o long to
come, when the Palace was so near, and asked him about it. He told us
that our little buildings were at the left side of the Emperor's Palace
and that Her Majesty had had the entrance leading from our place to her
Palace closed up for certain reasons which he would not tell, but said:
"You see this place ought to face East instead of towards the lake." The
view on the lake was beautiful and I told him I liked it much better the
way it was. He smiled and said: "You will have to learn a lot before you
find out this wicked place." I was surprised at what the eunuch said,
but did not like to ask him any questions. He also told us that the
Emperor's Palace was just behind our place and was a large building
similar to Her Majesty's Palace. We looked and could see the trees of
his courtyard above the roof. Then he pointed to another building behind
the Emperor's, which was larger but lower than the Emperor's Palace, and
also had a large courtyard, and said it was the Young Empress's Palace.
It had two buildings flanking it on each side and the eunuch told us
that the one on the left was the Secondary Wife's bedroom. That there
had been an entrance between the two Palaces, but that Lao Fo Yeh (The
great old Buddha), as the eunuchs called Her Majesty, had blocked it up
so that the Emperor and Empress could not communicate with each other,
except through Her Majesty's own Palace. I suppose this was the way she
kept watch over them and knew at all times what they were doing. This
was all news to me and I did not know what to think of it. I was afraid
that this eunuch Li would tell me more of these curious things, so I
told him I was tired and would go to my room and rest, and he went away.

When I finally got inside my room and had a chance to look around, I saw
that it was very prettily furnished with ebonywood furniture, which was
covered with red satin cushions and the windows were hung with red silk
curtains. All the bedrooms were just alike. The kong (bed) was made of
brick covered with the same kind of wood and ran along the wall under
the front window. It had high teaster posts with slats running across on
which red curtains were hung. These kongs are very curiously built. They
are made of brick and have a hole in the front center in which fire is
placed to heat the brick in winter time. During the day a sort of table
is placed on top of the kong and removed again at night.

Shortly after we had gone to our rooms,