IX IMPERIAL HOT SPRINGS AND THE MING TOMBS.

September z^th and r I "HE point of view being always the most imJL portant matter in life often transforming a blood-thirsty murder into an act of heroism, and vice vers&> so in planning an outing one of the most important matters is the order in which it is taken. The Tang-shan, or celebrated Imperial Hot Springs, would be a most interesting sight for a first day's journey to the Ming Tombs; we unfortunately kept them for our last day, returning from Mongolia and the Ming Tombs. Russian soldiers are understood to have been through the place, but it would certainly not be fair to reproach them with all the dilapidation that one sees. At the same time the place irresistibly suggests the idea of an invasion of Goths and Vandals rather than the gradual decay of long neglect. The large marble baths with their fine white marble railings are now a sad scene of dilapidation, although the original hot springs are still bubbling up beside them. But the gardens are supremely beautiful, as a garden run riot generally is, with all the slightly

irritating traces of the gardener's hands effaced by the wild prodigality of Nature. Irresistibly they recall the scene in which the Belle au Bois Dormante was found and wakened by the prince, at all events, that in the picture by Burne Jones, if not in reality. Every kind of beautiful and flowering shrub seems to have been planted here and to have grown into an overgrown tangle. When the luxuriant wistaria is in blossom in the spring, veiling the ruins beneath its fragrant lilac tresses, the scene must be one of almost magic loveliness. Unfortunately we were there in September, too late also for the lotus except for one still lingering blossom. Oaks, cypresses, cedars, maples, were all growing among little artificial hillocks, and along the sides of a lotus-covered moat, which runs in and out encircling the whole pleasaunce, also round the once beautiful, now some.what melancholy-looking, ornamental structures. Some people say that a great beauty ages much quicker, much sooner gets the air of a ci-devant than a plain woman. Certainly had the Tang-shan been an ordinary field it could never have so recalled other days, as now when one saw that once long ago, in the early days at least of this dynasty, when emperors still rode a-hunting or to battle* and received their counsellors at four o'clock in the morning not as now by convention, but because it was for them the one convenient time it was clear that then every possible loveliness had been heaped upon this garden.

IX 帝王溫泉與明陵

9月

觀點往往是生活中最重要的事情，它常常能將一個嗜血的謀殺轉變為英雄行為，反之亦然。因此，在計劃出遊時，最重要的事情之一就是如何安排出行的順序。唐山，也就是著名的帝王溫泉，本來是一個極其有趣的景點，適合作為前往明陵的第一天行程；但不幸的是，我們把它留到了最後一天，從蒙古和明陵回來時才參觀。據說俄國士兵曾經到過這個地方，但將所見的一切破損歸咎於他們，顯然是不公平的。同時，這個地方不可抗拒地讓人聯想到哥特人和汪達爾人入侵的景象，而不是長期忽視導致的逐漸衰敗。那些大理石浴池，曾經擁有精美的白色大理石欄杆，如今卻成了一片破敗的景象，儘管原始的溫泉水依然在旁邊湧動。然而，花園依然極其美麗，正如一個已經被自然的豐富繁茂所覆蓋、且已消除了園丁痕跡的花園那樣。這一場景讓人不禁想起《睡美人》中，那位王子找到並喚醒公主的場景，至少是伯恩·瓊斯（Burne Jones）畫中的那個場景，即使不是現實中的情景。各種美麗和開花的灌木似乎都被種植在這裡，並已經長成了繁茂的灌木叢。當春天來臨，繁茂的紫藤花盛開時，它的芳香紫色花簾遮蓋了廢墟，那時的景色一定如同魔法般美麗。不幸的是，我們是在九月份到達這裡，也已錯過了荷花的花期，只看到了一朵仍在盛開的蓮花。橡樹、柏樹、雪松和楓樹都在小小的人工丘陵中生長，還有在荷花覆蓋的護城河兩旁生長，這條護城河蜿蜒曲折，環繞整個園林，並圍繞著曾經美麗、如今略顯憂鬱的裝飾性建築。一些人說，絕世美女老去的速度要比普通女人快得多，老得也更早，顯得像一個過去的美人。當然，如果唐山只是一片普通的田野，那它永遠不會如此令人懷念過去的時光；如今，當人們看到它，便能想像很久以前，至少在這個王朝早期，當皇帝們仍然騎馬狩獵或上戰場、並且在凌晨四點接見大臣的時候——那時這並非因為習俗，而是因為這是他們唯一方便的時間——很明顯，當時這個花園中堆積了所有可能的美麗。

