A FLOATING SLUM.
Stand beside the imperial custom-house at Canton and let the eyerange down the river toward Hongkong. As far as the sight can reachlie boats, boats, and again boats. These are no ordinary craft, merevessels of transport plying hither and thither, but the countless homesof myriad Chinese, in which millions of human beings have been born,have lived, and have died. They are the dwellings of the very poor, wholive in them practically free from rent, taxes, and the other burdensof the ordinary citizen.
The Tankia--which means boat-dwellers--as the denizens of thesefloating houses are called, form a sort of caste apart from the restof the Cantonese. The shore-dwellers regard them as belonging to alower social order; and indeed they have many customs, peculiar tothemselves, which mark them as a separate community. How the swarmingmasses of them contrive to support existence is a mystery, but theirchief mode of employment is in carrying merchandise and passengers fromplace to place.