THIS gentleman is a sort of appendage to a man in power. Some half-dozen
of them generally precede a mandarin of rank when he goes in procession,
but more especially when he attends a tribunal of justice. Their
peculiar province seems to be that of keeping off the crowd. The
feathers they wear in their tall conical hats are from three to six feet
in length, and are apparently the tail feathers of a peculiar species of
pheasant, which is represented as very scarce. Some of them wear the
tail feathers of the argus pheasant.
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[Illustration:
CHINA—PLATE 48
]
Plate XLVIII.