4 BROWN : 



absorption by the Trans-Siberian Railway is one of the vague 

 but gigantic possibilities of the future. 



The Wall is typical and characteristic in the highest 

 degree. As enormous, as useless and as helpless as the bulky 

 Empire of which it used to be the futile hem. Empire and 

 Wall alike are, or are ready to become the prey of the spoiler. 



Nothing that is not formidable, nothing that men do not, 

 for some reason, fear, at least a little, is respectable or safe. 



The great Gibbon said that " if the Chinese seldom dared 

 to meet their enemies in the field, their passive courage pre- 

 sented an endless succession of cities to storm and of millions 

 to slaughter." 



To-day the Flowery Empire is being partitioned among the 

 Powers like a school of herrings. The Wall is garret lumber, 

 given room merely because the room is not \'et wanted for 

 something else — allowed to stand because no use has yet been 

 found for what composes it. 



The Great Wall as laid down upon the maps extends gener- 

 ally westward from about the 126th meridian to the looth. 

 Twenty-six degrees of longitude. This on the equator would 

 be, at 70 miles to the degree, 1820 miles. On the 40th parallel 

 it would be 1394 miles. But the line of the wall is so crooked 

 that if fairly straightened out it would be considerably more 

 than this. 



On the whole, therefore, its length might after eveiy rea- 

 sonable adjustment, reach even the 1500 miles that have been 

 claimed for it. 



I am not aware that any veiy accurate siu'veys have been 

 made, and it sounds well not to mind a hundred miles or so 

 more or less. 



However that may be, it runs along the northern frontier of 

 China proper, between this and the great provinces of Mongolia 

 and Manchuria, Mongolia being the westward one of the two. 

 Peking ( Pei Ching, North Capital) is in (nearly enough) 40° 

 north latitude, and is 117° east of Greenwich. A point of the 

 Great Wall lies fortv miles due north of the citv. 



