The Opera was performed in an unheated, barnlike structure. It was so cold that the audience kept on their heavy coats and were provided, in addition, with blankets to wrap around their feet. In spite of the fact that charcoal braziers were placed between the stage and the first row, the temperature in the building was close to freezing, and the breath of the actors as they chanted their lines came out in puffs of smoke. These performers were Spartans indeed, changing their costumes in the draughty, unheated barn, their teeth chattering and their tawny flesh a mass of goose pimples. The costumes, in contrast to those seen on a Peking or a Shanghai stage, were fashioned of rough, drab bits of cast-off apparel, crudely sewn together and patched with whatever pieces of material could be begged, borrowed or stolen. The show itself, like the Ballet in Moscow, was a superb exhibition of Chinese art, for, when shown to foreigners, it was free from Communist propaganda. The falsetto voices of the actors sing-songed the ancient Chinese poetry, while their bodies swayed to its rhythmic cadence. During the performance, an usher went up and down the aisle tossing hot towels to guests who called shrilly for them. These, wrung out of boiling water, gave the hall a dank, slightly rancid atmosphere, reminiscent of a river in summer. Roasted watermelon seeds were pressed generously upon the honored guest by his Chinese Communist hosts, who were noisily but skillfully cracking them edgewise between their strong front teeth and spitting out the husks. Not all the visitor’s stay, however, was passed in entertainment. Before leaving Yenan, General Marshall sat behind locked doors with Mao and members of the Politburo. No other American was allowed to be present at this meeting. What was said is not known, but there were rumors in Communist circles that the subject of the conversations had to do with the future of Manchuria, and perhaps all of Asia. On leaving this capital city of Communist China, Marshall returned to the United States to make his report to President Truman. When he came back to China, Marshall made his residence in Nanking (the Nationalist capital at that time), but established a Northern Headquarters in Peiping (meaning Northern Peace), in order to work out a truce between Communists and Nationalists. The futility of this endeavor was obvious even to the Chinese GI, who nicknamed the Peiping Headquarters the “Temple of the Thousand Sleeping Colonels,” and to the American GI, who dubbed it “Marshall’s Bird Sanctuary.”