CHAPTER I

PAGE The delight of exploring unknown lands--Saint Louis and the Tartars of olden times--The Anglo-French force enters Pekin--Terror of the "Red Devils"--The "Cup of Immortality"--The "Sons of Heaven"--Hong-Kong as it was and is--The Treaty of Tien-tsin--The game of "Morra"--First Tea-party in the Palace of Pekin--Chinese agriculture and love of flowers--Chinese literati--An awkward meeting between two of them--Love of poetry in China--Voltaire's letter to the poet-king--The Chinese army--The _Shu-King_, or sacred book of China--Yao and his work--Chung, the lowly-born Emperor--The Hoang-Ho, or "China's Sorrow"--Yu the engineer and his work--Chung chooses Yu to reign after him--The foundation of the hereditary monarchy in China 1