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- 15 - river is very high and muddy today, and all the streams are swollen. This morning I heard that a creek ahead of us had washed away its bridge. There was no crossing the creek without a bridge. I said that we had a carpenter with us, and so we would build a bridge, and ordered all the coolies to bring along their loads and help. They were so confident that we couldn't build a bridge that they didn't come. It was five li from the inn where they were to the creek, and they thought they would have to carry back their loads to the inn again for the night. One of the coolies had the carpenter's saw. Although he was especially ordered to bring the saw along, he did not come. With no tool but the Smithsonian hunter's hatchet, the carpenter and I cut down trees and built a bridge across that roaring stream, so that we have made our full stage today. Not a nail went into that bridge. It was done in a comparatively short time. The trees that made the foundation were tied tightly together by ropes of tree bark made by the carpenter. The bridge is so strong that it will probably last a couple of years at least. In some places the floods washed great rocks down from the hillsides onto the road, and uprooted trees. We did not see a single bird worth shooting, and the day's catch of insects was small. We expect to reach Mupin early tomorrow and to get away for a hunting trip at Gan^[[1]] Yang^[[2]] Ba^[[4]] the next day. About noon the postal runner met us and gave me several letters, including two from home. One letter from Shanghai told of the acceptance of an article of mine on Image worship in China for publication in the Chinese Recorder. Frequently our road leads us across a precipice 50 to 100 feet high overhanging the river, with no fence on the outside of the road, and the road only three or four feet wide. On both sides of the stream there are high mountains, covered with forests. Often the sides of the mountains are perpendicular cliffs or sheer precipices. Yesterday at one place we could hear the roa[[double underline]]d[[/double underline]]^[[r]] of great rocks falling on the opposite side of the river. July 19. We got started soon after daylight and reached Mupin in the early afternoon. We stopped in an inn during a thunder shower. After our arrival at Mupin the weather settled down into a steady rain. It is hard to preserve some specimens in the summer time. I worked for quite a while this afternoon on the muskdeer skins and on some bird skeletons where the maggots were busily working. I plan to go to Gang Yang Ba tomorrow morning. The time for collecting in this district is altogether too short. Labelled box no. 352, wrapped insects [[strikethrough]]1[[/strikethrough]]353, flies, 354, wrapped insects. July 20. We had the usual trouble in getting the coolies started this morning. The coolies delayed to smoke opium etc., etc. We were told that it is 60 li from Mupin here. We are now at Gan Yang Ba. It seems to me that it is the
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