rthward,--we should probably have been enthusiastic
over the lesser towns. But we began at the top; and when you have seen
the best there is, everything else is anticlimax.

We arrived the other evening in a tremendous dust-storm, the first real
dust-storm we have experienced. We ran into it at Tientsin, where we
changed trains to continue the last two hours of our journey north, and
were uncomfortable beyond description. The Tientsin train was absolutely
unheated, cold as a barn. The piercing wind from the plains penetrated
every nook and crevice of the carriage, and the cracks were legion: the
windows leaked, the closed ventilators overhead leaked, the doors at
each end of the carriage leaked, and we wrapped ourselves in our ulsters
and traveling-rugs and sat huddled up, miserable and shivering. But it
wasn't wind alone that blew in through the numerous holes. There was
wind, of course, in plenty, but it carried in it a soft, powdery red
dust, a fine, thin dust, able as the wind that bore it to sift through
every crack and opening. It filled the carriage, it filled the
compartment, and when the lamps were lit we sat as in a fog, dimly able
to see each other through the thick, hazy atmosphere. There we sat,
coughing and sputtering, breathing dust into ourselves at every breath,
unable to escape. We became covered with it; it piled itself upon us in
little ridges and piles; no one moved much, for that shook it off into
the surcharged air, already thick enough, Heaven knows.

Two hours of this, bitter cold and insufferable, choking dust. And every
one in the crowded compartment was suffering from Chinese colds; we had
them too, contracted at Shanghai. And let me tell you that a Chinese
cold is something out of the ordinary. Whatever happens here happens on
a grand scale, and these colds, whatever the germ that causes them, are
more venomous than anything you've ever known. No wonder the railway
station looked good to us; no wonder we were glad to be welcomed back to
the old hotel, at the end of such a journey!

We found plenty of hot water when we got here. Not that hot water does
one much good in Peking. For Peking water is hard and alkaline, and
about as difficult to wash in as sea-water, if one uses soap; we are
dirty despite all the facilities afforded us. I should say that the
Chinese had given up the struggle several generations ago; and small
blame to them. We reached here the last day of February, and are now
e