For some miles north of Yung-ning Hsien the river retains its breadth of fifty yards, flowing between low hills which were well cultivated. These give place to a rocky country, huge boulders lining the banks and encroaching on the river’s bed to such an extent as to leave only sufficient breadth for one boat to pass. This cooping-up of the waters and declivity in the bed give rise to a series of rapids, two of which are really dangerous. In this, what may be called, mid-section of the river, oars were abandoned (there not being room to use them), and the navigation was conducted by means of a long spar which projected over the bows, and had often as many as six of the crew hanging on to its butt end. At one of the dangerous rapids we narrowly escaped being dashed to pieces. The boat was rushing down at full speed through huge boulders to a four foot fall, when the bow spar snapped in two, the projecting part falling into the river, the butt end rolling on deck and the crew sprawling over and under it. Amid their frantic yells the steersman, fortunately, did not lose his head, and succeeded in bringing us up alongside the rocks just above the fall. We were now perfectly helpless, and the greater part of the afternoon of the 11th was spent by the skipper in visiting adjacent villages in search of a new spar. He was at length successful, and over the fall we went, the planks of the boat quivering under us.
To the north of the rocky section the country opens out, gently undulating and cultivated; the sloping banks of the river, which here attains a breadth of a hundred yards, were fringed with feathery bamboos, the current became actually sluggish, and trackers were sent on shore to expedite the descent. The Yung-ning loses itself peacefully in the Yang-tsze at the district city of Na-ch’i Hsien, which lies on the right bank of both rivers. Under the busy market-town of Lien-ch’ien-tzŭ, which occupies the bend opposite Na-ch’i, lay a fleet of about fifty salt junks ready to ascend to Yung-ning Hsien. They were summoning their crews by beat of gong, when we issued from the river on the morning of the 12th of June.
I must not leave the Yung-ning River without saying a few words as to its importance as a trade route. By it, Western Kuei-chow is supplied with salt from Ssŭ-ch’uan, principally from the Tzŭ-liu-ching wells, and it is the main thoroughfare for the distribution of native cottons, manufactured in Ssŭ-ch’uan from raw cotton from the Central Provinces of China, required by Western Kuei-chow and Eastern Yün-nan. Foreign cottons go as far as Sui Fu, and thence by way of the Hêng and Nan-kuang Rivers to Northern and Eastern Yün-nan.