en the sun enters the fifteenth degree of aquarius; which the Chinese look upon as the beginning of the spring. On this day the Governor comes out of his palace, carried in his chair, preceded by banners, lighted torches, and divers instruments; he is attended with several litters, painted, and adorned with a variety of silk tapestry; exhibiting[408] various figures, and the portraits of illustrious persons who had practised husbandry, with histories relating to the same subject! He is crowned with flowers; and marches in this equipage towards the eastern gate of the city, as it were to meet the spring.

Among the figures, there is a cow of earthenware, so monstrously large that forty men can hardly carry it.—Behind the cow, whose horns are gilt, is a young child with one foot naked and the other shod: him they call the genius of labour and diligence; who strikes the earthen cow incessantly with a rod, as though it were to make it advance. All the husbandmen follow with their instruments; after whom proceed companies of Masquers and Comedians, acting plays. In this manner they march to the Governor's palace, where they strip the cow of her ornaments; and drawing out of her belly a prodigious number of small cows made of clay, and distribute them among the multitude, as well as the fragments of the cow, which they break into pieces.—Afterwards the Governor makes a short discourse, recommending the care of husbandry as one of the things most conducive to the good of a state.

The attention of the Emperors and Mandarins to the cultivation of the land is so great, that when deputies arrive at court from the Vice-Roys, the Chinese monarch never forgets to demand in what condition the fields appeared to them; and the falling of a seasonable shower furnishes a proper occasion for visiting a Mandarin, to compliment him the