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[[underline]] Chapter XV. [[/underline]] 323.

[[underline]] Departure for Shanghai. [[/underline]]
  Not wishing to remain idle in Peking while waiting for affairs to settle down, I now decided to resume my plan, interrupted by civil war a couple of months before ([[underline]] cf. [[/underline]] page 319), of making an archaeological survey of the ancient sites along the Yangtze, in central China.  Accordingly, on May 12th I went to Tientsin, and there embarked the same day for Shanghai on the S.S. [[underline]] Tungchow [[/underline]], looted not long before by Chinese pirates but now back on her run again.  Mr. Tung was to follow me in a few days; but Mr Ch'iu, whom I should have been glad to have with me especially on account of his familiarity with Chinese history, deemed it wiser to stay in Peking until the situation became less disturbed.
  After an uneventful voyage, on the 16th I reached Shanghai.  There I spent the next few days making inquiries about conditions on the upper river; for about them we in Peking had for some months had no detailed reports, but only vague rumors that they were very much upset.  That this was the case, I now received abundant confirmation; but matters did not seem bad enough to justify me in abandoing my proposed survey.

[[underline]] Situation of Yüeh. [[/underline]]
  My most feasible plan still seemed to be to pursue my investigations in a direction opposite to the one followed by civilization in its spread through the Yangtze valley, from up the great river downward to the sea ([[underline]] cf. [[/underline]] page 317 and Appendix II).  I therefore decided to commence my task with an inspection of what had once been the kingdom of Yüeh.
  That state lay in what is now Chekiang province, on the semitropical shores of Hangchow Bay (famous for its remarkable bore).  The capital of Yüeh was at or very near the present city of Shao-hsing [[2 Chinese characters]], close to the sea and not very far from 150 miles west of south from Shanghai. Essentially a thalassocracy, Yüeh made its influence felt over a wide

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