Sketches from Formosa.

106 SKETCHES FROM FORMOSA
there might be favourable opportunities for having some
open-air preaching. In this, however, we were disappointed,
as the place was filled with rude soldiers from
Canton, who were waiting for another larger party, to
begin the construction of a road across the mountains.
The dialect they spoke was unintelligible to us, and they
behaved in rather a quarrelsome way, so that we were
compelled to remain indoors. Lim-ki-po and Tsu-chip
contain a Chinese population from the Chin-chiu region,
and in both places the people have repeatedly treated us
with kindness, and listened with marked attention to our
preaching. Lim-ki-po is only a day's journey from
Ka-gi city, while one day more beyond it to the north
brings us on to the territory of the Tsui-hwan, within
ten miles of Po-li-sia.
We arrived at Lake Candidius on the I5th, and spent
two days in that neighbourhood. I then took the opportunity
of making a careful circuit of the Lake in one of
the native canoes, as it was desirable to ascertain what
outlet there was for the water, and thus gain a better
knowledge of the stream-system away to the west.
Some of the quiet nooks and corners we visited are spots
of surpassing loveliness, and as our canoe would go
shooting across, and the cry of the startled wild-fowl
would break the silence from time to time, one could not
but look up, far, far up, to the great Maker and Preserver
of all. I regretted there were fewer opportunities for
preaching than upon any previous occasion, the bulk of
the people being in a state of almost hopeless intoxication.
Probably in less than a hundred years the Tsui-hwan will
be known only by name. The males among them are
rapidly being slain by simple downright laziness and
drink, and the neighbouring Chinese always succeed in
buying up their best-looking daughters. The more
immediate hindrance to bringing them under the influence