I must leave many of the temples and objects of interest in Peking undescribed, as my aim is rather to convey a general impression of the condition of the country and of its people as we find them now-a-days, than to enter into minute details. I can therefore only cast a passing glance at a few places of public importance. The Confucian Temple covers a wide area, and like all palaces, shrines and even houses, is completely walled around. The main gateway which leads into the sacred enclosure is presented in the accompanying picture. This gateway is approached, as were the ancient shrines of Greece and Rome, through an avenue of venerable cypress trees; and the whole establishment forms perhaps the most imposing specimen of purely Chinese architecture to be found among the ornaments of the capital. The triple approach and the balustrading are of sculptured marble; while the pillars and other portions of the gateway are of more perishable materials — wood, glazed earthen- ware and brick. On either side are groves of marble tablets, bearing the names of the successful Han-lin scholars for many centuries back; and that one to the left, supported upon the back of a tortoise, was set up here when Marco Polo was in China. Within this gate stand the celebrated stone drums, inscribed with stanzas, cut nearly 2,000 years ago, in primi- tive form of Chinese writing. Thus these drums prove the antiquity at once of the poetry and of the character in which that has been engraved. These inscriptions have been translated by Dr. S. W. Bushell, the gentleman who has also discovered the site of the famous city of Shang-tu, referred to by Coleridge as Xanadu, and spoken of by Marco Polo as the northern capital of the Yuen dynasty. The great hall within simply contains the tablet of China's chief sage and those of twenty-two of his most distinguished followers. The spirits of the departed great are
