There are several tempies outside the walls. The spacious Altar 10 Earth is near one of the northern gates, where, surrounded by groves of trees and a moat, is the double-terram & a tar on which the Emperor annually sacrifices. The Altar to the Sun and the Altar to the Mon show similar arrangements: the latter is approached by a broad avenue a quart r of a male in length. There is aise a Lama Temple of great celebrity outside the Ar-ting Gute, containing a colossal monument of white marble, entirely covered with carvings forming a pictorial epitome of the birth, life, and death of the founder of Buddhism. The princip object of interest in the environs of Pekin has been for centuries the Summer Palact of the Emperors, enclosed by a wall six miles in length, situated ten miles to the north-west of the capital, and approached by a road paved with slats of granite. It has long been the principal resident of the Emperor and his Court, the palace at Pekin only being used occasionally. With the enclosure were no less than thirty-six palaces and a large number of pagodas, kiosks, and temples, wine in 1560 were pillaged, and to a large extent destroyed, by the Allied Forces. The invaders were amazed at the interminable succession of pagodas, temples, white marble palaces, and fantastic towers, containing treasures and curiosities of unfold valne. Some of the principal objects were taken possession of by the generals in the names of France and England respectively; the officers and soldiers loaded themselves with as much as they could lay hands on; and finally the whole place was set on fire, as a retributive measure in consequence of the murder of the thirteen prisoners above referred to. It was considered that the Chinese Government would be thus taught that they could not with impunity treacherously seize and cruelty torture persons who put faith in their professions of peace. It seems probable that in this very royal residence the tortured victims had been exhibited for the amusement of the residents, as the clothes of the victims, soiled and statned with, blood, were found in the palace. To reach the Great Wall of China from Pekin is a journey of about forty miles. In the year 240 B.C., Che-wang-te, the first Emperor of the Tsm dynasty, began thus stupendous work. It is fifteen hundred miles in length, but is not uniform in strength. for the whole distance. The task was evidently performed in a much more perfunctory manner at a distance from the capital than in its immediate neighbourhood, where the work could be readily inspected by the Emperor. In some part it is a mere terrace of earth, that can he crossed and re-crossed on horseback. Near Pekin it consists of two walis of brick or masonry, several feet apart, with the intervening space filed in with earth. Square towers forty feet in height rise at frequent intervals, and at every important pass there is a strong for trees, The great canal system of China has been justly extolled by travellers. The noblest work in the series is the Grand Canal, starting neat Pekin, of which Barrow writes:— *I may safely say that, in point of magnitud,, our most extensive inland navigation of Fusland est, no more be compared to the grand trank that intersects China than a garden fish pond to the great lake of Windermere This canal is 1000 mile m length, and decumiod. 901 000 men for vous in its construction. m some ports almost completely filled up. 1: is now greatly out of repair, and LYONS. In Roman Times-Successes and Reverses-The City of To-day-The Place Bellecour-Principal Districts and Streets-The Fortress of St. John-Legend of the Tour de la Belle-Allemande-Rousseau in Lyons-The Quays-The River and its Bridges-Clerical Influence-Religious History of the City-Churches, their Vicissitudes and AssociationsThe Cathedral-Pilgrim Church of Notre Dame de Fourvières-View from the Terrace-Hôtel de Ville-Bourse and other Public Buildings-Industries-Silk-weaving and Weavers. THE ARMS OF JULIUS CESAR, in the course of his victorious campaigns in Gaul, encamped for a time in close proximity to the present site of the city of Lyons. He does not mention any town in the neighbourhood, yet some authorities assert that long before a colony had been founded there by some fugitive Rhodians, driven out of Provence by the imperious Phocæans of Marseilles. Be that as it may, we know that about 49 B.C. certain inhabitants of Vienne (not the city on the Danube, but the city on the Rhône), being driven out during the wars of Cæsar and Pompey, went and settled there. After the Dictator's death, the Senate directed the governor of the province, Lucius Munatius Plancus, the friend of Cicero and Horace, to build a city for these refugees. There was probably a village of some kind-Celtic, Greek, or otherwise-close by, from which the new colony took its name-Lugdunum. It was not long before Lugdunum grew into a place of importance. Successive Roman governors vied with each other in embellishing the city, which speedily became rich and powerful. It was the principal mart for the Western provinces of the Empire. Agrippa made it the starting-point of the four great military roads that traversed Gaul. Temples, aqueducts, baths, theatres, and all the adjuncts of a splendid Roman city, adorned the hill-slopes. From the vast theatre, the spectators turning eastward could gaze over the plains of the Allobroges to the distant Alps. Close by was the immense palace of the Roman governors, in which Augustus, surrounded by a brilliant Court, spent three years organising the administration of the Western provinces. Lyons was made the capital of Gaul, and Drusus, Caligula, and Claudius, each in turn, honoured and adorned the city. But in 59 A.D. the city was marvellously destroyed. "Una nox fuit inter urbem maximam et nullam" is the testimony of Seneca concerning the event-" There was but one night between a great city and nothing." It is believed by some writers that a subsidence took place in the hill on which the city was built, that conflagrations broke out among the falling houses, and then the city disappeared. Thanks to the prompt aid afforded by the capricious Nero, Lyons speedily rose from its ashes. In ten years it had again become a populous and splendid city, upon which Vitellius, Domitian, Trajan, Hadrian, and other Emperors successively lavished gifts and privileges. In 197 A.D., when the courageous Albinus fell before his rival