PEKING, THE CITY OF THE UNEXPECTED 



341 



his sons and his daughters, his wives and 

 his concubines. 



Even the foreigners in Peking have 

 fallen into this habit of surrounding 

 themselves with blank and unexpressive 

 walls ; so that behind such barriers are 

 found not only temples and parks and 

 palaces, but colleges and churches and 

 legation buildings. 



THE UNEXPECTED IS THE KEYNOTE OE 

 CHINESE ARCHITECTURE 



Indeed, the unexpected is the essence 

 of Chinese architecture. One can never 

 get a complete view of a temple or a 

 yamen unless there be some adjacent hill 

 or tower or city wall from which to 

 view it. 



On level ground only the outer wall 

 and the entrance are seen, and when 

 these are passed one sees only the first 

 court, with its more elaborate entrance 

 to the second ; and so on through three, 

 four, five, six, it may be seven, court- 

 yards, each complete in itself, each with 

 a central building, through which one 

 passes to the court beyond, each building 

 larger, higher, or more decorative than 

 the last, each breaking upon the beholder 

 with a fresh surprise. 



This arrangement, admirable as it is 

 in producing sudden and increasing won- 

 der and in allowing the architect to work 

 up to a climax through a series of sur- 

 prising effects, fails at times in its lack 

 of vista. This is notably true of smaller 

 buildings, which sometimes appear 

 cramped and huddled, sometimes cosy 

 and pleasing, seldom imposing. But in 

 Peking, where Chinese building has 

 reached its most magnificent develop- 

 ment, there is a fine spaciousness in the 

 courtyards, so combined with massive 

 structure, restraint, and dignity of line 

 and simple barbaric coloring that one 

 fairly catches his breath in admiration at 

 the strength and power of it. 



This is especially true of the imperial 

 palace, which is perhaps the most effect- 

 ively arranged group of buildings in all 

 China. Gateway after gateway, each 

 gate a palace in itself, pillared, roofed, 

 and buttressed, leads into a wide-lying 

 courtyard whose placid expanse dwarfs 

 ancient trees around its edges into seem- 

 ing shrubs. 



Each court is a unit of grandeur and 



magnificence in itself, and at the same 

 time an integral member of a series lead- 

 ing up to the marble-terraced courtyard 

 of the great throne hall. 



Although the imperial palace is the 

 finest architectural, ensemble in the cap- 

 ital, it is in the Temple of Heaven, or, as 

 the Chinese call it, "The Happy Year 

 Hall," where the emperor used to offer 

 annual supplication to Heaven for a pros- 

 perous new year, that we find a single 

 building in which the simple dignity of 

 Chinese architecture is at its best. 



This is perhaps the most frequently 

 pictured of all Chinese buildings. Every 

 Chinese photographer displays it in his 

 window ; every vender of post-cards fea- 

 tures it ; every book on China reproduces 

 it ; it is probably the one view of things 

 Chinese which every Westerner who 

 knows anything at all about China has 

 seen. Yet I know of no building which 

 most pictures fail so pitifully to portray. 



In the usual print or photograph it is 

 squat, plump, and, heavy, like a German 

 wedding cake. In reality it is strong and 

 gracious and mighty, and when the vis- 

 itor comes into its presence he has come 

 into the presence of a great peace. 



There it stands on a vast platform, its 

 base above the tree-tops. Above the plat- 

 form is a threefold marble terrace, white 

 and circular; then red columns, green- 

 gold friezes, and three fine, flaring, cir- 

 cular roofs, with shadows and mystery 

 under the eaves, and the roof tiles not 

 crying-yellow, like those of the imperial 

 palace, but deep, deep blue. 



It is the "quietness and confidence" of 

 which Isaiah speaks, made visible in 

 wood and tile and marble. 



THE EEEMENT OE SURPRISE EEADS CHI- 

 NESE ARCHITECTURE ASTRAY 



But it is just in this, its chief master- 

 piece, that Chinese architecture, in its in- 

 sistence on the unexpected, has gone far- 

 thest astray. The temple is in the midst 

 of a huge park ; acres of lawn and dense 

 groves of ancient evergreen surround it ; 

 there is every condition conducive to the 

 most effective use of distance and vista : 

 yet the temple approaches are so clouded 

 and cluttered with cheap, tawdry, deca- 

 dent gateways that nothing of the temple 

 itself is seen until one actually stumbles 

 upon it through the last gate. 



