Travels in China by Sir John Barrow (top e book reader .txt) 📕

"Having expressed my sense of this mark of his condescension in the proper manner, and my increasing admiration of every thing I had yet observed at Gehol, I retired and, whilst he proceeded to his adorations at the pagoda, I accompanied the ministers and other great Collaos of the court to a pavilion prepared for us, from whence, after a short collation, we set out on horseback to view this wonderful garden. We rode about three miles through a very beautiful park kept in the highest order and much resembling the approach to Luton in Bedfordshire; the grounds gently undulated and chequered with various groupes of well contrasted trees in the offskip. As we moved onward an extensive lake appeared before us, the extremities of which seemed to lose themselves in distance and obscurity. Here was a large and magnificent yacht ready to receive us, and a number of smaller ones for the attendants, elegantly fitted up and adorned with numberless vanes, pendants, and streamers. The shores of the lake have all the varieties of shape, which the fancy of a painter can delineate, and are so indented with bays, or broken with projections, that almost every stroke of the oar brought a new and unexpected object to our view. Nor are islands wanting, but they are situated only where they should be, each in its proper place and having its proper character: one marked by a pagoda, or other building; one quite destitute of ornament; some smooth and level; some steep and uneven; and others frowning with wood, or smiling with culture. Where any things particularly interesting were to be seen we disembarked, from time to time, to visit them, and I dare say that, in the course of our voyage, we stopped at forty or fifty different palaces or pavilions. These are all furnished in the richest manner with pictures of the Emperor's huntings and progresses, with stupendous vases of jasper and agate; with the finest porcelain and Japan, and with every kind of European toys and sing-songs; with spheres, orreries, clocks, and musical automatons of such exquisite workmanship, and in such profusion, that our presents must shrink from the comparison, and hide their diminished heads; and yet I am told, that the fine things we have seen are far exceeded by others of the same kind in the apartments of the ladies, and in the European repository at Yuen-min-yuen. In every one of the pavilions was a throne, or imperial state, and a Eu-jou, or symbol of peace and prosperity, placed at one side of it resembling that which the Emperor delivered to me yesterday for the king.

"It would be an endless task were I to attempt a detail of all the wonders of this charming place. There is no beauty of distribution, no feature of amenity, no reach of fancy which embellishes our pleasure grounds in England, that is not to be found here. Had China been accessible to Mr. Browne or Mr. Hamilton, I should have sworn they had drawn their happiest ideas from the rich sources, which I have tasted this day; for in the course of a few hours I have enjoyed such vicissitudes of rural delight, as I did not conceive could be felt out of England, being at different moments enchanted by scenes perfectly similar to those I had known there, to the magnificence of Stowe, the softer beauties of Wooburn, and the fairy-land of Paine's Hill.

"One thing I was particularly struck with, I mean the happy choice of situation for ornamental buildings. From attention to this circumstance they have not the air of being crowded or disproportioned; they never intrude upon the eye; but wherever they appear always shew themselves to advantage, and aid, improve, and enliven the prospect.

"In many places the lake is overspread with the Nenuphar or lotus (Nelumbium) resembling our broad leaved water lilly. This is an accompaniment which, though the Chinese are passionately fond of, cultivating it in all their pieces of water, I confess I don't much admire. Artificial rocks and ponds with gold and silver fish are perhaps too often introduced, and the monstrous porcelain figures of lions and tygers, usually placed before the pavilions, are displeasing to an European eye; but these are trifles of no great moment; and I am astonished that now, after a six hours critical survey of these gardens, I can scarcely recollect any thing besides to find fault with.

"At our taking leave of the minister, he told us that we had only seen the eastern side of the gardens, but that the western side, which was the larger part still remained for him to shew us, and that he should have that pleasure another day.

"Accordingly, on the day of the Emperor's anniversary festival, after the ceremony was ended, the first or great Collao Ho-chun-tong, the Foo-leou, the Foo-leou's brothers Foo-chan-tong, and Song-ta-gin, with the other great men who attended us two days since, in our visit to the eastern garden, now proposed to accompany us to the western, which forms a strong contrast with the other, and exhibits all the sublimer beauties of nature in as high a degree as the part which we saw before possesses the attractions of softness and amenity. It is one of the finest forest-scenes in the world; wild, woody, mountainous and rocky, abounding with stags and deer of different species, and most of the other beasts of the chase, not dangerous to man.