Severus, the city of Lyons, for having sided with Albinus, was sacked by the soldiers of the conqueror, and formsands of the inhabitants were massacred. But from the smoking ruins a goodly city agan rasa, and several Roman Emperors made it their temporary abode. Constantine was staying here when summoned to assume the imperial purple. When the Roman Lupu began to break up, the Northern hordes swept down upon Lyons. Julian (afterwards fus apolate Eu peror, annihilated the first bands; but after his departure, to fulfil his dest cas oti a wider field, fresh swarms successively appeared, and about the middle of fa 15 century Attila, the "scourge of God," sacked the city, and almost all the memorials of its aucunt gory perished. For a time it was owned by the Visigoths, then by the 15 ng und ans, whose king, Chilperic, made it the capital of his kingdom in 476. For at enjoyed something like tranquillity; but its returning prosperity was soon again checked by mundations and pestilence and wars. From the sixth to the ninth century it is longed alternately to France and Burgundy. The history of Lyons at this period resembles that of Paris feeble kings, with maires-du-palais controlling everything; coalitions of berous for putting down this man and setting up that; an absence of law or any public forex capable of preventing excesses; and the murder of the wise and generous men who chef's from the ranks of the Church) occasionally came forward on behalf of the mass of the people In 571 the Lombards crossed the Alps, ravaged Burgundy, and pillaged the ety of LxoHS, But in 715 an invasion took place of a far more terrible character. The Saracens masters of Spain, swarmed into the southern provinces of France, spreading ruin and devastation in their track. Lyons was taken and completely overthrown, its churches destroyed, and when the conquerors rode away with their plunder only a heap of ruins remained Under Charles Martel and Pepin le Bref the Saracens were hurled back into Spain, and Icons slowly rose from its ashes. The slopes of its two hills and the banks of its two were ngam covered with buildings when Charlemagne appeared on the scene. He hid muted in his powerful hands the whole French Monarchy and its dependencies, had overcome all resistance from within and from without, and was now applying the whole force of line gems and his will to the advancement of civilisation and the establishment of low and justice While retaming absolute authority in his own hands, he acted through tival commissioners, who entried out his plans. The commissioner at Lyons was Bishop Lexdendo under whose wise and beneficent rule a career of prosperity again set in. Building went où apice a whole now quarter, La Juiverie, was added to the city to attract the Jews, of whose mereantile instincts Lyons felt she had need; churches, monasteries, and public edifices rose from their ruins; art and commerce flourished. Charlemagne wanted to spread Leydride alone seemed to comprehend and to strive to second the imperial wishes. He opened public schools in the city, and when, in the dark age that succeeded, the people and nobias of Prince were alike stupidly ignorant, it was a common thing in Lyons to know how to rond esenlite, and sing Afte, some further clvingos Ivans found itself, towards the end of the ninth century, unde The doreamon of the Archbishons and Chapter of St. John; first as feudal barons of the German Empire, and afterwards as independent Ind Against these ecclesiastical valers the city revolted m the thirteenth century. Heroe struggies ensued till, in 1812. 1. R.. annexed the elv to The railm of Franco, bat extrmed it in its local government by two consuls, who continued to exercise a respected judicial power till the eighteenth century. Having briefly traced the history of Lyons from its first colonisation to the period of its final incorporation into the French kingdom, we need only add such further details as may suggest themselves in connection with the various sites and monuments. To the early introduction of Christianity into the city and the heroic sufferings of its martyrsto the religious wars of the sixteenth century and the revolutionary struggle and massacres of the eighteenth-and to some other events of importance, we shall have occasion to refer in the course of our survey. The Lyons of to-day is a stately city, splendidly situated at the junction of the Rhône and Saône. It occupies the tongue of land about three miles long and three-quarters of a mile broad between those rivers, and also a portion of the opposite banks. Seen for the first time, from one of the neighbouring heights, it presents an imposing spectacle. Upon the peninsula between the two rivers are the districts of Perrache, Bellecour, St. Clair, and [Lyons. La Crois Bour Upon the west bank of the Saône are Fourvières, St. Irénée, and Valon; and upon the east bank of the Saine, Les Brotteaux and La Guillotière. These districts present distinguishing characteristics, and claim separate notices. The southern extremity of the central peninsula is the district of Perrache-named after the celebrated sculptor, a native of Lyons, by whom the junction of the rivers was removed from near the church of Ainay to its present confluence. Upon this recovered land, solid and substantial buildings of utility are chiefly conspicuous-railway stations, dock warehouses, arsenal, custom-house, abattoir, prison, barracks; and beyond these are factories and smoky chimneys, and the dyke which enables the two rivers to merge their waters without undue disturbance. The Cours du Midi, a grand promenade and review ground, stretching from the Rhône to the Saône, separates Perrache from Bellecour. The Place Perracho was formerly the scene of public executions, and a local writer suggests this as the reason why, during the second Empire, a bronze statue of Napolion 1. was erected on the spot. The statue was hurled down from its pedestal in the stormy days of the Commune, in 1870. Northward, from the Face Perrache runs the Rue de Bourdon, which, with its adjacent streets, forms the decades amstocratic quare of Evous. More in unpretentions roomy mansions, dwell the ngesedures of the oil blesse: bees also, are found the retired military heroes and sareessä leviers, anī ď inte peus a good gruking of successful merchants have worked them vay na die damÏ = L anals thank the Place Bellecour the finest some in TurnE |