[Illustration: _Drawn by W^m. Alexander from a Sketch by Capt. Parish, Roy^l. Artil^y._ _Engraved by T. Medland._ _View in the Eastern Side of the Imperial Park at Gehol._ _Published by Mess^rs. Cadell, & Davies, Strand, London._ May 2, 1804.] "Having expressed my sense of this mark of his condescension in the proper manner, and my increasing admiration of every thing I had yet observed at Gehol, I retired and, whilst he proceeded to his adorations at the pagoda, I accompanied the ministers and other great Collaos of the court to a pavilion prepared for us, from whence, after a short collation, we set out on horseback to view this wonderful garden. We rode about three miles through a very beautiful park kept in the highest order and much resembling the approach to Luton in Bedfordshire; the grounds gently undulated and chequered with various groupes of well contrasted trees in the offskip. As we moved onward an extensive lake appeared before us, the extremities of which seemed to lose themselves in distance and obscurity. Here was a large and magnificent yacht ready to receive us, and a number of smaller ones for the attendants, elegantly fitted up and adorned with numberless vanes, pendants, and streamers. The shores of the lake have all the varieties of shape, which the fancy of a painter can delineate, and are so indented with bays, or broken with projections, that almost every stroke of the oar brought a new and unexpected object to our view. Nor are islands wanting, but they are situated only where they should be, each in its proper place and having its proper character: one marked by a pagoda, or other building; one quite destitute of ornament; some smooth and level; some steep and uneven; and others frowning with wood, or smiling with culture. Where any things particularly interesting were to be seen we disembarked, from time to time, to visit them, and I dare say that, in the course of our voyage, we stopped at forty or fifty different palaces or pavilions. These are all furnished in the richest manner with pictures of the Emperor's huntings and progresses, with stupendous vases of jasper and agate; with the finest porcelain and Japan, and with every kind of European toys and _sing-songs_; with spheres, orreries, clocks, and musical automatons of such exquisite workmanship, and in such profusion, that _our_ presents must shrink from the comparison, and _hide their diminished heads_; and yet I am told, that the fine things we have seen are far exceeded by others of the same kind in the apartments of the ladies, and in the European repository at _Yuen-min-yuen_. In every one of the pavilions was a throne, or imperial state, and a _Eu-jou_, or symbol of peace and prosperity, placed at one side of it resembling that which the Emperor delivered to me yesterday for the king.