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420
EAST ASIA.
to the south-west lies the port of Icana'i, where tie chief export is coal from the
neighbouring pits.
On the more thickly peopled south coast are the towns of Sam, also a centre of
the coal industry ;
Yubutx, a much frequented fishing station, and Mororan, on the
deep bay of Yedomo, where the bar has 26 feet at low water. Here travellers
embark to cross Volcano Bay and visit the city of Hakodate, which stands on one
of the safest and most spacious harbours in the world. Thrown open to foreign
trade in 1854, this port, which in clear weather commands a view of the Hondo
Fig.
195. HAKOUATK.
Scale 1 : 40,000.
I40M3: I4045' EofG.
to 16 Feet. 16 to 32 Feet. 32 Feet and upwards.
___^__ 1,100 Yards.
mountains, has made rapid progress since the middle of the century. The population
has increased five-fold during that period, and about one hundred Europeans have
settled in the town, which has become the chief station of the whalers frequenting
the Sea of Okhotsk. A Japanese squadron visits the roadstead every year, but the
foreign shipping is inconsiderable, the native steamers having almost monopolised
the export business. One of the staples of this trade is the kawpu, or " sea
which is dried on the strand and
cabbage," an edible seaweed 20 to 40 feet long,
forwarded to Hondo and South China. Some fine country-houses have sprung up
here and there on the slope of the hill, 1,150 feet high, which commands the
approach to the roadstead and to the peninsula of Hakodate.