central buildings of the palace to the outermost wall of fortifi- cation. The ground-plan of the Imperial buildings is in most respects identical with the ground-plans of the great temples and tombs of the country. So much alike are they, even in the style and arrangement of their edifices, that a palace, with scarcely any alteration, might be at once converted into a Bud- dhist temple. Thus we find that the Great Yung-ho-Kung Lamasary of the Mongols in the north-east quarter of the city, was at one time the residence of the son and successor of Kang-hi. The chief halls of the Imperial palace — if we may judge from the glimpse one gets of their lofty roofs when one stands on the city wall— -are three in number, extending from the Chien-men to Prospect Hill, and in every instance are ap- proached by a triple gateway. The like order prevails at the Ming tombs. There one finds an equal number of halls, with a triple doorway in front of each; while the temple and domestic archi- tecture throughout the north of China is based upon the same plan. In the latter case there are three courts, divided from each other by halls, the apartments of the domestics being ranged about the outer courts, while the innermost of the three is devoted to family use.
It is interesting to observe the evidences which crop up every- where, showing the universal sacredness of the numbers three and nine. Thus at Peking, the gates with which the outer wall of the Tartar city is pierced form together a multiple of three, and the sacred person of the Emperor can only be ap- proached, even by his highest officers, after three times three prostrations. The Temple of Heaven, too, in the Chinese city, with its triple roof, the triple terraces of its marble altars and the rest of its mystic symbolism throughout, points either to three or its multiples.
