It is a bridge of seven beautiful arches; it is 12 yards broad and 150 yards long, of perfect simplicity and symmetry, with massive piers, all built of dressed masonry and destined to survive the lapse of centuries.
Triumphal archways with memorial tablets and pedestals of carved lions are befitting portals to a really noble work.
On the 23rd we reached the important city of Chuhsing-fu, a walled city, still half-in-ruins, that was long occupied by the Mohammedans, and suffered terrible reprisals on its recapture by the Imperialists.

For four days we had travelled at an average rate of one hundred and five li (thirty-five miles) a day.

I must, however, note that these distances as estimated by Mr.Jensen, the constructor of the telegraph line, do not agree with the distances in Mr.Baber's itinerary.

The Chinese distances in li agree in both estimates; but, whereas Mr.Jensen allows three li for a mile, Mr.Baber allows four and a-half, a wide difference indeed.
For convenience sake I have made use of the telegraph figures, but Mr.
Baber was so scrupulously accurate in all that he wrote that I have no doubt the telegraph distances are over-estimated.
We were again in a district almost exclusively devoted to the poppy; the valley-plains sparkled with poppy flowers of a multiplicity of tints.
The days were pleasant, and the sun shone brightly; every plant was in flower; doves cooed in the trees, and the bushes in blossom were bright with butterflies.

Lanes led between hedges of wild roses white with flower, and, wherever a creek trickled across the plain, its willow-lined borders were blue with forget-me-nots.