Next, at the provincial distributing centers such as Ta-t'ung, Shasi, and Hankow were the important brokers (hang-shang, lit., "guild merchants") or salt hongs, who purhcased the salt for resale, or arranged its resale, to the provincial distributors, who themselves went by a variety of names: in Hupei, p'u-fan (lit., "store merchants") for the urban areas and shui-fan (lit., "water merchants") for the backcountry; in Huai-pei, hu-shang (lit., "lake merchants"); in Szechwan an-shang (lit., "port merchants"). These in turn sold to the public, either through their own shops or through petty retailers and peddlers.