in wooden frames ; and at night they are replaced in the
plantation houies. The trees are pruned from time to time,
in order to caufe a greater quantity and a conftant fucceflion
o f young leaves. The inhabitants o f this province, eipecially
in the cities, are almoft uriiverfally clothed in filks ; this rule
among the Chinefe o f confirming, as much as poffible, the pro-
dufts o f their own country, and receiving as little as they can
avoid from foreign nations, extends even to the provinces; a
pra&ice arifing out o f the little refpeft that, in China, as in ancient
Rome, is paid to thofe concerned in trade and merchandize.
Befides filk Tche-kiang produces camphor, tallow from the
Croton, a confiderable quantity o f tea, oranges, and almoft all
the fruits that are peculiar to the country. Every part o f the
province appeared to be in the higheft ftate o f cultivation and
the population to be immenfe. Both the raw and manufactured
filks, nankins and other cotton cloths, were fold at fuch
low prices in the capital o f this province, that it is difficult to
conceive how the growers or the manufacturers contrived to
gain a livelihood by their labour. But o f all others, I am the
moft aftoniihed at the fmall returns that muft neceflarily be
made to the cultivators o f the tea plant. The preparations o f
fome o f the finer kinds o f this article are faid to require that
every leaf fhould be rolled fingly by the hand; particularly fuch
as are exported to the European markets. Befides this, there
are many proceffes, fuch as fteeping, drying, turning, and pack-.
■ ing, after it has been plucked off the ihrub leaf by leaf. Yet
the firft coft in the tea provinces cannot be more than from fourpence
pence to two {hillings a pound, when it is confidered that the
ordinary teas ftand the Eaft India Company in no mpre. than
eight-pence a p ound; and the very beft only tw,o ibiljings
and eight-pence*. Nothing can more clearly point out the
patient and unremitting labour o f the Chinefe, , than the
preparation o f this plant for the market. It is a curious ,cir-
cumftance that a body o f merchants in England ihould furniih
employment, as might eafily be made appear, to more than a
million fubjedts o f a nation that affeds to defpife merchants,
and throws every obftacle in the way o f commercial inter-
courfe.
The mean temperature o f ‘Tche-kiang, In the middle o f N ovember,
was from fifty-fix degrees at funrife, to fixty-two degrees
at noon. The extent from North to South is between
the parallels o f twenty-eight and thirty-four and a half degrees
o f northern latitude.
The northern part o f Kiang-fee contains the great Po-yang
lake, and thofe extenfive fwamps and moraffes that furround
it, and which, as I have already obferved, may be confidered as
the fink o f China. T h e middle and fouthern parts are mountainous.
The chief produce is fugar and oil from the Camellia
Sefanqua In.this province are the principal manufactories o f
porcelain, whofe qualities, as I have in • a former chapter ob-
* The Eaft India Company pays from thirteen to iixty tales per pecui for their
teas; fome tea o f a higher price is purchafed by individuals, but feidom or ever by
the Company. A tale is fix ihillings and eight-pence, and a pecui is one hundred
and thirty-three pounds and one third»
ferved,