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lower gate was a new little shrine, with three images. Two of these were still unpainted, and we would see that they had been made of camphor wood. The carving was of rather sketchy character, but not bad, and the fragarance of the wood must have insured them life for many years.

On the upper slopes of the hills and in patches throughout the valley are the tea bushes from which comes this famous Lung Ching tea. As a matter of fact not only the tea from the valley, but that from this entire neighborhood, is styled Lung Ching, and it is one of the best green teas in China.

We walked back to our boat, and returned to our house under a gorgeous sunset, in time to wash before supper.

Friday, 24 July

In the afternoon we explored in the city. We walked along trying one shop after another to get some of the little wooden gongs the Buddhists use in their worship. We wanted them made of camphor wood, but most of the small ones are of other stuff. Finally we found them and went on our way. We turned into one narrow little street by the side of the canal and found it lined on both sides with silver and jewel shops. They had tempting arrays of jade and other stones. When we came to the place where we must recross the canal we found a little temple with a birhgt [[handwritten mark to correct to bright]] orange wall. The name was the Shui Teh Ssu, or Water Virtue Temple. We went in and found a single young priest busy with his vespers. He sat in a chair that had a mosquito net canopy over it, where, evidently, he spent most of his time, reading or studying before the little image of We T'o. On the main altar was a case containing twenty-four small images of various deities. We should have enjoyed staying here and watching, or talking to the friendly old Taoist priest that followed us in. But when we turned in a crowd of idly curious people tagged us and began flowing into the temple around us and behind us, so that we quickly left. There were unusually many of them and they were unusually brazen, and I do not like it. But, then, we are aliens, and as a rule get better treatment here than most aliens do at home.