Oblong Folio album (ca. 26,5x36,5 cm or 10 ½ x 14 ¼ in). Eleven card stock leaves. With eighty mounted gelatin silver photos, from ca. 13,5x19,5 cm (5 ¼ x 7 ¾ in) to ca. 4,5x4,5 cm (1 ¾ x 1 ¾ in); most photos are ca. 11x15 cm (4 ¼ x 6 in) or slightly smaller. No captions. Period style black half morocco with black cloth boards; spine with raised bands and gilt-tooled decorative borders. One photo previously removed from the album, a few photos mildly faded, but overall a very good album of strong interesting photos.

Historically significant collection of early original photos of northern China, apparently taken by a French military officer during and after the invasion of China by the Eight-Nation Alliance in 1900-1901. One of the first photos is a classical group portrait featuring Russian, German and French officers of the Allied army. The other images show French officers and soldiers on the grounds of a foreign concession in China, likely the French part of the Legation Quarter in Beijing. The photos depict them during a military exercise, in an armoury (with Chinese armed forces), standing next to a waving French flag on top of a Chinese city gate (likely in Beijing), mounted on horses with flags, posing in a large group in front of a decorated arch (likely for the 14th of July), in a rail cart (driven by a donkey), with the sign “Atelier des Constructions. Service de la voie,” riding bicycles, playing tennis, dressed in Chinese costumes, &c. A group portrait depicts French military men next to a monument with the sign “À la mémoire des militaires et marines français morts en Chine pour la Patrie.”

Three photos document the construction of a music bandstand, likely in the French Legation in Beijing. Two group portraits show French and Chinese workers, posing in front of the completed structure, with the visible names of French composers on top (Boieldieu, Auber, Halevy, and others).

The other images show a military tent camp, a part of the Legation Quarter in Beijing, with a tower of the Methodist Hospital on the far left, the station of the Peking-Mukden Railway at Shan Hai Kuan (Shanhaiguan). Two more photos – a view of the Great Wall of China and a seaside scene were apparently also taken there. Other interesting images show a street, likely in Beijing, with the signs of a “Dentist,” “New-Hotel” and “Fabrick of Lemonade, Soda Water, &c.;” a group of Europeans and Chinese next to the “Yue Shung Ho Go, Hotel and general store keepers, wine and spirit merchants;” a European military parade in China; a street procession, interior of a cave temple, &c. There are also well-executed portraits of Chinese people - women wearing traditional warm clothes, families, schoolchildren, rickshaw drivers, members of a Chinese military music band, and others.

Overall, an interesting collection of original photos of northern China and its people, as well as European military men following the intervention in the early 20th century.