In company with Mr.Burlingame and General Van Valkenburg, our ministers to China and Japan, I made an excursion to the Yosemite Valley, and the Big Tree Grove.

With the same gentlemen I went over the then completed portion of the railway which now unites the Atlantic with the Pacific coast, and attended the banquet given by the Chinese merchants of San Francisco to the ambassadors on the eve of their departure.

A Chinese dinner, served with Chinese customs;--it was a prelude to the Asiatic life toward which my journey led me.
I arrived in San Francisco on the thirteenth of April and expected to sail for Asia within a month.

One thing after another delayed us, until we began to fear that we should never get away.

For more than six weeks the time of departure was kept a few days ahead and regularly postponed.