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[[underline]] Chapter XI. [[/underline]] 228. our reconnaissances. [[superscript]] (216) [[/superscript]] We felt that we could not have begun our mission in northern Shansi under more favorable auspices. ------------------------ [[superscript]] (216) [[/superscript]] Experience had shown me that in northern China at least, it was in the saddle that investigations such as ours could be carried out most expeditiously and with the maximum of freedom and convenience. --------------------------------- [[underline]] Site of ancient P'ing Ch'eng. [[/underline]] That afternoon we set out in carts---pending the arrival of the promised saddle-horses---to inspect what we were told was the site of the old North Wei capital, on the farther or eastern bank of Yü Ho. The weather was cold but clear. Snow, gleaming in the sunlight, lay on the hills roundabout. [[superscript]] (217) [[/superscript]] Overhead, numerous gangs of wild geese were flying ------------------------- [[superscript]] (217) [[/superscript]] Ta T'ung lies at an elevation of 4700 feet, in a wide plain bordered by hills, those on the north forming the scarp of the Mongolian plateau. --------------------------------- northward. For some hundreds of yards east of Ta T'ung we passed between irrigated fields in which men and boys were preparing for the spring planting. Here also we noted in the peasant costumes those bright colors, particularly red, which we had previously seen elsewhere in northern China (see,[[underline]] e.g. [[/underline]] , page 109), though not in the Peking region. We also noticed, grazing over the river-bottoms, flocks of fat-tailed sheep, tended by shepherds picturesque in their shaggy sheepskin coats (^[[p]]l. 37, fig. 1). At one spot we came upon a life-size bull cast in iron and standing on an elliptical stone pedestal (^[[f]]ig. 49). This figure was supposed to control and check floods. I have seen similar ones, set up for the same purpose, in various parts of China. This ideological connection between bulls and water occurs not only in that country but in other lands as well, from ^[[e]]nd to end of the north temperate ^[[z]]one of the Old world. Instances from the Greek and Keltic mythologies will
