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everything are here for our enjoyment. We had a good supper, played the victrola for a few records, and decided to retire to the sleeping porch.

4 July, Saturday

     Here was a perfectly ^[[good]] birthday, and good day for a birthday. It was warm and we were^[[/]]not in the mood for doing much chasing around, so we stayed in the house until tea time, had tea and then went for a walk. This was my first sight of West Lake, and I was quite content. The east shore of the lake, and part of the north, is occupied by hotels, summer residences, and the like (the city is on the east shore of the lake) and some of them are pretty bad. Hills surround the lake on three sides, and the city fills the plain on the fourth. Most of the buildings sink into a common blend from^[[/]]a little distance and one can quite forgive them, and, under certain conditions even enjoy them. One, though, has irked me from my first sight of it, and probably will continue to bother. On the shoulder of a hill north of the lake is a slender and graceful Needle-point Pagoda. From city and lake it is a commanding landmark, and we have good view of it and the hills from our sleeping porch. Just at its foot, so near as to almost crowd it off the hill, a foreigner, Dr. Main, has built an ugly two-storied barn of a residence that looms up white and ghoul-like from almost every angle. It is difficult to see the slim pagoda without that square white atrocity intruding itself upon the scene. It is a barbarity of barbarities and it alone should make loyal Chinese weep and wish us all to depart for our own shores or worse.

    We walk^[[ed]] on over the causeway to the far end of Imperial Island, and back again in time for supper. After supper we stood out on the porch as the far hills flamed red and little tongues of sunset flame lapped along their peaks. I had discovered some music within my abilities and amused myself on the piano for a time before moon was high.

5 July, Sunday

     Again it is a good day, thougha bit hot.  To avoid the heat we went out for a walk immediately after lunch. Rather paradoxical that, but a fact none the less. We wandered along the streets until