Proceeding along a Chinese street a stranger would not fail to notice its intersection now and again by a large palisaded enclosure, with a huge ornamental gateway of three doors on the one side, and a high blank wall facing the gate on the other, the latter rudely daubed with the picture of a rampant dragon in red and white paint. This is the entrance court of a Yamen, or the residence, as well as public office of a mandarin; on either side, where the street enters and leaves the enclosure, is a roughly-constructed barrier gate, one surmounted by the characters “East office gate,” the other by “West office gate.” In the case of a high-class yamen, such as that of a viceroy, the thoroughfare is turned so as to go round to the back of the front wall, and a notice is stuck up to the effect that all officials under a certain rank are to dismount from their horses or leave their sedan-chairs at the barrier gate. The main gate with the three doors is always placed so as to face towards the south, and where the street happens to run north and south, a cross street is opened, into which the yamen is made to face with east and west entrances on the two sides. Certain superstitious grounds, connected with the supposed position of the sun, give occasion to this arrangement, and even the Emperor himself, when sitting in state, has his face turned towards the south.