Next to the pagodas, the most conspicuous objects are the gates of cities. These are generally square buildings, carried several stories above the arched gateway and, like the temples, are covered with one or more large projecting roofs. But the most stupendous work of this country is the great wall that divides it from northern Tartary. It is built exactly upon the same plan as the wall of Pekin, being a mound of earth cased on each side with bricks or stone. The astonishing magnitude of the fabric consists not so much in the plan of the work, as in the immense distance of fifteen hundred miles over which it is extended, over mountains of two and three thousand feet in height, across deep vallies and rivers. But the elevations, plans, and sections of this wall and its towers have been taken with such truth and accuracy by the late Captain Parish, of the Royal Artillery, that all further description would be superfluous. They are to be found in Sir George Staunton's valuable account of the embassy to China. The same Emperor, who is said to have committed the barbarous act of destroying the works of the learned, raised this stupendous fabric, which has no parallel in the whole world, not even in the pyramids of Egypt, the magnitude of the largest of these containing only a very small portion of the quantity of matter comprehended in the great wall of China. This indeed is so enormous, that admitting, what I believe has never been denied, its length to be fifteen hundred miles, and the dimensions throughout pretty much the same as where it was crossed by the British Embassy, the materials of all the dwelling-houses of England and Scotland, supposing them to amount to one million eight hundred thousand, and to average on the whole two thousand cubic feet of masonry or brick-work, are barely equivalent to the bulk or solid contents of the great wall of China. Nor are the projecting massy towers of stone and brick included in this calculation. These alone, supposing them to continue throughout at bow-shot distance, were calculated to contain as much masonry and brick-work as all London. To give another idea of the mass of matter in this stupendous fabric, it may be observed, that it is more than sufficient to surround the circumference of the earth on two of its great circles, with two walls, each six feet high and two feet thick! It is to be understood, however, that in this calculation is included the earthy part in the middle of the wall.