123

The inn at Chang-ping-chow (best pronounced as Jumping Joe !) was the cleanest and best we stayed at, and from there one ought to visit the Ming Tombs, or The Thirteen Tombs, as Chinese call them. Each succeeding monarch of a dynasty has to be content with a somewhat smaller tomb than his predecessor ; thus the stone animals are not on the same colossal scale as at Nanking, where everything is ruder, larger, more uncouth, and therefore more startling. But the site near Peking is far finer* No one had prepared us for its awe-inspiring stateliness. Beautifully enshrined as in the bosom of the hills, each in his sepulchre, lie these monarchs, in their day some of the greatest rulers the world has ever seen ; Chinese emperors ruling over China as has so seldom been the case, most dynasties there being of alien origin, and under their Chinese rule embracing so many circumjacent peoples.

The workmanship and decoration are far finer than at Nanking, and they are also in a much better state of preservation, though even here too many fine memorials of the past are missing. Visiting them from Peking they are approached, as they should be, through the long array of memorial arches, gates, and processions of stone animals that leads into the sacred valley. Coming to them from Nankow you arrive at the beginning of the now somewhat dreary two miles of millet-fields, leading up to the tomb enclosure and at the end of the grand approaches. Thus taken separately, the effect is somewhat marred, though nothing can detract from the solemn beauty of the setting. Indeed, it is hard to say whether the beauty of the position does not more appeal to those who descend on the tombs from the somewhat savage Pass. Rather over two miles from Chang-ping-chow the approach begins with a magnificently carved pailow, or memorial arch, considered the finest in China, all of white marble, fifty feet high, and eighty feet wide, formed of five arches built upon square pillars.

Half a mile further is the Red Gate, with an inscription, ordering all people there to dismount from their horses ; but the beautiful pavilion also of white marble, supported upon four carved columns and the work of the same Emperor, is no longer there.

昌平州（發音最好像「跳躍的喬！」）的客棧是我們住過的最乾淨、最好的地方，從這裡應該去參觀明陵，或者如中國人所稱的「十三陵」。每一個繼任的皇帝都不得不接受一個比前任略小的陵墓；因此，石雕動物的規模不像南京那樣龐大，那裡的一切都更粗糙、更巨大、更笨拙，因此也更令人震驚。但是，北京附近的這個地點要遠遠更美。沒有人準備讓我們面對它那令人敬畏的宏偉壯麗。這些皇帝們被安葬在這些如同山脈懷抱般美麗的陵墓中，在他們的時代，他們是世界上最偉大的統治者之一；作為中國皇帝，他們統治著中國，這種情況在中國歷史上非常少見，大多數朝代都是異族統治，但在他們的中國統治下，還統治著許多周邊的民族。

這裡的工藝和裝飾比南京的要精緻得多，而且保存得也要好得多，儘管即使在這裡，許多過去的精美紀念物也已消失無蹤。從北京來訪時，應該從長長的紀念拱門、門樓和石雕動物隊伍穿過，進入神聖的山谷。從南口過來時，你會先到達現在略顯荒涼的兩英里長的莊稼地，通向陵墓區，並位於這壯觀入口的盡頭。因此，如果單獨進行參觀，效果會有些受損，儘管無論如何都無法削弱這個地方莊嚴的美麗。事實上，很難說這個位置的美麗是否更能打動那些從相對荒涼的隘口來到陵墓的人。距昌平州略超過兩英里的地方，入口處是華麗的牌樓，被認為是中國最精美的建築之一，全部由白色大理石建成，高五十英尺，寬八十英尺，由五個拱門構成，建在方形柱子上。

