Sage, and they are sufficient for us." Will not the new arts and sciences of the West convince them that their Sage was not omniscient?

In 1866 I earned the honours of a hadji by visiting the tomb of Confucius—a magnificent mausoleum surrounded by his descendants of the seventieth generation, one of whom in quality of high priest to China's greatest teacher enjoys the rank of a hereditary duke.

On that occasion, I had come up from a visit to the Jews in Honan. Having profited by a winter vacation to make an expedition to K'ai-fung-fu, I had the intention of pushing on athwart the province to Hankow. The interior, however, as I learned to my intense disappointment, was convulsed with rebellion. No cart driver was willing to venture his neck, his steed, and his vehicle by going in that direction. I accordingly steered for the Mecca of Shantung, and, having paid my respects to the memory of China's greatest sage, struck the Grand Canal and proceeded to Shanghai. From K'ai-fung-fu I had come by land slowly, painfully, and not without danger. From Tsi-ning I drifted down with luxurious ease in a well-appointed house-boat, meditating poetic terms in which to describe the contrast.

The canal deserves the name of "grand" as the wall on the north deserves the name of "great." Memorials of ancient times, they both still stand unrivalled by anything the Western world has to show, if one except the Siberian Railway. The Great Wan is an effete relic no longer of use; and it appears to be satire on human foresight that the Grand Canal should have been built by the very people whom the Great Wall was intended to exclude from China. The canal is as useful to-day as it was six centuries ago, and remains the chief glory of the Mongol dynasty.

Kublai having set up his throne in the north, and completed the conquest of the eighteen provinces, ordered the construction of this magnificent waterway, which extends 800 miles from Peking to Hangchow and connects with other waterways which put the northern capital in roundabout communication with provinces of the extreme south. His object was to tap the rice-fields of Central China and obtain a food supply which could not be interfered with by those daring sea-robbers, the redoubtable Japanese, who had destroyed his fleets and rendered abortive his attempt at conquest. Of the Great Wall, it may be said that the oppression inseparable from its construction hastened the overthrow of the house of its builder. The same is probably true of the Grand Canal. The myriads of unpaid labourers who were drafted by corvée from among the Chinese people subsequently enlisted, they or their children, under the revolutionary banner which expelled the oppressive Mongols.

Another port in this province which we cannot pass without an admiring glance, is Chefoo (Chifu). On a fine hill rising from the sea wave the flags of several nations; in the harbour is a cluster of islands; and above the settlement another noble hill rears its head crowned with a temple and groves of trees. On its sides and near the seashore are the residences of missionaries. There I have more than once found a refuge from the summer heat, under the hospitable roof of Mrs. Nevius, the widow of my friend Dr. J. L. Nevius, who, after opening a mission in Hangchow, became one of the pioneers of Shantung. In Chefoo he planted not only a church, but a fruit garden. To the Chinese eye this garden was a striking symbol of what his gospel proposed to effect for the people.

CHAPTER VII

PROVINCE OF CHIHLI

Taku—Tientsin—Peking—The Summer Palace—Patachu—Temples of Heaven, Earth, and Agriculture—Foreign Quarter—The Forbidden City—King-Han Railway—Paoting-fu

Crossing the gulf we reach Taku, at the mouth of the Peiho, and, passing the dismantled forts, ascend the river to Tientsin.

In 1858 I spent two months at Taku and Tientsin in connection with the tedious negotiations of that year. At the latter place I became familiar with the dusty road to the treaty temple; and at the former witnessed the capture of the forts by the combined squadrons of Great Britain and France. The next year on the same ground I saw the allied forces repulsed with heavy loss—a defeat avenged by the capture of Peking in 1860.

In the Boxer War the relief force met with formidable opposition at Tientsin. The place has, however, risen with new splendour from its half-ruined condition, and now poses as the principal residence of the most powerful of the viceroys. Connected by the river with the seaboard, by the Grand Canal with several provinces to the south, and by rail with Peking, Hankow and Manchuria, Tientsin commands the chief lines of communication in northern China. In point of trade it ranks as the third in importance of the treaty ports.

Three hours by rail bring us to the gates of Peking, the northern capital. Formerly it took another hour to get within the city. Superstition or suspicion kept the railway station at a distance; now, however, it is at the Great Central Gate. Unlike Nanking, Peking has nothing picturesque or commanding in its location. On the west and north, at a distance of ten to twenty miles, ranges of blue hills form a feature in the landscape. Within these limits the eye rests on nothing but flat fields, interspersed with clumps of trees overshadowing some family cemetery or the grave of some grandee.

Between the city and the hills are the Yuen Ming Yuen, the Emperor's summer palace, burnt in 1860 and still an unsightly ruin, and the Eho Yuen, the summer residence of the Empress Dowager. Enclosing two or three pretty hills and near to a lofty range, the latter occupies a site of rare beauty. It also possesses mountain water in rich abundance. No fewer than twenty-four springs gush from the base of one of its hills, feeding a pretty lake and numberless canals. Partly destroyed in 1860, this palace was for many years as silent as the halls of Palmyra. I have often wandered through its neglected grounds. Now, every prominent rock is crowned with pagoda or pavilion. There are, however, some things which the slave of the lamp is unable to produce even at the command of an empress—there are no venerable oaks or tall pines to lend their majesty to the scene.

Patachu, in the adjacent hills, used to be a favourite summer resort for the legations and other foreigners before the seaside became accessible by rail. Its name, signifying the "eight great places," denotes that number of Buddhist temples, built one above another in a winding gorge on the hillside. In the highest, called Pearl Grotto, 1,200 feet above the sea, I have found repose for many a summer. I am there now (June, 1906), and there I expect to write the closing chapters of this work. These temples are at my feet; the great city is in full view. To that shrine the emperors sometimes made excursions to obtain a distant prospect of the world. One of them, Kien Lung, somewhat noted as a poet, has left, inscribed on a rock, a few lines commemorative of his visit:

"Why have I scaled this dizzy height?
Why sought this mountain den?
I tread as on enchanted ground,
Unlike the abode of men.

"Beneath my feet my realm I see
As in a map unrolled,
Above my head a canopy
Adorned with clouds of gold."

The capital consists of two parts: the Tartar city, a square of four miles; and the Chinese city, measuring five miles by