which the I.G.'s wife went in state and, as became her rank, in a big
green box of a sedan chair with four bearers. Indeed this was the
only possible means of going about comfortably at night in a city
of unexpected ditches, ruts like sword-gashes, and lighted only by
twinkling lanterns of belated roysterers.

The I.G. was therefore somewhat disconcerted when his chair coolies,
having been six months in his service, came to say they could remain
no longer. "It is not that we are discontented with our wages," the
head man explained, "or that you are not a kind master, or that the
_Taitai_ [the lady of the house] is an inconsiderate mistress."

"Then you have too much work to do?"

"No, that's the trouble," the man replied, "we have not enough. Our
shoulders are getting soft and our leg muscles are getting flabby. Now
if the _Taitai_ would only go out for twenty miles every day instead
of for two miles every ten days as she does now, we would be delighted
to remain in your service." Was ever stranger complaint made by
servant to master?

Whenever work permitted Robert Hart and his wife rode out into the
country on their stocky native ponies, sometimes to one and sometimes
to another of the picturesque temples, pagodas and monasteries which
then abounded in the hills near by. The favourite picnicking place of
the little community--almost the only Imperial property open in those
days--was the ruined palace of Yuen Ming Yuen destroyed by the Allies
in 1860. It must have been a most charming spot, at all events in the
autumn months, when the persimmon-trees, heavy with balls of golden,
fruit, overhung its grey walls.