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Ch'iEN men; this is the principal gate of the nine gates of PEKING; IT IS 

 THE ENTRANCE TO THE FORBIDDEN CITY 



been carefully treasured by Christian 

 missionaries since the Christian church 

 became aware of its existence through 

 the Roman Catholic fathers, 1625 .\. D. 



Several years ago the governor of the 

 province of Shensi, where it was found, 

 placed it in the Pei-lin (Forest of Tab- 

 lets), at Hsi-ngan, for protection against 

 vandals. The Pei-lin is a collection of 

 more than 1,400 historical records in 

 stone, both pictorial and otherwise, run- 

 ning back 12 centuries, and the greatest 

 collection in the country. Not less curi- 

 ous than the Nestorian tablet are the two 

 tablets at Kai-feng, province of Honan, 

 commemorating an ancient and now ex- 

 tinct Jewish colony at that place. 



Tablets greet the traveler at every 

 yamen (official residence), temple, bridge, 

 mountain pass, by the roadside and 

 tomb, and in the faces of walls where 

 they are incorporated. In eastern China 

 pavilions are built over them, while in 

 the west of China they are framed in 

 bricklike doors and are called "tao pei," 

 or road tablets. 



A curious tablet exists at Nanking to 

 commemorate the visit there of the Em- 



peror Kang Hsi and reproving the in- 

 habitants for their extravagance and prod- 

 igality. 



In Manchuria, near the Yellow River, 

 is a tablet more than 18 feet high that 

 is interesting, at this time of Japanese 

 expansion on the continent, because of 

 the fact that it mentions the Japanese by 

 a nickname. 



Another of interest is used to cover a 

 well under the famous Golden Hill at 

 Port Arthur. It records the fact that a 

 Chinese envoy passed that point during 

 the Middle Ages on a mission to the 

 court of one of the Manchurian kings 

 of the period. 



Perhaps the latest tablets to be erected 

 in connection with the imperial court 

 are those in commemoration of incidents 

 in the flight of the late Empress Grand 

 l^owager and the Emperor Kuang Hsu 

 to Hsian-fu in 1900. At Chu-yun-kuan, 

 in the Nankou Pass, through which the 

 court passed in its flight, the traveler is 

 struck by a tablet over the gateway read- 

 ing, "First Gate of the World" — this be- 

 ing the chief entrance to China from 

 Tartary. But within the entrance of the 



1015 



