During the whole of our journey from Llama Miao to Ku Pei Ko̔u we did not see a single Mongol, much less a camp. The ground is not suited to their nomad and pastoral habits; it is colonised exclusively by Chinese, principally farmers from the province of Shantung. Europeans have very rarely followed this route; so far as I can make out they have been seen here once, or at most twice.
15th May.
This day week we were shivering in furs at Llama Miao. To-day a gauze shirt was too much; the flies were a perfect pest. It was too hot to do anything but sleep, which they put out of the question. It was not until after dinner that we could venture out. We went up a hill behind the inn, from which we had a fine view of the sun setting behind the heights which the Great Wall scales. In the valley beneath wayfarers were hurrying to reach the town before the closing of the gates; the rear was brought up by a herd of about a hundred pigs, the last travellers who entered China this night by the gates of Ku Pei Ko̔u.
About Ku Pei Ko̔u and the road back to Peking I wrote to you last year, and this letter is too long already. Three days brought us home to the Legation.
P.S.—By the bye, although the part of Mongolia we visited is set down on the maps as belonging to the province of Chi Li, which it is so far as its government is concerned, I have spoken of China as bounded by the Great Wall. No Mongol living beyond it would consider himself as an inhabitant of China, and the Chinese themselves speak of the places which are “Ko̔u-wai,” outside the mouth or frontier, as Mongolia. In Stamford’s large map of China and Japan you will see how Chang Chia Ko̔u, Dolonor or Llama Miao, and Ku Pei Ko̔u are placed—some of our other halting-places are also given, but you would hardly recognise them from their spelling.
May 20th—Sunday.—Went round some of the curiosity shops, where I was shown, among other things, a wonderful ewer and cover of rock crystal, about a foot high. I have seen nothing finer of its kind than the carving. In the days of Chien Lung the Magnificent, himself a great patron of art, when a fine piece of rock crystal, jade, or cornelian was brought in from the western mountains as tribute, a committee of taste decided the shape to be given to it, and fixed upon the artist to whom it should be entrusted by Imperial Command.
May 21.—The pious Chinese are all off these days making a pilgrimage to a holy shrine among the hills, called Miao Fêng Shan, to burn joss-stick as a sovereign prophylactic against disease and misfortune of all kinds.
May 22.—The thermometer standing at 100° in the shade. The heat frightfully oppressive. Happily on the following day there came a great thunderstorm, with hailstones as big as pigeon’s eggs. This cooled the air. The formation of the hailstones was curious: a nodule of ice surrounded by a coating of frozen snow, which in its turn was encased in ice. Bad for heads!
May 27.—An outbreak of the “Heavenly Flowers,” or smallpox, causes general consternation and vaccination. Any one who is opposed to vaccination had better see the ravages of this horrible disease in an Eastern city; so common is it that no Chinaman who has not “put forth the heavenly flowers” is considered quite complete. It is like distemper with dogs in Europe.
May 29.—Dined with Dr. and Mrs. Wells Williams at the American Legation, a handsome and delightful couple now entering middle age. Dr. Williams, the author of a Chinese dictionary, and that most encyclopædic book The Middle Kingdom, is one of the most learned of sinologues. He began his career in China as a missionary in the south, but his great talents rendered him necessary to the American Government, and he is now chargé d’affaires here. He was very interesting, talking, among other subjects, on the paper currency. Bank-notes, it seems, were first introduced in the days of the Sung dynasty, during the reign of Shao Hsing (A.D. 1170). At that time copper was scarce, so the Government issued great notes (Ta Chao) of the value of 1000 to 5000 copper cash, and small notes (Hsiao Chao) worth from 100 to 700 cash. Officers were appointed everywhere to issue and receive these notes. They were to be renewed within seven years, and fifteen cash in every thousand were deducted for the expense of making them. They were said to be “kung ssŭ pien,” “convenient both for the public and for private individuals.” Marco Polo mentions them with praise.