The Chinese city, perhaps, has more charm for the lover of the picturesque, though it is less interesting now than formerly, since the formidable embrasured wall surrounding it has been pulled down by order of the Allied generals. In it stands a grim memento of another outburst of fanaticism against the hated foreigner—the ruins of the Roman Catholic Cathedral, destroyed by the Chinese in 1870. The city itself is like unto all other Celestial cities. Narrow lanes, low houses, ill‐kept thoroughfares, gaudiness and dirt intermingled, stench and filth abominable. To it, however, was wont to go the seeker after curiosities, choice silks, or rich furs from Manchuria and Corea. But the retributive looting that fell on it after its capture has left it bare indeed. On the platform of the railway station almost the first friendly face we saw was that of perhaps the best‐known man in North China, Major Whittal, Hyderabad Contingent. Interpreter in Russian, fluent in French and German, his linguistic abilities had been responsible for his appointment to the scarcely enviable post of Railway Staff Officer at Tientsin. In a town that held the headquarters of every foreign army, where troops and stores of all kinds were despatched or arrived daily in charge of representatives of the different forces, such a position required the possession of a genius for organisation and infinite tact and patience. Even as we greeted him, French, Russian, or German officers and soldiers crowded round, to harry him with questions in divers tongues or propound problems as to the departure of troop trains or the disposal of waggons loaded with supplies for their respective armies. The Britisher is usually supposed to be the least versed of any in foreign languages. But the Continental officers were very much surprised to find how many linguists we boasted in our expeditionary force. At every important railway station we had a staff officer who was an interpreter in one or more European languages. There were many who had passed examinations in Chinese. A French major remarked to me one day: “_Voilà, monsieur_, we have always thought that an Englishman knows no tongue but his own. Yet we find but few of your officers who cannot converse with us in ours. Not all well, certainly; but, on the other hand, how many of us can talk with you in English? Scarcely any. And many of you speak Russian, German, or Italian.” It was not the only surprising fact they learned about the hitherto despised Anglo‐Indian army.