. China, its marvel and mystery. was to get permissionto paint the Imperial Palaces, offered most kindly towrite to our Minister, and so forward the matter. I, with this gentleman and another, made an ex-cursion on donkeys up the mountains to see the GreatWall. After passing through the city we found therewas only a track, very bad through the recent rains. Wehad quite a narrow escape ; we had to pass under an arch-way through a spur of the Great Wall, and, having beenthere before, I remarked to my friends that it was partlyfallen in. We had hardly got through when there wasa loud crash. We di
. China, its marvel and mystery. was to get permissionto paint the Imperial Palaces, offered most kindly towrite to our Minister, and so forward the matter. I, with this gentleman and another, made an ex-cursion on donkeys up the mountains to see the GreatWall. After passing through the city we found therewas only a track, very bad through the recent rains. Wehad quite a narrow escape ; we had to pass under an arch-way through a spur of the Great Wall, and, having beenthere before, I remarked to my friends that it was partlyfallen in. We had hardly got through when there wasa loud crash. We did not wait to see what it was;but on our return journey found the whole arch hadfallen in, and we had to make our way round andover the wall. It is quite a long ride up the hillside; and aftergoing as far as the donkeys could take us, we dis-mounted, went on foot farther up, and were able tosee and appreciate what an amount of patient labourmust have been spent on this wall. At this point the first few feet above the ground io8. THE GREAT WALL SHAN-HAI-KWAN show solid stone masonry, above which are large bricks ;and on picking up pieces of this brick I found it wasnot hard, and yet there it had been for all thesecenturies! At short intervals, and wherever there wasa bridge over a stream, are watch-towers solidly builtwith battlements. No precipitous mountain-side stops the wall. Itgoes on and on, built up in a most marvellous manner;and away above us, on quite a pinnacle, there was anoutstanding tower from which the country could bewatched for miles. I was told that the method ofgetting the bricks to the top was this : many goatswere kept and fed on the hill-tops and then drivendown and loaded, each with a brick or two. Theyslowly made their way back up to their the outer or Manchurian side of the wall, at somelittle distance, are forts on prominent positions ; someof which, judging by the ruins remaining, must havebeen of considerable extent. What a magnifice
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Keywords: ., bookcentury1900, bookdecade1910, bookpublishernewyo, bookyear1910
