Sacramento daily record-union. [volume] (Sacramento [Calif.]) 1875-1891, 1886-05-08
CHINA'S GREAT WALL.
Some Interesting Facts Concerning the
CeiestiaIs' Walled Defenses.

CeiestiaIs' Walled Defenses.
OF course we had to go to the great wall
of China, says Pekin correspondent of the
Davenport Democrat. China abounds in
great walls Her mural defenses were most
extensive-walled country, walled cities,
walled villages, walled palaces and tenn
ples-wall after wall and wall within wall.
But the greatest of all is the Great Wall of
China, which crests the mountain range
and crosses the gorge from here some forty
miles away To go to Pekin and not go
out to the wall would be objectionable. 1t
matters not that the Pekin wall is higher
and wider, nor that the way is cold and
rough and often perilous-you must go and
see the Great Wall.
Six mortal hours TO make the last fifteen
miles. Squeezing through the last deep
gorge and a deep rift in solid rock, cut out
by ages of rolling wheels and tramping
feet, we reach the great frowning, double
Fashioned gate Of stone and hard-burned
brick-one archway tumbled in. This was
the object of our miSsiou-the great wall OF
China built 213 years before our era built
of great slabs of well-hewn stone, laid in
regular courses some twenty feet high, and
then topped out with large, hard-burned
brick, filled in with earth, and closely
paved on the top with more dark, tawny
brick-the ramparts high and thick and
castellated for use of arms. Right and left
the great wall sprung far up the mountain
side-now straight, now curved, to meet
the mountain ridge, turreted each 800 feet
"a frOWning mass of masonry. No need
to tell you of this wall the books will tell
you that-how it was built TO keep the war
like Tartars out-twenty-hve feet high by
forty thick, 200 miles long, with room on
top for six horses to be rode abreast. Nor
7 I'll hot fn,.1 mt
those hordes at bay, nor that in the main
the material used upon it is just as good
and firm and strong as when put in place
To tell you how one feels while standing
on this vast work, scrutiniZing its old ma
sonry, its queer old cannon, and ambitious
sweep along the mountain crest, were only
folly. In speechless awe we strolled or sat
and gazed in silent wonder. Twelve hun
dred miles of this gigantic work. built on
the rugged, craggy mountain tops, vaultlng
over gorges, spanning wild streams, netting
the river archways with huge, hard bars OF
copper; with double gates, with swinging
doors and bars set thick with iron armor-
a wonder in the world, before which the
old-time classic seven wonders, all gone
now save the great pyramid-were toys.
The great pyramid has 100000 cubic feet,
the great wall 6,350,000, 900 cubic feet. An
engineer in Stewards party here some years
ago gave it as his opinion that the cost of
this wall, figuring labor at the same rate,
would more than equal that of all the 100
900 miles of railroad in the United States.
The material it contains would build a
wall six feet high and two feet thick right
straight around the globe. Yet this was
done in only twenty years, without trace
of debt or bond. 1t is the greatest individ-
ual labor the world has ever known. You
stand before it as before the great Omnipo-
tent-bowed and silent.