ABSTRACT
The earliest attempts at buildings in China, were close imitations of tents, and to this day they have not departed from the original design. The Great Wall was constructed by Thsing-chi-hoang-ti about two hundred and fourteen years before our era. A French writer calls it a “monument le plus colossal, comme le plus insense, peut-etre, qu’ait jamais concu la pensee humaine.” But Thsing-chi-hoang-ti knew what he was about; the Tartars might invade his dominions, but that was not his only or chief reason for the immense structure. Thsing-chi-hoang-ti embellished his capital with buildings of the greatest magnificence. He augmented the number of regal edifices by causing three hundred royal palaces to be erected within the walls of the city, and four hundred in the country. Chinese gates and garden-houses have lightness and grace, but there is comparatively little in their architecture worthy of imitation.
