of pen at one corner with all the other women and
children and not allowed to sit with the men. We went in there, too,
for as long as we could stand it. The audience were too quaint, not in
their national dress, but ordinary clothes and pigtails; you couldn't
have been sure they were human beings, or of what sex.

The play seemed to a thrilling one as far as we could see; they had
just got to a part where the whole company were going to be beheaded.
One of our party felt faint from the heat, and no wonder, so we
continued our travels. We descended a kind of ladder near the door,
into the bowels of the earth; and I was glad it was almost pitch dark,
because Gaston was just below me and made the greatest fuss of the
necessity of putting each of my feet safely on the steps for me; and
once towards the bottom I am sure he kissed my instep, but as it might
have been a bundle of tow which was sticking out on the last step,
brushing against me, I did not like to say anything to him about it. We
crossed some kind of rat hole rooms in utter darkness, and here one
respectful brotherly arm, and one passionate, _entreprenant_ one came
round my waist! And while in my right ear the voice of Valerie's
brother said kindly, "I'm obliged to hold on to you or you'll have an
awful fall"--in my left Gaston was whispering, "Je vous adore, vous
savez; n'allez pas si vite!" So I had to be very angry with him, and
clung to Valerie's brother, who toward the end of the evening got into
being quite a cousin instead of an aunt or father.

We had been burrowing under the auditorium, and presently found
ourselves in a large cellar where a Chinese was cooking on a brazier an
unspeakable melange of dog, fish, and rat for the actors' supper, with
not a scrap of ventilation anywhere!! Finally, up some steps, we
emerged behind the scenes, and saw all the performers dressing--rows of
false beards and wonderful garments hanging all around the walls; the
most indescribable smell of opium, warm eastern humanity, and grease
paint, and no _air_! A tiny baby was there being played with by its
proud father. Their lung capacity must be quite different to ours,
because if we had not quickly returned I am sure some of us would have
fainted. I felt strangely excited; it had a weird, fierce effect. What
a fatal mysterious nation the Chinese! Unlike any others on earth. I
did not much care who held me going back. I only wanted to rush to the
open air, and when we had