The summer palace
3 min readThen we went through the screen wall which served to keep out pryingeyes, and we entered one of the most spectacular places in the world Dozens of palaces of different styles, dozens of gardens laid out different ways, hills, trees, flowers and a stunning lake. Where does one tart?
The hall of Benevolence and Longevity, where audiences took place, the Palace of Virtue and Harmony, with its three-storey theatre, the Palace of Jade ripples, where guangxu was kept prisoner for six years, the Libraryof Buddhist Classics, the Hall of Dispelling Clouds where birthdays werecelebrated, the four-storey Pagoda, the Pavilion of precious Clouds with its bronze balconies, the Temple of the Five Wise Men, bridges, viewing points, patios, gardens.
At the foot of longevity hill, next to the lake we sat on a bench and, as we rested, Hong Jian said.
The gallery we see here, built in 1750 by Emperor Qianlong, is 728 metres ong and houses more than 14,000 paintings. Some are not merely decorative but, like the scenes of the West Lake in Hangzhou, they depict scenes from history, legends or novels. a favourite pastime among visitors s to identify them and bet on how good their knowledge of them is while sitting and resting on the balustrade.
One such story is about zhuge Liang’s arrows
This wise strategist was an advisor to the king of Wu and one day he was invited to express his views on a problem.
We must fight on water-said the commander-in-chief. -What weapons are most suitable?
Arrows-said the strategist without hesitation
We’d need about a hundred thousand what can we do?
If you give me three days, I promise to bring them to you. All I ask is that on the morning of the third day you should send about 200 men to collect them.
Zhuge Liang managed to borrow 20 light boats, he had them covered with straw and he placed dummies rather like scarecrows on them. He spent the rest of the time playing Weiqi with his friends，in full view of the somewnat uneasy commander.
On the third day，very early in the morning the small fleet guided by a few oarsmen slowly approached the enemy camp.Thick fog favoured the manoeuvre.Alerted by the sentries，the enemy soldiers went to the beachand resolutely fired all their arrows against the ships which they could scarcely make out The archers never suspected that they were handing over valuable gifts，one by one，as the arrows embedded themselves into the straw.After the manoeuvre was complete，the boats returned to their point of departure and thus Zhuge Liang kept his promise This story belongs to the first long novel of classical Chinese literature With 120 chapters and more than 400 characters the chronicle of the Three Kingdoms，written in 1494 by Luo Guanzhong，describes historicalconditions over a period of almost a hundred years from the end of the second century to the end of the third.
Helin chipped in-Why don’t you tell us something about the legend of the monkey king？i understand that several scenes from this work have been painted in this gallery.
The story of the monkey king or rather，the journey to the West，is a cycle of stories which began with the one-hundred chapter long novel written by Wu Chengen（1500-1582）A monk of the tang Dynasty-this is a real event that happened in the seventh century-went on a pilgrimage to India in search of Buddhist scriptures.The trip lasted seventeen years and these fantastic tales of gods and demons aroused exceptional interest among the Chinese people.The Monkey King stands out among all the other characters as he is courageous bold intelligent and funny so he is one of the most beloved legendary heroes and he appears in theatre，opera，cartoons and movies.
