house are kept private, and effectually guarded from intrusion of strangers by a high wall, and at the doors by a numerous staff of messengers. The stables are usually on the east side and contain stout Mongol ponies, large Ili horses, and a good supply of sleek, well-kept mules, such as North China furnishes in abundance. A prince or princess has a retinue of about twenty, mounted on ponies or mules."*

If

By something more than a sumptuary law, all houses of any pretension face southward, and their sites, far from being left to the mere choice of the proprietors, are determined for them by the rules and regulations of Fêng Shui. This Fêng Shui is that which places a preliminary stumbling-block in the way of every Western improvement. If a railway is proposed, the objection is at once raised that it would destroy the Fêng Shui of the neighbourhood by disturbing the sepulchres of the dead. a line of telegraph is suggested, the promoters are promptly told that the shadows thrown by the wires on the houses they pass would outrage the Feng Shui of the neighbourhood and bring disaster and death in their train. In the minds of the people Fêng Shui has a very positive existence, but with the mandarins, who are not all so grossly ignorant, it has been found that when state necessities require it, or when a sufficient sum of money is likely to be their reward, the terrors of Fêng Shui disappear like the morning mists before the sun. The two words Fêng Shui mean "Wind" and "Water," and are

*

P. 372.

"Journeyings in North China," by A. Williamson, vol. ii.

admittedly not very descriptive of the superstition which they represent.

So far as it is possible to unravel the intricacies of subtle Oriental ideas, Fêng Shui appears to be a faint inkling of natural science overlaid and infinitely disfigured by superstition. As it is now interpreted, its professors explain that what astrology is to the star-gazer, Fêng Shui is to the observer of the surface of our planet. The features of the globe are, we are told, but the reflex of the starry heaven, and just as the conjunction of certain planets presage misfortune to mankind, so the juxtaposition of certain physical features of the earth are fraught with like evil consequences to those under their influence. But, in addition to this, it is believed that through the surface of the earth there run two currents representing the male and female principles of Nature, the one known as the "Azure Dragon," and the other as the "White Tiger." The undulations of the earth's surface are held to supply to the professors of Fêng Shui, aided as they always are by magnetic compasses, the whereabout of these occult forces. To obtain a fortunate site these two currents should be in conjunction, forming as it were a bent arm with their juncture at the elbow. Within the angle formed by this combination is the site which is calculated to bring wealth and happiness to those who are fortunate enough to secure it either for building purposes or for a graveyard. As it is obvious that it is often impossible to secure such a conjunction, the necessary formation has to be supplied by artificial means. A semicircle of trees planted to cover the back of a house answers all the purposes of the "Azure Dragon" and "White

Tiger," while in a level country, a bank of earth of the same shape, surrounding a tomb, is equally effective. Through the mist and folly of this superstition there appears a small particle of reason, and it is beyond question that the sites chosen by these professors are such as avoid many of the ill effects of the climate. Many years ago, when we first settled at Hong Kong, the mortality among the soldiers who occupied the Murray Barracks was terrible. By the advice of the colonial surgeon, a grove of bamboos was planted at the back of the buildings. The effect of this arrangement was largely to diminish the sickness among the troops, and it was so strictly in accordance with the rules of Feng Shui that the natives at once assumed that the surgeon was a past-master in the science. Again, when we formed the new foreign settlement on the Shamien site at Canton, the Chinese prophesied that evil would befall the dwellings, and "when it was discovered that every house built on Shamien was overrun as soon as built with white ants, boldly defying coal-tar, carbolic acid, and all other foreign appliances; when it was noticed that the English consul, though having a special residence built for him there, would rather live two miles off under the protecting shadow of a pagoda, it was a clear triumph of Fêng Shui and of Chinese statesmanship."*

In front of every house which is protected at the rear by the approved genial influences, there should be a pond, and the approach to the door should be winding, for the double purpose of denying a direct mode of egress to the fortunate breath

* "Fêng Shui," by E. J. Eitel.