usually ended in a good-sized town. I should have
preferred it otherwise, for there is more quiet and freedom in the
villages. But my coolies would have it so; they liked the stir and
better fare of the towns, and the regular stages are arranged
accordingly. Our entrance was noisy and imposing. My coming seemed
always expected, for as by magic the narrow streets filled with staring
crowds. Through them the soldiers fought a way for my chair, borne at
smart pace by the coolies all shouting at the top of their voices. I
tried to cultivate the superior impassiveness of the Chinese official,
but generally the delighted shrieks of the children at the sight of Jack
at my feet, and his gay yelps in response, "upset the apple cart." There
was a rush to see the "foreign dog." I gripped him tighter and only
breathed freely when with a sharp turn to right or left my chair was
lifted high over a threshold and borne through the inn door into the
courtyard, the crowd in no wise baffled swarming at our heels,
sometimes not even stopping at the entrance to the inner court, sacred
(more or less) to the so-called mandarin rooms, the best rooms of the
place. I could not but sympathize with the innkeeper, the order of his
establishment thus upset, but he took it in good part; perhaps the
turmoil had its value in making known to the whole world that the
wandering foreigner had bestowed her patronage upon his house. I am sure
he had some reward in the many cups of tea drunk while the crowd
lingered on the chance of another sight of the unusual visitor. Anyway
we were always made welcome, and no objections were offered when my men
took possession of the place in very unceremonious fashion, as it seemed
to me, filling the court with their din, blocking the ways with the
chairs and baskets, seeking the best room for me, and then testing the
door and putting things to rights after a fashion, while the owner
looked on in helpless wonder.

In the villages one stepped directly from the road into a large
living-room, kitchen, and dining-room in one, and out of this opened the
places for sleeping. The inns in the towns are built more or less after
one and the same pattern. Entrance is through a large restaurant open to
the street, and filled with tables occupied at all hours save early dawn
with men sipping and smoking. From the restaurant one passes into a
stone-paved court surrounded usually by low, one-story buildings,
although occasionally there