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THE NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC MAGAZINE 



Photograph by J. A. Muller 



THl 



SUMMER PALACE, ON THE SLOPE OF THE MOUNTAIN OF TEN 

 THOUSAND ANCIENTS 



''The stately pleasure dome of the poet's imaginings, with its graceful, spiry, triple-roofed 

 pavilion set upon a massive four-square base of stone, towering above porticos and pailous, 

 summer-houses, grottos, islands, lily ponds, and bridges of marble" (see text below). 



and red-brown, deepening into twilight 

 purple. 



My host knew well the charm of the 

 hills; so when, in my first rash judgment 

 on the city, I hinted that I found it dusty 

 and sprawling and not as I expected, he 

 took me off to the hills. That was he- 

 fore I had seen the blue peace of the 

 Temple of Heaven, or the yellow splen- 

 dor of the Forbidden City, or the many 

 hues and the agility of the rampant 

 dragons ; for he knew that, to understand 

 Peking and to love it. one must feel its 

 glory in the setting of the hills, not see it 

 through the critical dust of the streeted 

 plain. 



So on the morning after my arrival we 

 put ourselves into two rickshaws and our 

 ruilts and blankets into a third, for every 

 provident traveler in China carries his 

 bed with him. and away we went, three 

 and a half miles, at a dog trot, to the 

 western gate, thence seven more over the 

 willow-shaded highway to the Mountain 

 of Ten Thousand Ancients, a pleasant 

 wooded hillock, deep green against the 

 bare brown of the lanuary hills. 



Before it lies a broad lake and on its 

 slope stands the far-famed Summer Pal- 

 ace. Though several centuries more re- 

 cent than Kublai Khan, this is indeed 

 the stately pleasure dome of the poet's 

 imaginings. Kublai might well have de- 

 creed it. with its graceful, spiry. triple- 

 roofed pavilion set upon a massive four- 

 square base of stone, towering above 

 porticos and pailous, kiosks and summer- 

 houses, grottos and labyrinthine passages, 

 islands and lily ponds, bridges of marble, 

 and grotesque dragons cast in bronze. 



There was ice three feet thick on the 

 lake where lotus flowers bloom in sum- 

 mer ; but the sun shone gloriously, illum- 

 ining golden roofs and deepening the 

 foliage of pine and cedar, and on the hill- 

 top behind and above the palace shone a 

 temple all of glazed tile, mottled green 

 and yellow, glowing like a jeweled crown. 



The wintry weather, coupled with the 

 one-dollar admission fee., gave us the 

 whole vast inclosure to ourselves. Here 

 I had my first opportunity in China to 

 eat my lunch in the open unsurrounded 

 bv a concourse of the curious ! 



