d been for fifteen months employed in carving on one side of an
enormous elephant's tusk the representation of a battle scene, and on
the other that of a thanksgiving procession. It will take him at least
another year to finish the job. It is for the Paris Exhibition. It
will be quite interesting to look for our old Japanese and Chinese
friends and their products on that occasion.

From ivory carving, we went to a black-wood furniture shop, where we
saw some very handsome things, by no means dear considering the amount
of time and labour bestowed upon them. We finished up with the Temple
of the Five Hundred Genii, whose five hundred carved wooden statues,
thickly gilt, all very ugly, and all in different attitudes, stand
round the statue of a European in sailor's costume, said to be meant
for Marco Polo, but, whoever it may be, evidently considered an object
at least of veneration, if not of worship.

We now returned through the dirty city to Shameen, and the relief,
after crossing the bridge into an open space where one could breathe
freely and see the blue sky, was indescribable.

_Friday, March 2nd_.--Before we had finished breakfast the other
gentlemen strolled in from their various quarters, and the drivers and
guides arrived from the Vice-Consul's. A long morning's work had been
mapped out for us--thirteen sights before luncheon, then a visit to
the French Consulate, followed by eight more objects of interest to be
seen before we finally crossed the Pearl River to visit the Honan
Temple. Quitting the pretty cool suburb by another bridge, we passed
through streets quite as dirty as those of yesterday, until the heart
of the city had been reached. We went first to the wedding-chair shop,
where they keep sedan-chairs, of four qualities, for hire whenever a
wedding occurs. Even the commonest are made gorgeous by silver gilding
and lacquer, while the best are really marvels of decorative art,
completely covered with the blue lustrous feathers of a kind of
kingfisher. In shape they are like a square pagoda, and round each
tier are groups of figures. The dresses are also made of expensive
feathers, but then they last for generations. There are no windows to
these strange conveyances, in which the bride is carried to her future
home, closely shut up, with joss-sticks burning in front of her.
Recently there have been two sad accidents. In one case the journey
was long, there was no outlet for the smoke of the joss-sticks