CHAPTER XII.

THE HEATHEN CHINEE.

Ir is a far cry from San Francisco to Yokohama, the distance seeming the greater by reason of the loneliness of the way. Nineteen days are occupied in crossing 4,700 miles of water, and during all that time till within a hundred miles of Yokohama we do not see a sail or other sign of human life. Life of any kind except that borne along by the ship herself has been curiously absent. One day a missionary from Illinois created some excitement by discovering a whale; but it turned out to be only a porpoise. Opportunities for observing the common objects of the sea are limited in Illinois.

Save for the albatross the great waste of water bounded by the horizon would be absolutely lifeless. But the albatross we have always with us. Shortly after land had faded

from sight three

attached themselves to the

ship, and through a wild, wet day followed it, sometimes swooping far ahead as if impatient of its slow progress, and then returning quietly to talk the matter over in our wake. On the fourth day the number was increased to nine, at which it steadily stood. It is hard to say whether they are always the same birds, and much kindly thought is bestowed upon their sleeping arrangements. Wherever they sleep or howsoever they rest, they are always full of life and strength and grace, careering round the ship, and never tired of their one game, which consists of getting a clear run with one or two flaps of their wings, then with graceful swoop coming down to the water's edge and seeing which can go nearest to the waves without wetting the tip of one wing. One Sunday afternoon, to the scandal of the missionaries, of whom we have six on board, they began playing" cart-wheels," in close imitation of the London street boy; but they soon tired of this, and went back to the prize skimming-game, which they have played incessantly ever since.

One day a ship in full sail bound east passed us. The day after, when within a hundred miles of port, we had a visitor in the shape of a dove. Like the one despatched by Noah, it had been out over the waste of waters in search of land, and finding none

gladly took refuge on our ark. It sat for hours on one of the yardarms, and regarded with profound interest the crowd of Chinese playing dominoes on the lower deck. In the afternoon came also a couple of white albatross, which gaily escorted us till night fell upon the ship almost under the shadow of land.

A wreck on the Atlantic is bad enough, but a wreck on the Pacific is almost hopeless. On a recent passage of one of these steamers the look-out discovered far on the lee what looked like an abandoned junk. Bearing down upon it, signs of life were noted, and a boat was prepared for the rescue. The steamer bearing close down upon the junk and having too much way on her passed it. Whereupon seven half-starved Japanese, who had been eagerly watching her approach, believing the steamer was after all abandoning them, flung themselves upon the deck with a despairing shriek, and all that could be seen was half a dozen skeleton hands waving over the bulwarks of the junk-a mute appeal to relent and rescue them. When the Japanese were taken off they could scarcely crawl across the deck of the steamer, and one died the same night, delirious with his first meal. It was a junk, rice laden, and had been driven out to sea by a typhoon. Three long months

they had been tossing about on the lonely Pacific, hungrily scanning the horizon, and never a sail had they seen till the steamer hove in sight. They had subsisted wholly on raw rice, and, it fortunately being the rainy season, had found a bare but sufficient supply of water. Under the unremitting care of their rescuers the six Japanese recovered health and strength. Indeed, before being landed at Yokohama, they were well enough to roundly abuse the captain for having burned their waterlogged junk after saving them, and to threaten an action for damages.

An ordinary Atlantic steamer would make this voyage in fourteen days. The Coptic, though small as compared with the Atlantic liners, could easily do it in sixteen. But the managers at San Francisco have reached the conclusion that more money is to be made by extending the natural limits of the voyage, which not infrequently runs to twenty-six days. The Occidental and Oriental Line is registered as a Liverpool company, and the ships at the time of my visit actually belonged to the White Star Line. Practically the little knot of men already alluded to as "controlling" all public works in connection with San Francisco have closed their rapacious hand over this line of steamers which they charter. There is

another line, the Pacific Mail, to which an innocent public might look to deliver them from a tyranny of monopoly. But San Francisco operators are not likely to leave a weapon of the kind hanging loose. The two companies pool their earnings, and of course settle their freight charges on a common basis limited by the endurance of the public. I do not know anything of the freight charges, but can bear testimony that the passage-money as compared with the mileage of the Atlantic is nearly fifty per cent. higher.

That might be borne, especially as there is no redress; but the hapless passengers have some cause for complaint that their time should be ruthlessly wasted, offered up a sacrifice to the Moloch of the niggardly economy of the San Francisco clique. Things have grown worse since the company became possessed of a so-called coal mine. This is known as the Carbon Hill Mine, and, according to the San Francisco joke, the managers of the Occidental Line debated for some time whether they should work it for slate or for coal. It was decided by a toss-up to call it a coal mine, and the proceeds are sent out to be burned in this line of mail steamers. Burning it liberally, and with a fair wind, we gaily bowl along at ten knots an hour. With a head wind and