再往前半英里是紅門，上面刻有要求所有人下馬的訓令；但那個同一皇帝所建的由四根雕刻柱子支撐的美麗白色大理石亭子已經不復存在。

There is still a monument to Yungloh, erected by his son, standing on a huge stone tortoise twelve feet long. The famous Emperor Chien-lung wrote a poem engraved on the back of the tablet in the eighteenth century. Four griffin-topped stone pillars, exquisitely carved, stand round it. On each side of what reverent Sinologues please themselves by calling the Holy Way there is a regular procession of animals and people, each formed out of a monolith of bluish marble, remarkable both from the workmanship and the great size, which last makes people, unaccustomed to the wonderful dexterity displayed by Chinese in handling great weights with what seem to our engineers the most inadequate appliances, marvel bow they can have been brought there. All the men wear the old Ming dress, common to Chinese before the Manchus forced on them their own long plaits of hair and horseshoe cuffs, or the long necklace they, in their turn, borrowed from the Lamas. After about an hour spent in passing through all these entrances, what was once a stone road leads us beneath the light perforations of the very elegant Dragon Gate, again griffin-topped. Clumps of foliage then become visible in the distance, enclosing the golden-roofed buildings clustered round the different tombs, some at three, some at four miles' distance, but all alike beautifully enshrined in the bosom of the hills, at the upper end of the long wide valley.

在明陵群中，還有一座由永樂帝的兒子所建的紀念碑，矗立在一隻長達十二英尺的巨大石龜之上。著名的乾隆皇帝在十八世紀曾寫下一首詩，刻在這座石碑的背面。四根頂部裝飾著獅鷲的石柱，雕刻精美，圍繞著這座紀念碑而立。在被敬仰的中國學者稱為「神道」的道路兩側，有一列動物和人像隊伍，每個雕像都是由一整塊帶有藍灰色的巨石雕刻而成，這些雕像不僅工藝精湛，而且尺寸巨大，令不熟悉中國人在使用看似對我們的工程師來說極其不足的工具處理重物時所展現出來的奇妙靈巧的人們感到驚嘆，不知這些雕像是如何運到這裡的。所有的人像都穿著明朝的舊服飾，這是滿清統治前中國人所常見的裝束，當時滿族人強迫他們留長辮子，並穿上馬蹄袖的服飾，這些服飾中的長項鍊也是滿族人從喇嘛那裡借來的。經過大約一小時穿過所有這些入口，我們來到了一條曾經是石頭鋪成的道路下方，經過了輕巧的、透雕的非常優雅的龍門，同樣是頂著獅鷲的雕飾。接著，在遠處可以看到成簇的樹叢，環繞著金色屋頂的建築群，這些建築分佈在不同的陵墓周圍，有些距離三英里，有些距離四英里，但無一例外地都美麗地坐落在長長的寬闊山谷的盡頭，群山的懷抱之中。

For natural beauty and grandeur the site could not to this day be surpassed ; but alas ! three beautiful marble bridges lie in ruins, and many other architectural ornaments have been destroyed, whilst even the way can be found now only with difficulty through millet-fields and Persimmon orchards with brilliant orange fruit hanging from the trees; till, two miles further on, the special enclosure round Yungloh's, the first, and therefore the largest, of the tombs is reached, encircled by cypress-trees. Again a pavilion protecting a huge tablet, this time on the back of a tenfeet-long fabulous monster ; then the " Rest the Spirit " entrance with white marble steps and railings, the latter carved into the likeness of clouds, phoenix, and dragons. At either side of the inner grove of firs and oak-trees, the latter with enormous leaves which are used for wrapping parcels, are lovely paper-burning shrines built entirely of golden yellow porcelain, and along the further end of the courtyard stretches the great hall seventy yards long by thirty wide, and supported upon eight rows of four pillars of teak cut from that particularly stately laurel, one of the finest trees in China, and called there the Nan-muh or Southern-wood, because the best comes from Burmah. There were all manner of beautiful woods and marble used in the decoration of this ancestral hall, but Chien-lung took them all away when he was building his Summer Palace, He spent several millions to repair the damage he had done, and yet further imposed upon himself the penance of travelling as far as Nanking, to expiate this violation of the graves of his predecessors at the similar though less magnificent tomb of the founder of the Ming dynasty, whom he thus treated as the head of the house.