There are no Monthyon prizes, such as those given by the French Academy for acts of disinterested goodness, or surely this unselfish son would have received one. M. Vaucher and I went to visit the quay outside Canton, which was the scene of the massacre of 100,000 Tai-Ping rebels, after the defeat of Hung-Hsiu-ch'wan in 1865. The ferocious mandarin Yeh had them all decapitated at the edge of the river Kwan-Tung, their heads falling into the muddy stream. A Dutchman, who had belonged to a factory in Canton at the time, told me that he witnessed the terrible scene from his window, and had been greatly struck by the extraordinary composure with which the victims met their fate. Motionless and with bowed heads they knelt at the edge of the quay, awaiting the fatal stroke of the sword. "I had some idea," added the Dutchman, "of sending the poor fellows some packets of cigarettes to cheer their last moments, but I should have been completely ruined, for their numbers increased every day." The tragic story of the Tai-Ping rebellion, its extraordinary success at first, and its final suppression under Gordon is well known. In the two campaigns against the Tai-Pings, the future hero of Khartoum fought no less than thirty-three battles, besieging and taking numerous walled cities, and changing the whole history of the vast Celestial Empire. Had the revolt been finally successful, as it at one time bid fair to be, Hung, the enlightened leader, might have founded a new dynasty, and warded off for a long time at least the dismemberment of the once vast Empire of the East. [Sidenote: A CHINESE PANTHEON] My last visit was to the so-called Temple of the live hundred genii, containing five hundred grotesque gilded statues, taller than life, and of a surprising girth. We must not, however, make fun of them, for each one represents some Celestial who has made his mark in art, science, or philosophy. In France such a temple would be called a Pantheon, and that is what it really is, a place set apart for the commemoration of the great ones of the past. In the Temple of the five hundred genii lived a beautiful little water-snake, which a bonze of venerable appearance tended with reverent care, feeding it on green frogs and cantharides. I tried to find out why he set such store upon it, and the following story was told to me: