We know that the Chinese, very many centuries ago, manifested a considerable interest in astronomy; nor was there wanting with them an interest in geography. It was, however, especially in the former science they may be said to have made contributions of real value. An unreliable record, telling us of the interest exhibited by the Emperor Shun, reigning more than two thousand years before the beginning of the Christian era, notes that he made use of an armillary sphere in his study of the stars. Little is there to assure us that prior to the time of Kúblai Kaan (1216-1294) there were those who turned their attention to the construction of globes. That great Mongol Emperor’s astronomer Ko-Shun-King, having demonstrated the superiority of his astronomical wisdom, was directed to institute reforms in Chinese chronology and to construct for purposes of scientific investigations such instruments as he thought to be necessary. Accordingly he removed from the old observatory “an armillary sphere dating from 1049,” substituting in its place a number of large and small instruments, two of which have survived to our day--an armillary sphere and a celestial globe, which may be said to date from about the year 1274. These instruments of the astronomer Ko-Shun-King had place in an observatory which he had erected on the site of an ancient structure at the southeast corner of the Tartar city wall, being raised above the parapet. There they remained until the year 1673 when the Jesuit astronomer Father Ferdinand Verbiest judged them to be useless and persuaded the Emperor to pull them down and put up new ones of his own contriving.[115] The old instruments were stored away at the foot of the terrace, and of these, as before noted, but two now remain. Le Comte refers to the celestial globe as one well cast, and having a diameter of about three feet, the degrees and minutes being marked both “longitudinally and latitudinally.” An early description tells us that its equator is in the center, equidistant from the two poles, in each case a quarter of a circumference. The ecliptic is elevated above and depressed below the equator, in each case barely twenty-four degrees. The elevations and depressions of the moon in its orbit being variable, a bamboo hoop, divided into degrees equally throughout, is used to verify the intersections with the ecliptic and accordingly is moved from time to time. The globe rests on a square box, the north and south poles being respectively above and below the surface fully forty degrees, half of the globe being visible and half concealed. Toothed wheels, set in motion by machinery concealed within the box, are so adjusted as to cause the globe to revolve.