o his friend: "What are the three river-gods called?"

"The one in the temple," was the reply, "is the Golden Dragon-King.
The two on the columns are two captains. They do not dare to sit in
the temple together with the king."

This surprised the scholar, and in his heart he thought: "Such a tiny
snake! How can it possess a god's power? It would have to show me its
might before I would worship it."

He had not yet expressed these secret thoughts before the little snake
suddenly stretched forth his head from the bowl, above the altar.
Before the altar burned two enormous candles. They weighed more than
ten pounds and were as thick as small trees. Their flame burned like
the flare of a torch. The snake now thrust his head into the middle of
the candle-flame. The flame must have been at least an inch broad, and
was burning red. Suddenly its radiance turned blue, and was split into
two tongues. The candle was so enormous and its fire so hot that even
copper and iron would have melted in it; but it did not harm the
snake.

Then the snake crawled into the censer. The censer was made of iron,
and was so large one could not clasp it with both arms. Its cover
showed a dragon design in open-work. The snake crawled in and out of
the holes in this cover, and wound his way through all of them, so
that he looked like an embroidery in threads of gold. Finally all the
openings of the cover, large and small, were filled by the snake. In
order to do so, he must have made himself several dozen feet long.
Then he stretched out his head at the top of the censer and once more
watched the play.

Thereupon the scholar was frightened, he bowed twice, and prayed:
"Great King, you have taken this trouble on my account! I honor you
from my heart!"

No sooner had he spoken these words than, in a moment, the little
snake was back in his bowl, and just as small as he had been before.

In Dsiningdschou they were celebrating the river god's birthday in his
temple. They were giving him a theatrical performance for a birthday
present. The spectators crowded around as thick as a wall, when who
should pass but a simple peasant from the country, who said in a loud
voice: "Why, that is nothing but a tiny worm! It is a great piece of
folly to honor it like a king!"

Before ever he had finished speaking the snake flew out of the temple.
He grew and grew, and wound himself three times around the stage. He
became as thick around as a small pail, and hi