main road from the Ordos. It is some ninety feet in height and surrounded 

 by a high wall. There are three storeys : the first a solid block of masonry 

 about thirty feet square ; the second and third similar, but lessening in size. 

 Access to the second storey is gained by a stairway inside the lowest, but the 

 steps from this to the top are on the outside. From here a splendid birdseye 

 view of the desert is obtainable — countless sandhills stretching away north 

 and south to the horizon ; in the near distance two affluents of the Yu-lin Ho, 

 their banks marked out by elms and willows. The sandhills assume varying 

 hues of pink and yellow, swept from time to time by a darker patch of mauve, 

 the shadow of a drifting cloud. The delicacy of the colouring, remarkable at 

 all times, becomes specially so at sunset. A peculiar phenomenon was noticed 

 from the temple, the great sandbank that lies beyond the river taking on at 

 night a deep red glow particularly noticeable in the moonlight. The Great 

 Wall at this point, and indeed along the whole boundary-line between the 

 Ordos and Shensi, is little more than a low ridge of earth. Its course, 

 however, is easily distinguishable by the watch towers still existing at 

 intervals of about three hundred yards. In many cases these are in admirable 

 preservation, leading to the supposition that the Wall in this part was not 

 itself faced with brick or stone. It seems possible that there were battlements 

 of brick, but there is no indication of any further masonry. It has been 

 suggested that the towers are of later date than the Wall, or that they alone 

 have been kept in repair ; but there is no good reason for either view, and 

 certainly there is no trace of any repair whatever.* But so much has been 

 written about this stupendous work that any further discussion or remarks 

 here would be superfluous. 



An interesting visit was paid to a temple situated on the bank of the 

 Yu-lin Ho, at the point where it cuts through the Wall. It is formed mainly 

 by caves hewn out of the solid sandstone, which appears here as a massive 

 outcrop. Opposite the temple, on the western bank of the river, are numerous 

 epitaphs carved on the face of the cliffs in Chinese and Tartar characters. 

 They are to the memory of officials and Mongol princes, whose sepulchres 

 can be seen as deep excavations below. Photographs of the fort and temple, 

 and of the Wall at various points, were secured. A series of astronomical 

 observations of both sun and stars, reduced to the South Gate, seemed to 

 indicate that the old Jesuit longitude is about twenty-eight miles out. 



♦ As a matter of historical interest, it may be mentioned that the Wall was repaired by Chien Shen, of the Ming 



dynasty (1465-87). 



21 



