Buddhist nunneries in Peking have theatrical shows once a year. A large mat shed is erected, and play actors are invited to perform an ordinary play. The nuns wait on the spectators of the play, and the money collected helps to defray the expenses of the nunnery for the current year. Plays are considered religious, because they are supposed to be performed to amuse the gods in whose temples they are performed.

Every year, in the third and ninth months,--our April

and October,--a procession is organised in Peking to Miau-feng shan, a Buddhist place of pilgrimage; the journey to which by the pilgrims occupies three, four, or five days. Money is subscribed, and is placed in the hands of a committee who erect lofty mat sheds on the line of route for the entertainment of the pilgrims. The worship consists of bowings, kneelings, head-knockings, burning incense, and offering of money to the attendant priest. Large pits are filled with copper money to a depth of two, three, or five feet. With the money thus obtained the priests return to their monasteries, leaving this particular temple shut up and unoccupied at the end of the season, till the time of pilgrimage comes round again, six months later, in the autumn or spring as the case may be. The chief divinity is Pi-hia Yuen-chiun, a Tauist personage, but the temple is cared for by Buddhist priests. It is placed among the mountains to the north west of Peking.

On one occasion I passed a pilgrim going from Peking to Miau-feng shan to fulfil a vow. He was a Manchu of twenty-seven years of age. He had been ill, and while ill had vowed to walk in chains to the temple and back. An iron chain bound his feet and hands. It was borrowed from a temple where such gear is kept for the occasional use of pilgrims.

The next day I met another such pilgrim returning, but stronger in body and livelier in appearance than the one I conversed with the day before. Both were attended by a companion, and both wore a red dress in token of their being malefactors; for the pilgrims style themselves on these occasions criminals, and the chain is a sign of voluntary bondage undertaken in the spirit of confession of demerit. They at first look like prisoners in charge of police, but their submissive air and the red dress show that they are devotees.

Three sisters, called the three niang-niang, are worshipped at Miau-feng shan. The second of the three is chiefly

worshipped there. The eldest is honoured at some place in Shan-tung with special reverence.