Chinese architecture, as it were, suppresses the walls. It amplifies and multiplies the roofs; and their exaggerated corners, lifting themselves with an exquisite resilience, return toward the sky in flowing curves. They remain suspended in air! The wider and heavier the fabric of the roof, the more, by that very weight, does it give an impression of lightness through every deep shadow projected below. Hence the use of black tiles, that form deep grooves and strong copings with high openings between them, makes the highest ridges detached and distinct. Clear though intricate of outline, their frieze is lifted through the lucid air. The temple is seen as a portico, a canopy, or a tent, of which the uplifted corners are attached to the clouds; and in its shade are installed the idols of the earth. A fat, gilded fellow lives under the first portico. His right foot, drawn beneath him, indicates the third attitude of meditation, where consciousness still exists. His eyes are closed, but under his golden skin can be seen the red lips of a distended mouth whose long rounded opening stretches at the corners into the shape of an eight. He laughs, and the laugh is that of a face asleep. At what does this obese ascetic laugh? What does he see with those closed eyes? On each side of the hall, two at the right and two at the left, the four painted and varnished colossi, with short legs and enormous torsos, are the demons who guard the four shores of Heaven. Beardless as children, one brandishes serpents, one plays the viol, and one shakes a cylindrical engine like a closed parasol or a firecracker. I penetrate into the second court. A great brass incense-burner covered with inscriptions is in the middle. I stand before the principal pavilion. On the ridges of the roof little painted groups of figures seem as though they were passing from one side to the other, or ascending while engaged in conversation. At the angles of the coping hang two pink fish, their long feelers curving tremulously, their tails in the air; in the center two dragons are fighting for the mystic jewel. I hear songs and the beating of bells, and through the open door I see the evolutions of the bonzes.