ght them about all they knew. Unlike most
theatres in China, it had a curtain which was closed between the acts,
also wing slides and drop scenes. Her Majesty had never seen a foreign
theatre and I could not understand where she got all her ideas from. She
was very fond of reading religious books and fairy tales, and wrote
them into plays and staged them herself, and was extremely proud of her
achievement.

Her Majesty sat talking, we standing, for some little time and she asked
me if I understood the play, and I told her that I did and she seemed
quite pleased. Then she said in such a charming way: "Oh! I am so
interested in talking with you that I have forgotten to order my lunch.
Are you hungry? Could you get Chinese food when you were abroad, and
were you homesick? I know I would be if I left my own country for so
long a time; but the reason why you were abroad so long was not your
fault. It was my order that sent Yu Keng to Paris and I am not a bit
sorry, for you see how much you can help me now, and I am proud of you
and will show you to the foreigners that they may see our Manchu ladies
can speak other languages than their own." While she was talking I
noticed that the eunuchs were laying three large tables with nice white
table cloths, and I could see a number of other eunuchs standing in
the courtyard with boxes of food. These boxes or trays are made of wood
painted yellow and are large enough to hold four small and two large
bowls of food. After the tables were laid ready, the eunuchs outside
formed themselves into a double line from the courtyard to a little gate
running into another courtyard and passed these trays from one to the
other up to the entrance of the room, where they were taken by four
nicely dressed eunuchs and placed on the tables.

It seems that it was a habit of Her Majesty to take her meals wherever
she happened to be, so that there was no particular place that she
used as a dining room. I should also mention that these bowls were of
Imperial yellow with silver covers. Some were ornamented with green
dragons and some with the Chinese character Shou (Long Life).

There were about one hundred and fifty different kinds of food, for I
counted them. They were placed in long rows, one row of large bowls and
one row of small plates, and then another row of small bowls, and so on.
As the setting of the tables was going on, two Court ladies came into
the bedroom, each carrying a large yellow box. I