The boy travellers in the Far East : adventures of two youths ... - Library

412 THE BOY TRAVELLEKS.
-FIVIi-STOIilliD I'AGODA.
cause it is five stories liigli. It stands on a liill tliat overlooks tlie whole
city on one side, and a lai-ge cemetery on the otlier; and \vlien von have
climbed to the top, the view is vei-y tine. The roofs of the houses are of all
sha]}es and kinds, and the streets are so narrow that yon can see very few
of tliem as you look down from the top of the pagoda. On the one hand
you have a densely ],)eopled city of the living, and on the other an equally
densely peopled city of the dead. Our guide said the cemeterj' had more
inhabitants than the city; and when we asked him how many people lived
there, lie said ' Many millions.' You have to come to China to learn that
the people in a cemeterj' ai-e supposed to live there.
"And yet the guide Avas not so far ont of the way, according to the
Chinese idea. The Chinese bring food to the graves of their friends, and
leave it there as an ofEering. The spirits of the dead are believed to linger
around the spot and to eat this food, but it is really devonred by the priests
and others who stay around the cemetery, and what tliey do not eat or
carry away is consumed by the birds. At certain seasons they have grand
festivals, when many thousands of people go to the cemeteries with offer-
ings for the dead, and good things for themselves. The affair is more like
a picnic tlian a ceremony of mourning ; and when it breaks up, tiie mourn-
ers go to the theatre or some other place of amnsement. The best burial-
jilace is on a liill-side, and the tomb is made in the form of a terrace, or
I'ather of three terraces, with steps leading up to them. As you look at it