Turning out of our beds the next morning we found the boat moored to the bank of the canal, opposite a long, rambling, one-storied building, which proved to be the "hong" of the tea-merchant to whom the neighboring plantations belonged. We were really in the tea country at last. On every side of us, as far as the eye could reach, the dark-green tea-plants were growing in their beds of reddish sandy soil. Notwithstanding the cook's urgent appeals to wait until chow-chow was ready, we jumped ashore and into the midst of a crowd of noisy coolies moving in every direction, each with his load slung at the ends of a bamboo across his shoulders, and singing a monotonous "Aho, Aho, Aho!" which appears as necessary to the Chinese carrier as the "Yo heave ho!" to the sailor. Long, narrow junks were lying at the bank, and being rapidly loaded with the familiar tea-chests; crowds of men, women and children were coming from the plantation, each with bags of the freshly picked leaves, or with baskets on their heads in which the more delicate kinds were carefully carried. We stepped into the building, and there witnessed the entire operation of assorting, firing the teas, and even the manufacturing of the chests. We would gladly have remained, but Aho came up and informed us "that breakfast hab got spoilem," so we deferred further investigation until after the meal. Akong joined us at breakfast, and partook of our curry and rice with great gusto, for tea-brokers as a rule are by no means averse to foreign chow-chow, and handle a knife and fork with almost as much ease as they do the native chop-sticks. Charley plied us both with questions regarding tea in general, and probably the following summary will pretty well represent the result of his queries: