So it may be that the poor beggars who laughed at that noble presence which has been the admiration of my friends in four continents, were moved to do so by the hope to deceive the evil spirits who had punished them with poverty, and so by their apparent gaiety induce them to relax the severity of their punishment.
To within two or three miles of this village the road was singularly level; I do not think that it either rose or fell 100 feet in twenty miles.

Forty li from where we slept the night before, having previously left the main road, we came to the large walled town of Yunnan-hsien.
The streets were crowded, for it was market day, and both sides of the main thoroughfares, especially in the vicinity of the Confucian Temple, were thronged with peasant women selling garden produce, turnips, beans and peas, and live fish caught in the lake beyond Tali.

Articles of Western trade were also for sale--stacks of calico, braid, and thread, "new impermeable matches made in Trieste," and "toilet soap of the finest quality." I had a royal reception as I rode through the crowd, and the street where was situated the inn to which we went for lunch speedily became impassable.

There was keen competition to see me.

Two thieves were among the foremost, with huge iron crowbars chained to their necks and ankles, while a third prisoner, with his head pilloried in a _cangue_, obstructed the gaze of many.