"In many places immense woods, chiefly oaks, pines, and chesnuts, grow upon almost perpendicular steeps, and force their sturdy roots through every resistance of surface and of soil, where vegetation would seem almost impossible. These woods often clamber over the loftiest pinnacles of the stony hills, or gathering on the skirts of them, descend with a rapid sweep, and bury themselves in the deepest vallies. There, at proper distances, you find palaces, banquetting houses, and monasteries, (but without bonzes) adapted to the situation and peculiar circumstances of the place, sometimes with a rivulet on one hand, gently stealing through the glade, at other with a cataract tumbling from above, raging with foam, and rebounding with a thousand echoes from below, or silently engulphed in a gloomy pool, or yawning chasm.

"The roads by which we approached these romantic scenes are often hewn out of the living rock, and conducted round the hills in a kind of rugged stair-case, and yet no accident occurred in our progress, not a false step disturbed the regularity of our cavalcade, though the horses are spirited and all of them unshod. From the great irregularity of the ground, and the various heights to which we ascended, we had opportunities of catching many magnificent points of view by detached glances, but after wandering for several hours (and yet never wearied with wandering) we at last reached a covered pavilion open on all sides, and situated on a summit so elevated as perfectly to command the whole surrounding country to a vast extent. The radius of the horizon I should suppose to be at least twenty miles from the central spot where we stood; and certainly so rich, so various, so beautiful, so sublime a prospect my eyes had never beheld. I saw every thing before me as on an illuminated map, palaces, pagodas, towns, villages, farm-houses, plains, and vallies, watered by innumerable streams, hills waving with woods, and meadows covered with cattle of the most beautiful marks and colours. All seemed to be nearly at my feet, and that a step would convey me within reach of them.

"I observed here a vast number of what we call in England sheet cows, also sheet horses, many pyeballs, dappled, mottled, and spotted, the latter chiefly strawberry.

"From hence was pointed out to us by the minister a vast enclosure below, which, he said, was not more accessible to him than to us, being never entered but by the Emperor, his women, or his Eunuchs. It includes within its bounds, though on a smaller scale, most of the beauties which distinguish the eastern and the western gardens which we have already seen; but from every thing I can learn it falls very short of the fanciful descriptions which Father Attiret and Sir William Chambers have intruded upon us as realities. That within these private retreats, various entertainments of the most novel and expensive nature are prepared and exhibited by the Eunuchs, who are very numerous (perhaps some thousands) to amuse the Emperor and his ladies, I have no doubt; but that they are carried to all the lengths of extravagance and improbability those gentlemen have mentioned, I very much question, as from every enquiry I have made (and I have not been sparing to make them) I have by no means sufficient reason to warrant me in acceding to, or confirming, the accounts which they have given us.

"If any place in England can be said in any respect to have similar features to the western park, which I have seen this day, it is Lowther Hall in Westmoreland, which (when I knew it many years ago) from the extent of prospect, the grand surrounding objects, the noble situation, the diversity of surface, the extensive woods, and command of water, I thought might be rendered by a man of sense, spirit, and taste, the finest scene in the British dominions."

After the descriptive and interesting detail of the beauties of the two sides of the imperial park or gardens of Gehol, his Lordship makes a few general observations on Chinese gardening, and the ornamental edifices that are usually employed to aid the effect, as well as contribute to use and convenience. He observes,

"Whether our style of gardening was really copied from the Chinese, or originated with ourselves, I leave for vanity to assert, and idleness to discuss. A discovery which is the result of good sense and reflexion may equally occur to the most distant nations, without either borrowing from the other. There is certainly a great analogy between our gardening and the Chinese, but our excellence seems to be rather in improving nature, theirs to conquer her, and yet produce the same effect. It is indifferent to a Chinese where he makes his garden, whether on a spot favoured, or abandoned, by the rural deities. If the latter, he invites them, or compels them to return. His point is to change every thing from what he found