Barton County democrat. [volume] (Great Bend, Kan.) 1885-1915, 1889-06-13

It Winds Over Hill and Vale Like . Huge
Earth-Worm.

It Winds Over Hin and Vale Like Huge
Earth-Worm.
The great wall of China is, after all.
only a wall And it was built with
the same object as any other wall-to
keep people from coming where they
were not wanted. Mr.. Toole's famous
account of it is as historically accurate
as any. 1.-The most important build
ing in China" he is accustomed to
say, sis the Chinese wall. built to
keep the Tartars out. 1t was built at
such an enormous expense that thu
Chinese never got over it But the
Tartars did. and the way they accom-
plished this feat was as follows: One
went first and t'other went arter." It
differs from other walls in only two
respects-its age and its size. The
former is 2102 years; the latter is such
that it is the only work of human
hands on the globe visible from the
moon q take no responsibility Tor
either of these statements.) The
Chinese name for it is Wan-G-ch' ang-
eh'eng, 1.-The wall 1O.oOOh long" And
the gate on this highway is called
Pata-ling, and is about fifty miles north
west of Pekin and 2. 900 feet above the
sea- Beyond it lies Mongolia
Half an hour after this first glimpse
stood upon the wall itself. The
gateway is large double one. with a
square tower upon it. pierced with
oblong openings for cannon, of which
a dozen old ones lie in a heap. showing
hot OF he
ously defended at this point. A rough
stairway leads to the top, which is
about twenty feet wide, with a crenel-
lated parapet on each side. and you can
walk along it as far as you can see,
with here and there a scramble
where it has fallen in little. On
the whole, it is in excellent repair.
having, of course, been mended and
rebuilt many times. Every half-mile
Or SO is a little square tower of two
stories. The wall itself varies good
deal in height according to the nature
of the ground. averaging probably
about forty feet. On one side Mon
golia, as you see it, is a vast, undu-
lating, brown plain; on the other side
China is a perfect sea of brown hills
in all directions. and across these
stretches the great wall. On the hill
top, through the valleys, up and down
the sides, it twists in an unbroken
line, exactly like huge earth-worm
suddenly turned to stone. For many
miles it is visible in both directions,
and when you can no longer trace its
entire length you can still discover it
topping the hills one after another
into the remote distance.
And when you reflect that it is built
of bricks, in almost inaccessible places,
through uninhabited countries, that
each brick must have been transported
on a mans shoulders enormous dis
tances, and that it extends for 1900
miles, Or one-twelfth of the circumfer-
ence Of the globe. you begin to realize
that you are looking upon the most
colossal achievement of human hands.
The bricks are so big and heavy that
that I had to hire little donkey to
carry off two of them. This is the
only piece of vandalism to which
plead guilty on this trip. but the temp
tation was irresistible, and ..they will
never be missed Nowadays, of
course, the wall serves no defensive
purpose whatever and is not guarded
in any way. Not soul lives within
miles of it at most points. and it is but
landmark for the Mongols' camel
trains, a stupendous monument to the
great past of China, and an evidence
If celestial greatness and enterprise
gone never to return. Pittsburgh Dis
patch.