The Project Gutenberg eBook of Due West, by Maturin Murray Ballou

Title: Due West

or Round the World in Ten Months

Author: Maturin Murray Ballou

Release Date: February 28, 2009 [eBook #28222]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1

***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK DUE WEST***

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DUE WEST

OR

ROUND THE WORLD IN TEN MONTHS

BY

MATURIN M. BALLOU

THIRD EDITION.

BOSTON
HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN AND COMPANY
New York: 11 East Seventeenth Street
The Riverside Press, Cambridge
1885

Copyright, 1884,
By MATURIN M. BALLOU.

All rights reserved.

RIVERSIDE, CAMBRIDGE:
ELECTROTYPED AND PRINTED BY
H. O. HOUGHTON AND COMPANY.

PREFACE.

To circumnavigate the globe in our day is only a question of time and money, the facilities being ample, and the inducements abundant. Intelligently and successfully to consummate such a purpose is an education in itself. The tourist will find all previous study enhanced in value by ocular demonstration, which imparts life and warmth to the cold facts of the chroniclers, besides which a vast store-house of positive information is created which time cannot exhaust. Perhaps the majority of travelers see only that which comes clearly before them; but this they do most faithfully, being possessed of a stronger sense of duty than of imagination. The clear, direct vision of such people has its merit. There are others who both see and feel, to whom the simplest object in its suggestiveness may be full of beauty. It is the latter who pluck delightful mysteries out of travel; and who, after viewing nature, it may be in her calmest moods, bring away with them upon the tablets of memory a Claude Lorraine. The eyes will operate automatically, but it is of little avail unless one exercises the observing power; then they become luminous. You will find poetry nowhere unless you bring some with you, says Joubert. If the author succeeds in imparting to the reader but a share of the great and varied pleasure he realized in the ten months of travel herein recorded, his object in transcribing these experiences will have been fully consummated.

M. M. B.

CONTENTS.

CHAPTER I.

Synopsis of the Journey.—Crossing the Continent.—A Great Midland City.—Utah and the Mormons.—The Sierra Nevada.—San Francisco.—A Herd of Sea-Lions.—Possibilities of California.—The Love of Flowers.—Public School System.—Excursion to the Yosemite.—An Indian Stronghold.—Description of the Valley.—Passage of the Mountains.—Caught in a Snow-Storm.—A Forest of Feathers.—The Mammoth Trees of California.—Passing the Golden Gate.—Voyage across the Pacific.—A Lost Day

CHAPTER II.

Landing in Japan.—Characteristic Street Scenes.—Native Bazars.—Women of Yokohama.—Excursion into the Country.—Visit to Kamakura.—Peculiar Scenes on the Road.—A Wonderful Bronze Statue.—Popular Religions of the Country.—The Hakone Pass.—A Youthful Mother.—Native Jugglers.—Temple of Shiba.—Review of the Soldiery.—Ludicrous Sights.—A Native Fair at Tokio.—A Poor Japanese Woman's Prayer

CHAPTER III.

Foreign Influence in Japan.—Progress of the People.—Traveling Inland.—Fertility of the Soil.—Grand Temples and Shrines at Nikko.—The Left-Handed Artist.—Japanese Art.—City of Kobé.—Kioto and its Temples.—Idol Worship.—Native Amusements.—Morals in Japan.—Lake Biwa.—Osaka on a Gala Day.—The Inland Sea.—Island of Pappenburg.—The Tarpeian Rock of Japan.—Nagasaki.—Girls Coaling a Ship.—National Products

CHAPTER IV.

Sail for Hong Kong.—Ocean Storms.—Sunset at Sea.—A Water-Spout.—Arrival in China.—Typhoon Bay.—Manners and Customs.—In and about Hong Kong.—Public Buildings.—Voyage up the Pearl River.—City of Canton.—Strangest of Strange Cities.—Opium Dens.—Temple of Honan.—The Worship of Swine.—Praying with a Fan.—Local Peculiarities.—Half Round the World.—Singapore.—A Tiger Hunt.—Burial at Sea.—Penang.—The Wonderful Palm

CHAPTER V.

Sailing Due West.—The Indian Ocean.—Strange Sights at Sea.—Island of Ceylon.—Singhalese Canoes.—Colombo.—A Land of Slaves.—Native Town.—Singhalese Women.—Fantastic Nurses.—Local Pictures.—Cinnamon Gardens.—Wild Elephants.—Lavishness of Tropical Nature.—Curious Birds and their Nests.—Ancient Kandy.—Temple of Maligawan.—Religious Ceremonies.—Life of the Natives.—Inland Scenery.—Fruits.—Precious Stones.—Coffee Plantations.—Great Antiquity of Ceylon