The furniture of some of these houses is very handsome. The same black, straight-backed settees and chairs seen everywhere in China are here, some of them handsomely inlaid with ivory, mother-of-pearl and fine porcelain. [Illustration: PAPER PRAYERS.] The Chinese are a polite people too. If you visit them in their homes, and they have been accustomed to mingle with Europeans, they will offer you their hand or will chin-chin, bowing very low and shaking their own hands. You are invited to sit down, and a cup of excellent tea in its purity is offered in the daintiest of cups. One is tempted to covet some of those beautiful table-covers, screens or fans, all so richly embroidered in bright-colored silks. Some of the fans are white silk, with birds and flowers painted on them. “But small the bliss that sense alone bestows, And sensual bliss is all the nation knows; In florid beauty groves and fields appear: Man seems the only growth that dwindles here.” [Illustration: PARLOR OF CHINESE HOUSE.] In the cool of the evening the working classes gather in groups round the doors of their houses, talking, laughing and smoking. One of the number is perhaps entertaining the others with music on a little instrument resembling a violin. But there is no music in it. If the reader would like to reproduce the sound, let him try drawing the bow over the violin-strings back and forth in a seesaw manner for an hour or two at a time, and he will have a faint idea of the distracting sounds drawn from the tortured instrument. There is not the slightest approach to melody. The scantily-clad coolie is not æsthetic, but as a nation the Chinese are very much so. If they have the means they surround themselves with beautiful things, such as silk, embroideries, paintings, carving in ivory, lacquer-ware, mosaics, birds and flowers. Their ladies paint their faces to look beautiful. But these stay in their native land; a Chinese woman is rarely seen in Siam. See that group of Chinamen who have been invited to a party given by the foreign minister on the king’s birthday. They walk up and down through the drawing-room and halls, so that we have a fine opportunity for seeing them in full dress. Thin loose trousers of blue silk, almost concealed by a robe of elegant silk richly embroidered, a cape of the same covering the shoulders; Chinese slippers embroidered and turned up at the toes; a hat (which they wear all the evening) resembling a butter-bowl; and, to complete the grand toilette, they flourish exquisite fans in silk and ivory. They make frequent visits to the refreshment-room, and seem to enjoy the good things provided.