Excerpt from The North American Review, Vol. 119
Near the foot of a bridge that spans the Imperial Canal a few rods to the north of the British Legation, the visitor to Peking may have noticed the entrance to a small yamen. Here are the head-quarters of the Hanlin Academy, - one of the pivots of the Empire, and the very centre of its literary activity.
On entering the enclosure, nothing meets the eye of one who is unable to read the inscriptions, that would awaken the faintest suspicion of the importance of the place. A succession of open courts with broken pavements, and covered with rubbish; five low, shed-like structures, one story in height, that have the appearance of an empty barn; these flanked by a double series of humbler buildings, quite inferior to the stables of a well-conducted farmstead, - some of the latter in ruins, and dust and decay everywhere: such is the aspect presented by the chief seat of an institution which is justly regarded as among the glories of the Empire! A glance, however, at the inscriptions on the walls - some of them in Imperial autograph - warns the visitor that he is not treading on common ground.
This impression is confirmed when, arriving at the last of the transverse buildings, it is found to be locked, and all efforts to obtain an entrance fruitless.
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