Ir is almost impossible to understand the difficulties under which diplomatists from Western countries labour unless one has paid a visit to Peking. We know that every year sends travellers to the northern capital more or less observant and intelligent. Men of leisure who have exhausted all the beaten tracks and seen al! the lions in Europe, Aumeriea, and the more accessible portions of the other great continents, at last seek new sensation in a trip to China. They enjoy the excellent shooting in the neighbourhood of Shanghai, and after having thoroughly appreciated the many advantages afforded to sportsmen in these regions, and made bags which will give them something to talk about for twelve months, they set forth on the business part of the trip, and resolutely determine to do Peking.
The regulation sights are duly seen. The traveller is impressed with the vastness and disgusted with the dust of the northern'capital. He visits the Observatory of the great Kangbi in the south-eastern part of the Tartar city. He inspects the Mohammedan Mosque. He sees the White Pagoda Temple, which recalls the grandeur of Kublai Khan. He passes through the various Examination Halls and observes the Russian Religious Establishments, He makes an excursion to the Great Wall, and if he be interested in the science of religion, he ponders upon the leasons that are to be taught by the Temple of Heaven, and strives to read the riddle of that venerable and mysterious nature worship, which has its outward expression in the Altars to Heaven and Earth, to the San and to the Moon, in the Black Dragon Pool, and the Temple to the God of Rain. After seeing the historic buildings and observing as far as is permitted the customs of the ancient Cambala, the globe trotter begins to interest himself in the European life of the city. He avails himself of his letters of introduction to the Embassies and to the Missionaries, and finds the most courteous treatment at the hands of the representatives of politics and propagandism, If he is even moderately observant, he sees much to interest him in, even, the tran-slent glimpses of the great game which are presented to his view. His lips are sealed, but he cannot fail to observe beneath the surface of official polite ness, hints of slumbering animosities, and signs that two important powers are pitted against each other, and that the contest of intrigue is carefully watched by the representatives of the other European nations. The absolute harmony which was expected to exist amongst the religious sects is, perhaps, not discovered to be a reality, but the polemical disturbances have ceased to be so fiery as they once were (since at present, there is no Chinese Cyril in the north), and, indeed, the overmastering interest and importance of the political struggle, and the enormous influence that China must have on the politics of the world, draw the eyes away from every smaller matter, and concentrate attention on the diplomatic fight between the Ministers of Foreign Powers, and the great satraps who divide the power nominally possessed by the Empresses Dowager and the Baby Emperor. The mechanical etiquetta of the Court goes on like clock work, but behind there are unquestion~ ably bustling spirits and rising ambitious and complicated plots and counter plots. The most lively presentment of Peking at the moment we believe, to be found in Sir Walter Scott's picture of the Court of Alexis Comnenus, in the novel of Count Robert of Paris. The Chinese attention to minute and abso-utely unimportant details of ceremonial, the outward reverence for Imperial institutions, the hollowness and corruption of the Statesmen and Magistrates are all faithfully figured in the sketch to which we refer. And as in Constantinople in the 11th century, so in Peking in 19th, there is the ever present apprehension of the clash with the material strength of the Western Military Powers. Yet, though hose are the elements now at work at Peking which cannot fail to fasten the attention of every traveller with a soul above curios, there is one peculiarity of the life at Peking which depresses and hangs about one to an extent which cannot be described. It is the leaden weight of apathy and slaggishness which we cannot remove. No one seems able to breathe freely. No one seems able to speak freely. The Ministers who go up full of energy and bold intention are soon petrified into grave and decorous statues. The solemn dulness of the scene knows no relief. Phere is an air about the place and the people, which one has to feel, crushing one's own activity and vigour, before one can describe it in words. This influence reaches its climax in the interviews of foreign Ministers with the Tsung-li Yamen, A man goos in and takes his seat at the table with a view of pressing a claim or elucidating a policy, but he finds half the time allotted to the interviews wasted in meaningless phrases and mutual enquiries for the health of the officials, and then when he comes to the matter in hand he is met by supercilious vows and hopeless silence which effectually shut up the avenues of approach he had been laboriously preparing by previous correspondence. He goes away angry, and after an interval, tries the process again, bat there is the same stolid indifference, and after a time he gives up attempting to move the inert mass and resigns himself wearily and despairingly to that inaction which is the genius of the place.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.