A Journey in a Junk [pp. 30-43]

A yOURNEY IN A 7UNK.
some straggling amonb the crowd; and
after them half-grown boys and girls,
their arms about each othler's waists.
The train is packed. Everybody is happy. It is a yelling, howling, hooting
happiness. These are not the butterflies of humanity. They are the grubs.
The crowd return contented to their
homes; a day in the country long suffices
them. Are we humanitarian? Are we
reformers? Are we "elevators of the
masses?" Do we groan over the wretchedness, squalor, and misery prevalent
among these children of the city? Let
us abate one - half our distress. For
these sufferers realize not all the pain
we attribute to them. They love Lon
don too well to leave it, were opportunity
offered. Green fields and fresh air will
answer for an occasional change, but
the country is "dull." Offer one of yon
crowd the choice between a cottage by
the sea, on condition of permanent residence, and a cellar in a London court,
with its bad air, bad water, shoals of
dirty children, squabbling women by
day, husband-beaten wives by night-its
noise, confusion, shrieks, cries, groans,
and clamor: Will they not sigh for the
court? Do they not love the swash and
stir of their metropolitan mire, where
something new, naughty, or excitable
may be seen every time their heads are
thrust from their windows?
A JOURNEY IN A JUNK.
THE RUINS OF ANGKOR WAT.
HI LE spending a short time at
that charmingly-romantic spot,
Macao-a Portuguese settlement on the
coast of China, redolent still with the
poetic genius of Camoens- a French
gentleman asked me if I had visited
the great wonder of the world, Angkor
Wat. I think I may fairly assume, that
most of my readers, like myself, had
never heard of Angkor Wat.
I resolved to visit this marvel of antiquity. For this purpose I had to go to
Saigon, the capital of French Cochin
China, the most utterly condemned spot
on the surface of the earth. Every evil
that can be said of any place has been
published and reiterated and sworn of
Saigon. It was said to be so hot that it
was doubtful whether there was anything more than a sheet-of-brown-paper
partition between it and another hot
place, which must be nameless in these
pages. I was told, that even a few
days there were sufficient to give a
fever which remained in the system for
months, and sometimes for life-that no
one went there but the reprobates of the
earth, who could not find iied-i-terre in
the other respectable colonies, such as
Singapore and Hongkong- that it was
equally a cesspool of moral vice as of
malaria and disease. All united in anathematizing Saigon, in order to prevent
me going there; and the result was, that
I took the first sailing-vessel, and, with
a northeast monsoon, found myself in
Saigon river in five days. In justice to
that much-abused city, I need only remark here, that I found it very interesting as a young city, and was never sick
for a single day.
I was still nearly two hundred and fifty miles from the goal of my ambition,
Angkor Wat. This would be a mere
step in America; but here, in the kingdom of Anam, without roads, without
communication, two hundred and fifty
miles through a dense jungle, inhabited
[JAN.
3o