store the eggs were purchased and the chicks were