North of the Imperial City lies the extensive yamun of the Ti-tuh, who has the police and garrison of the city under his control, and exercises great authority in its civil administration. The Drum and Bell Towers stand north of the Ti-ngan Măn in the street leading to the city wall, each of them over a hundred feet high, and forming conspicuous objects; the drum and bell are sounded at night watches, and can be heard throughout the city; a clepsydra is still maintained to mark time—a good instance of Chinese conservatism, for clocks are now in general use, and correct the errors of the clepsydra itself.
SHRINES OF ALL RELIGIONS.
Outside of the south-western angle of the Imperial City stands the Mohammedan mosque, and a large number of Turks whose ancestors were brought from Turkestan about a century ago live in its vicinity; this quarter is consequently the chief resort of Moslems who come to the capital. South-west of the mosque, near the cross-wall, stands the Nan Tang, or old Portuguese church, and just west of the Forbidden City, inside of the Hwang Ching, is the Peh Tang, or Cathedral; both are imposing edifices, and near them are large schools and seminaries for the education of children and neophytes. There are religious edifices in the Chinese metropolis appropriated to many forms of religion, viz., the Greek, Latin, and Protestant churches, Islamism, Buddhism in its two principal forms, Rationalism, ancestral worship, state worship, and temples dedicated to Confucius and other deified mortals, besides a great number in which the popular idols of the country are adored. One of the most worthy of notice is the Tí-Wang Miao, lying on the avenue leading to the west gate, a large collection of halls wherein all the tablets of former monarchs of China from remote ages are worshipped. The rule for admission into this Walhalla is to accept all save the vicious and oppressive, those who were assassinated and those who lost their kingdoms. This memorial temple was opened in 1522; the Manchus have even admitted some of the Tartar rulers of the Kin and Liao dynasties, raising the total number of tablets to nearly three hundred. It is an impressive sight, these simple tablets of men who once ruled the Middle Kingdom, standing here side by side, worshipped by their successors that their spirits may bless the state. This selection of the good sovereigns alone recalls to mind the custom in ancient Jerusalem of allowing wicked princes no place in the sepulchres of the kings. Distinguished statesmen of all ages, called by the Chinese kwoh chu, or ‘pillars of state,’ are associated with their masters in this temple, as not unworthy to receive equal honors.
A little west of this remarkable temple is the Peh-ta sz’, or ‘White Pagoda Temple,’ so called from a costly dagoba near it erected about A.D. 1100, renovated by Kublai in the thirteenth century, and rebuilt in 1819. Its most conspicuous feature is the great copper umbrella on the top. When finished, the dagoba was described as covered with jasper, and the projecting parts of the roof with ornaments of exquisite workmanship tastefully arranged. Around this edifice, which contains twenty beads or relics of Buddha, two thousand clay pagodas and five books of charms, are also one hundred and eight small pillars on which lamps are burned. The portion of the city lying south of the cross-wall is inhabited mostly by Chinese, and contains hundreds of hwui-kwan, or club-houses, erected by the gentry of cities and districts in all parts of the empire to accommodate their citizens resorting to the capital. Its streets are narrow and the whole aspect of its buildings and markets indicates the life and industry of the people. Hundreds of inns accommodate travellers who find no lodging-places in the Nui Ching, and storehouses, theatres, granaries and markets attract or supply their customers from all parts. There is more dissipation and freedom from etiquette here, and the Chinese officials feel freer from their Manchu colleagues.
THE TEMPLE OF HEAVEN.
Three miles south of the Palace, in the Chinese City, is situated the Tien Tan, or ‘Altar to Heaven,’ so placed because it was anciently customary to perform sacrifices to Heaven in the outskirts of the Emperor’s residence city. The compound is inclosed by more than three miles of wall, within which is planted a thick grove of locust (Sophora), pine and fir trees, interspaced with stretches of grass. Within a second wall, which surrounds the sacred buildings, rises a copse of splendid and thickly growing cypress trees, reminding one of the solemn shade in the vicinity of famous temples in Ancient Greece, or of those celebrated shrines described in Western Asia. The great South Altar, the most important of Chinese religious structures, is a beautiful triple circular terrace of white marble, whose base is 210, middle stage 150, and top 90 feet in width, each terrace encompassed by a richly carved balustrade. A curious symbolism of the number three and its multiples may be noticed in the measurements of this pile. The uppermost terrace, whose height above the ground is about eighteen feet, is paved with marble slabs, forming nine concentric circles—the inner of nine stones inclosing a central piece, and around this each receding layer consisting of a successive multiple of nine until the square of nine (a favorite number of Chinese philosophy) is reached in the outermost row. It is upon the single round stone in the centre of the upper plateau that the Emperor kneels when worshipping Heaven and his ancestors at the winter solstice.
Four flights of nine steps each lead from this elevation to the next lower stage, where are placed tablets to the spirits of the sun, the moon, the stars, and the Year God. On the ground at the end of the four stairways stand vessels of bronze in which are placed the bundles of cloth and sundry animals constituting part of the sacrificial offerings. But of vastly greater importance than these in the matter of burnt-offering is the great furnace, nine feet high, faced with green porcelain, and ascended on three of its sides by porcelain staircases. In this receptacle, erected some hundred feet to the south-east of the altar, is consumed a burnt-offering of a bullock—entire and without blemish—at the yearly ceremony. The slaughter-house of the sacrificial bullock stands east of the North Altar, at the end of an elaborate winding passage, or cloister of 72 compartments, each 10 feet in length.
Separated from the Altar to Heaven by a low wall, is a smaller though more conspicuous construction called Ki-kuh Tan, or ‘Altar of Prayer for Grain.’ Its proportions and arrangement are somewhat similar to those of the South Altar, but upon its upper terrace rises a magnificent triple-roofed, circular building known to foreigners as the ‘Temple of Heaven.’ This elaborate house of worship, whose surmounting gilded ball rests 100 feet above the platform, was originally roofed with blue, yellow and green tiles, but by Kienlung these colors were changed to blue. When, added to these brilliant hues, we consider the richly carved and painted eaves, the windows shaded by venetians of blue-glass rods strung together, and the rare symmetry of its proportions, it is no exaggeration to call this temple the most remarkable edifice in the capital—or indeed in the empire. The native name is Ki-kien Tien, or ‘Temple of Prayer for the Year.’ In the interior, the large shrines of carved wood for the tablets correspond to the movable blue wooden huts which on days of sacrifice are put up on the Southern Altar. Here, upon some day following the first of spring (Feb. 6), the Emperor offers his supplications to Heaven for a blessing upon the year. In times of drought, prayer for rain is also made at this altar, the Emperor being obliged to proceed on foot, as a repentant suppliant, to the ‘Hall of Penitent Fasting,’ a distance of three miles. A green furnace for burnt-offerings lies to the south-east of this, as of the North Altar; while in the open park not far from the two and seventy cloisters are seven great stones, said to have fallen from heaven and to secure good luck to the country.