The events of the day are the meeting of junks going down the river and passing ours. They go in long lines fastened together, flying the flag of some one of the allied nations, and carrying the sick, the wounded, and the spoils of war. In the twilight we pass the remains of a village in which the Russians, on their way to Manchuria, are encamped for the night. They are taking carved furniture out of an abandoned house, breaking it up and making a fire of it. As we go on we see the flames mounting in great jets, and reaching out to the sorghos near by; for a long time its incendiary light is visible behind us, in the mournful empty grayness of the distance. This first nightfall on our junk is full of gloom in the strange solitude into which hour by hour we penetrate still further. The shadows are deep about us and there are many dead along the ground. In the confused and infinite darkness, all about us seems hostile or gloomy, and the cold increases with the silence and obscurity. The impression of melancholy disappears at supper when our Chinese lantern is lighted, illuminating the sarcophagus, which we have closed as tightly as possible to shut out the wind. I have invited my two companions to my table--my comical little table, which they themselves have made from a broken oar and an old plank. The bread seems exquisite to us after our long walk on the bank; to warm us we have the hot tea which young Toum has prepared for us over a fire of sorghos, and when hunger is assuaged and Turkish cigarettes give forth their soothing clouds of smoke, we have almost a feeling of home and comfort in our poor shelter enveloped in outside darkness. Then comes bedtime--although the junk moves on, our towers continuing their march by feeling their way along the sorghos of the dark path, so full of surprises. Toum, although he is an elegant young Chinaman, goes to roost with the others of his race in the straw in the hold. The rest of us, still dressed of course, with our boots on and firearms at hand, stretch out on the narrow camp-bed of our cabin, looking at the stars, which, as soon as the lantern is out, appear between the meshes of our matting-roof, shining brightly in the frosty sky. Distant shots reach us from far off, indicating nocturnal dramas with which we have no concern, and just before midnight two guards, one Japanese and the other German, try to stop our junk; we are obliged to get up to discuss the matter, and by means of a hastily lighted lantern, show the French flag and the stripes that I wear on my sleeve. At midnight the Chinese make fast our boat, at a spot they say is safe, so that they too may rest. We all fall into a profound slumber in the icy night. IV TUESDAY, October 16. We are up at daylight and off again. In the cold, magnificent dawn, upon a clear pink sky, the sun rises and shines without heat on the green plain, and on the deserted place where we have slept.