Wherever we went, we were told by the Chinese that they harvest their walnuts at about the time of the year which in America would be about the first week in September. We found, however, that the nuts were off of the trees and assembled on the ground for sorting and drying, long before that. They were put in windrows covered with millet straw and left for ten days, after which time the hulls were chipped off with knives and the nuts immediately washed and put on the market. I was particularly struck with the mechanical motion with which the Chinese men worked; it was just as regular as a machine. This was the first time that characteristic came to my attention, and afterwards I was struck with the same thing everywhere. Each farmer takes his products, whatever they may be, to a common town called "market town," and there they are bought by the local merchants, or the "compradors." The exporters are missionaries and foreigners who make no effort to buy from the farmers, for the tradesman, or comprador, can get the nuts at a better figure than can the foreigners. The tradesman gets his commission in addition. The baskets of nuts are carried on poles placed over the shoulders of the Chinese. One of the principal walnut centers of Chantung Province is 25 miles from the railroad, and we made quite an effort to reach it. An agricultural missionary, a Mr. Gordan, made the trip there with me, and we found it a badly infested section. We arrived about three o'clock in the afternoon and took about one hour going around to see the nuts. There were places within the wall where nuts had been assembled, and we made estimates as to the number of pounds. I think there were from 100 to 150 sacks of nuts in a pile. Many of the women and children grow walnuts and these crops are inspected and sorted before being shipped to Peking. In the early summer, we saw quantities of apricot kernels being transported to the market and sold as almonds. We had understood that China was quite an important almond-producing country, but I doubt if there are any almonds in China. I did not see a tree, nor did I get an indication that there were any there. One of the largest chestnut trees that I saw measured eight feet and would have been valuable for timber purposes. It was in one of the very attractive little orchards of chestnut trees in the north of Shansi and northeast of Tientsin. We understood that there were very large orchards to the north, but you might say that there is no such thing as a large orchard in China. We counted about 100 trees in such orchards, and we made notes as to their bearing habits. We found the chestnuts of pleasing quality, of a fair size, and not quite as large as European nuts but larger than the American. We did not see many of the trees which had been allowed to develop normally. They are not of special value in China, and consequently, the branches are removed as high as possible, and often the tops are cut out.