n
Italy, nor beggary more shameless. Such is the latter end of the gospel
of Buddha in China. It seems better that he should sit deserted in his
Indian caves than be dishonoured by such mummeries.

But once it must have been otherwise. Once this religion was alive. And
then it was that men chose these exquisite sites for contemplation. The
Chinese Buddhists had clearly the same sense for the beauty of nature
that the Italian Franciscans had. In secluded woods and copses their
temples nestle, courts and terraces commanding superb views over the
great plain to Pekin. The architecture is delicate and lovely; tiled
roofs, green or gold or grey, cornices elaborately carved and painted in
lovely harmonies of blue and green; fine trees religiously preserved;
the whole building so planned and set as to enhance, not destroy, the
lines and colour of the landscape. To wander from one of these temples
to another, to rest in them in the heat of the day and sleep in them at
night, is to taste a form of travel impossible in Europe now, though
familiar enough there in the Middle Ages. Specially delightful is it to
come at dusk upon a temple apparently deserted; to hear the bell tinkle
as the wind moves it; to enter a dusky hall and start to see in a dark
recess huge figures, fierce faces, glimmering maces and swords that seem
to threaten the impious intruder.

This morning there was a festival, and the people from the country
crowded into the temple. Very bright and gay they looked in their gala
clothes. The women especially were charming; painted, it is true, but
painted quite frankly, to better nature, not to imitate her. Their
cheeks were like peaches or apples, and their dresses correspondingly
gay. Why they had come did not appear; not, apparently, to worship, for
their mood was anything but religious. Some perhaps came to carry away a
little porcelain boy or girl as guarantee of a baby to come. For the
Chinese, by appropriate rites, can determine the sex of a child--a
secret unknown as yet to the doctors of Europe! Some, perhaps, came to
cure their eyes, and will leave at the shrine a picture on linen of the
organs affected. Some are merely there for a jaunt, to see the sights
and the country. We saw a group on their way home, climbing a steep hill
for no apparent purpose except to look at the view. What English
agricultural labourer would do as much? But the Chinese are not
"agricultural labourers"; they are independent peasant