number o f wooden dwellings that were floating on the river.
Small huts, to the number o f thirty or forty, were fometimes
ereCted upon a Angle floating raft o f fir baulks, laihed together
by the ends and the fldes. On thefe rafts the people carry on
their trade or occupation, particularly fuch as work in wood.
Our conductors directed the yachts to halt before a detached
rock, riflng with a perpendicular front from the margin o f the
river to the height o f feven hundred feet. In this front we ob-
ferved a cavern, before which was a terrace that had been cut
out o f the rock, acceflible'by a flight o f fteps from the river.
Proceeding from the terrace into the cavity o f the rock, we
afcended another flight o f flairs, alfo cut out o f folid ftone,
which led into a very fpacious apartment. In the centre o f
this apartment fat the goddefs Poo-fa upon a kind o f altar, con-
ftituting a part o f the rock, and hewn into the fhape o f the
lien -w ha or Nelumbium. A fmall opening, next the river, admitted
a “ dim religious light,” fuitable to the folemnity o f
the place, which we were told was a temple confecrated to Poo-
fa , and a monaftery for the refidénce o f a few fuperannuated
priefts. On the fmooth fldes o f the apartment was infcribed a
multitude o f Chinefe verfes, fome cut into the rock,-and others
painted upon it. The lodgings o f the priefts were fmall caves
branching out o f the large temple. A third flight o f fteps led
from this to a fécond ftory, which was alfo lighted by a fmall
aperture in front, that was nearly choaked up by an immenfe
mafs o f ftaleCtite that had been formed, and was ftill increaftng,
-by the confiant oozing o f water holding in folution calcareous
matter, and fufpended from a projection o f the upper, part
o f
o f the rock. But the light was fufficient to .difcover a gigantic
image with a Saracen face, who “ grinn’d horrjble a ghaftly
“ fmile.” On his head was a fort o f crown; in one hand he
held a naked fcymeter, and a firebrand in the other; but the
hiftory o f this coloflal divinity feemed to be imperfeftly known,
even to the votaries o f Poo-fa themfelves. He had in all probability
been a warrior in his day, the Thefeus or the Hercules o f
China. The cave o f the Cumaean Sibyl could not be better
fuited for dealing out the myfterious decrees o f fate to the fu-
perftitious multitude, than that o f the ^uan-gin-Jhan, from
whence the oracle o f future deftiny, in like manner,
Horrendas canit ambages, antroque remugit,
“ Obicuris vera involvens.”
“ The wond’rous truths, involv'd in riddles, gave,
“ And furious bellow'd.round the gloomy cave.”
Lord Macartney obferved that this Angular temple brought
to his recolleddon a Francifcan monaftery he had feen in Portugal,
near Cape Roxent, ufually called the Cork Convent, “ which
“ is an excavation o f confiderable extent under a hill, divided
“ into a great number o f cells, and fitted up with a church,
“ facrifty, refeCtory, and every requifite apartment for the ac-
“ commodation o f the miferable Cordeliers who burrow in it.
“ The infide is entirely lined with cork : the walls, the roofs,
“ the floors, are covered with co rk ; the tables, feats, chairs,
“ beds, couches, the furniture o f the chapel, the crucifixes, and
“ every other implement, are' all made o f cork. The place was
“ certainly difmal and comfortlefs to a great degree, but it
“ wanted the gigantic form, the grim features, the terrific
3 “ afpeCt