Ten thousand miles from St.Louis and New Orleans I at last found what I sought for several years--a steamboat captain who understated the speed of his boat! Justice to the man requires the explanation that he did not own her.
[Illustration: ON THE AMOOR.] My second day on the Amoor was much like the first in the general features of the scenery.

Hills and mountains on either hand; meadows bounding one bank or the other at frequent intervals; islands dotted here and there with pleasing irregularity, or stretching for many miles along the valley; forests of different trees, and each with its own particular hue; a canopy of hazy sky meeting ranges of misty peaks in the distance; these formed the scene.

Some one asks if all the tongues in the world can tell how the birds sing and the lilacs smell.
Equally difficult is it to describe with pen upon paper the beauties of that Amoor scenery.

Each bend of the stream gave us a new picture.
It was the unrolling of a magnificent panorama such as no man has yet painted.

And what can I say?
There was mountain, meadow, forest, island, field, cliff, and valley; there were the red leaves of the autumn maple, the yellow of the birch, the deep green of pine and hemlock, the verdure of the grass, the wide river winding to reach the sea, and we slowly stemming its current.