the women of China were not held in as much consideration as they are among the nations of the West; but as mothers, they were treated with the utmost respect, especially by their sons, who, even when themselves advanced in years, paid great deference to the commands and counsels of an aged mother.

At this period the men did not shave their heads, as they do now; but suffered the hair to grow very long and thick, and fastened it in a knot at the top of the head. The male attire was long and flowing, with loose sleeves; and in the winter men of rank wore costly furs; but the winter dresses of the poor were made of sheepskin. As to the ladies, it does not appear that they have much altered the fashion of their dress from that time to this. Their costume is not altogether unbecoming. It consists in a full robe gathered into a narrow band round the throat, from which it hangs in graceful folds, unconfined at the waist, with large falling sleeves. The most striking difference in the appearance of the gentlemen of ancient and modern times relates to the head; that of the ladies to the feet, which were then suffered to grow to the natural size, and were not distorted and squeezed into shoes four inches long, as they are at present.

In the ordinary affairs of life the people were much governed by superstition, putting implicit faith in omens, dreams and spells innumerable. A belief in astrology was universal, and charms and talismans were frequently resorted to even by the most learned men of the age, by the power of which they hoped to avert an impending evil. One of these popular superstitions was exemplified in a singular manner during the War of the Three

Kingdoms, by a chief named Kung-ming, who was a great astrologer, and very often consulted the stars on the subject of future events. One night, being thus engaged, he fancied he saw signs in the heavens predicting that his own death would take place in a few hours; but, as he was not willing to die so soon, he lost no time in endeavoring to avert the fatal doom by means of a spell. He lighted a number of lamps in his tent, placing them in a particular order, corresponding with the position of the heavenly bodies at the time, and then composed a sort of prayer, which he continued to repeat incessantly as he sat on the ground before the lamps. But all was unavailing, for before the sun rose he had breathed his last, most probably in consequence of the nervous excitement produced by his own superstitious dread. The inefficacy of the charm was thus clearly proved, yet the superstition still remains, and many of the Chinese occasionally light lamps and arrange them in correspondence with the position of the stars, in the full persuasion that a threatened misfortune may be thus averted.

CHAPTER VII.

THE MIDDLE AGES IN CHINA.

THE study of the history of the middle ages in China

is calculated to fill the mind with surprise. Our ancestors present the melancholy picture of nations which had occupied a high position as to civilization retrograding to barbarism; of races which had enjoyed the light of the gospel of Christ allowing it to go out in darkness, and sitting down with a closed Bible, to accept for its heavenly teachings and comforts the "old wives' fables" of their heathen forefathers, only altered by the priests of Rome so far as to substitute the names of Christian saints for those of the ancient gods and goddesses. But in China there are peace, civilization, progress in the arts, and so manifest a superiority to Europe, that the fragmentary accounts of the travelers thither from the West express much the same wonder and admiration at what they beheld which now a native of Tibet might be expected to utter when he should visit the cities of France. The Arabs, who were then well acquainted with Europe, had such exalted ideas of the splendor of China that their authors were accustomed to say that "Chin" had the best inheritance of all the posterity of Noah, that he was the most ingenious and able of them all, and that he was the discoverer of the arts

of sculpture and architecture, of painting or dying with colors, and of the culture and manufacture of silk. The Persians also expressed this admiration of China. When they wish even now to describe a very beautiful and handsomely furnished house, they call it kaneh Chini, that is, a "Chinese house."1 Such were the ideas of the Nestorian and the Roman Catholic missionaries who were drawn thither by the hope of converting so grand an empire to the Christian faith. And such were the pictures which Marco Polo presented, which so greatly excited the zeal of Columbus and other European mariners to find a pasthither across the Western ocean.

sage

But it is not our purpose to renew these extravagant pictures, or at least what would seem to us in this age extravagant. We would only recall the fact of a relative position of the East to the West, as to civilization and wealth, a thousand years ago, just the opposite from that which now exists.

The ancient capital of the Chinese empire was Hangchau, a large, wealthy city, situated at no very great distance from Nanking, and containing an immense population, chiefly engaged in the manufacture of silk and cotton. The imperial palace, standing in the midst of extensive gardens, was adorned with Eastern splendor, and near it were several magnificent temples and many fine residences belonging to the grandees of the court. The first sovereign of the new dynasty of Tsin, however, removed the seat of government to Kai-fung, another large city, standing in the centre of the empire, in the province of Ho-nan, one of the most fertile and beautiful

I D'HERBELOT, Bibliothèque Orientale, iii., art. "Sin."

2 Travels, Part I., chap. lvii., etc.

parts of all China-the same where the remarkable Jewish colony was found; and this was the royal residence. until the reign of Yuen-ti, the fifth emperor of the line of Tsin, who built a very magnificent palace at Nanking, where the court was held with more splendor than had been exhibited by any of the former sovereigns.

There was an interval of repose which lasted some years, when a new invasion of the Tartars again spread terror and desolation throughout the western provinces. They were led by a barbarian prince, who laid claim to the empire on the ground of being descended from one of those princesses of the race of Han who had married Tartar chieftains; and the fierce invader, having made a captive of the emperor, obliged the unfortunate monarch to wait upon him at table for several days in his tent, and then had him cruelly put to death; soon after which one of his generals captured the son of the murdered sovereign, who was treated with every insult, and, in the habit of a slave, was compelled to attend the barbarian chief on his hunting excursions, and to perform the degrading office of carrying his parasol; for this article of convenience was known from a very early period to the Chinese, Tartars, Hindùs and other Oriental nations as an ensign of dignity, and only used by persons of rank.1

The unhappy prince was not destined long to endure.

1 The umbrella, or parasol, so universal now in China, and probably so ancient, is depicted in the ancient paintings of the Egyptians. In the sculptures of Nineveh it is an emblem of royalty. Sometimes in them it is seen borne by an attendant, and may have a veil suspended from one side, more effectually to shield the royal person from the sun, or it is fastened upon the chariot. The sides are often ornamented with fringe and the top with an appropriate figure. Such coincidences of customs help to illustrate the intercourse of these ancient nations.