The new town residence of the Empress is along the south-eastern wall, and there are other houses enclosed in gardens, all exhibiting the same architectural uniformity—red walls and yellow roofs. The only decoration is the marble staircase with carved dragons. In the adjacent gardens are the quarters of the household staff, and close by the old Foreign Mission and the cathedral. The Mission exchanged those quarters for a fine site farther off, where it is now established.
The Maisan (meaning "mount of coal") is an artificial hill in front of the principal Northern Gate. Its five peaks are adorned with fine summer residences of unequalled beauty, and roofed with enamelled tiles, displaying a number of the porcelain towers so familiar to us from our school-books.
Many versions have come down to posterity as to the origin of the Maisan, but I am inclined to think that originally it was erected for the same purpose as the walls round the gates—that of protection against evil spirits. My assumption is rather confirmed by the fact that in the grove extending along the side of the hill stands the great death-chamber, a hall supported on colossal pillars, wherein is deposited the coffin of a deceased Emperor. The funeral procession passes through the large Northern Gate in front of the graves of the Emperors. In China, where everything has a meaning, it would be fallacious to assume that the Maisan did not symbolize something, and the uncertainty and mystery only enhance the beauty of the evergreen groves of the place. It is like the Roman Testaccian Hill in this respect, the only interesting feature of whose barrenness lies in its mysterious origin.
TRIUMPHAL ARCH
"The Maisan is an artificial wall in front of the principal
Northern Gate"
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The fourth wall is that of the Tartar city, which is almost square, and has altogether ten gates—three to the north, three to the south, two to the east, and two to the west. The wall is about seventeen miles long and fifty feet high, and so wide that a dozen soldiers abreast can ride on it comfortably. At its four corners are four three-storeyed bastions with double-gabled, green-tiled roofs. Over the gates are towers with similar roofs, and everywhere the same Imperial emblems, the same dragons and ornamentation. Everything bears the stamp of uniformity, embodying one canon of taste and one idea.
One can hardly imagine a grander and more sombre structure than the symmetrical, harmonious walls of Pekin, and the more we see of them the more we are charmed.
The wall of the Chinese town was added to that of the Tartar city to form a parallelogram; it is similar to the former, though somewhat more modest. To the north the three gates of the Tartar city serve as entrance, while on its eastern and western sides are two gates respectively, and to the south is the principal entrance to Pekin. Then come the moats and ditches and the ubiquitous bridges. So any one desiring to approach the throne must pass altogether through five cities, seven gates, and five bridges, and in the Imperial city one must walk through five halls and five courts ere the throne itself is reached.
The conception of all this is as grand as it is masterly. Nowhere is the idea of majesty enhanced so infinitely, and nowhere is power adorned to such an extent as in China. The Winter Palace and Windsor Castle are merely private dwellings, and even Versailles loses much of its grandeur when compared to the Imperial Palace in Pekin.
It is only a few months since the Court returned from its protracted exile to the deserted palaces; and what a brilliant and magnificent spectacle that grand procession afforded on the long route through five cities and so many gates and bridges! although the uniforms of the soldiers must have looked rather shabby and the coats of the mandarins somewhat worn. The pageant must have been one of the most striking ever seen.