River of Smoke - Amitav Ghosh [98]
To the north of the bay where the Redruth was anchored lay several villages, on the shores of the promontory of Kowloon. A couple of times a day bumboats would paddle across the channel to offer provisions: chickens, pigs, eggs, quinces, oranges, and many different kinds of vegetable. The boats were mostly rowed by women and children, and except when it came to the matter of bargaining, the villagers were usually quite friendly. But when on land their attitude changed; they had had bad experiences with drunken foreign sailors and as a result they were apt to treat landing parties with suspicion and even outright hostility. The few foreigners who had rowed over to Kowloon had had an uncomfortable time of it, being followed everywhere with chants of gwai-lou, faan – gwai and sei-gwai-lou!
On Hong Kong, by contrast, visitors could be sure of being left alone since it was so sparsely inhabited. The stretch of land that lay closest to the Redruth for instance was empty of habitation. The nearest hamlet was a good distance away: it was not much more than a clump of dilapidated little hutments, surrounded by rice fields. Although there was little there to attract mainlanders, the island offered something of inestimable value to the foreign ships: good clean drinking water, which was to be had in abundance from the many clear streams that came tumbling down from the island’s peaks and crags.
Once every day, and sometimes more, a gig, loaded with empty barrels, would make the journey over from the Redruth to the narrow strip of pebbled beach that ran along the bay. Paulette would often accompany the sailors and while they were filling their barrels and washing their clothes she would wander along the beach or climb the slopes.
One day she followed a stream for a good half-mile, clambering up the steep, boulder-strewn nullah that guided it down from the peak. It was hard going, with little reward, and she was about to turn back when she looked ahead and spotted a hollow in the hillside, some hundred yards further up. There were white smudges on its sides, and on looking more closely she saw that a cluster of flowering plants was growing inside. She took off her shoes and pressed on, climbing over an escarpment of jagged rock and tearing her skirt in the process. But it was well worth it for she soon found herself looking at a bunch of exquisite white blooms: she had seen their like before, in Calcutta’s Botanical Gardens: they were ‘Lady’s Slipper’ orchids – Cypripedium purpuratum.
She went bounding down in delight and the next day she brought Fitcher with her. This time they went higher still and were rewarded with another find, hidden between two boulders: a pale red orchid. It was new to Paulette but Fitcher identified it at a glance: Sarcanthus teretifolius.
They had climbed a fair distance now and when they sat down to catch their breath Paulette was startled by the splendour of the vista below: the tall-masted ships looked tiny against the blue band of the channel; beyond lay the crags of the Chinese mainland, stretching into the hazy distance.
‘You are so fortunate, sir,’ said Paulette, ‘to have wandered in the forests and mountains of China. How thrilling it must be to botanize in these vast and beautiful wilds.’
Fitcher turned to her with a startled expression. ‘Wander? What can ee be thinking of? Ee don’t imagine, d’ee, that I was collecting in the wild in Canton?’
‘Were you not, sir?’ said Paulette in surprise. ‘But then how did you find all those new plants? All your introductions?’
Fitcher gave a bark of a laugh. ‘In nurseries – just as I would have at home.’
‘Really, sir?’
Fitcher nodded: traipsing through forests was out of the question in China since foreigners were not allowed to venture beyond Canton and Macau. The only Europeans who had seen anything of the flora of the interior were a few Jesuits, and a couple of naturalists who had