_Disembarkation_. _Foreign population of Shanghai_. _Congestion in the
city_. _Wonderful Shanghai._
Through China from end to end. From Shanghai, 1,500 miles by river and
1,600 miles walking overland, from the greatest port of the Chinese
Empire to the frontier of British Burma.
That is my scheme.
* * * * *
I am a journalist, one of the army of the hard-worked who go down early
to the Valley. I state this because I would that the truth be told; for
whilst engaged in the project with which this book has mainly to deal I
was subjected to peculiar designations, such as "explorer" and other
newspaper extravagances, and it were well, perhaps, for my reader to
know once for all that the writer is merely a newspaper man, at the time
on holiday.
The rather extreme idea of walking across this Flowery Land came to me
early in the year 1909, although for many years I had cherished the hope
of seeing Interior China ere modernity had robbed her and her wonderful
people of their isolation and antediluvianism, and ever since childhood
my interest in China has always been considerable. A little prior to the
Chinese New Year, a friend of mine dined with me at my rooms in
Singapore, in the Straits Settlements, and the conversation about China
resulted in our decision then and there to travel through the Empire on
holiday.
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