bove Yu-ping, and this
person's narration would avoid the semblance of the things that are
and he himself would thereby be brought to disrepute."

"Suffer not that apprehension to retard your impending eloquence,"
replied Shan Tien affably. "Be assured that the gods have exactly the
same manner of behaving in every land."

"Furthermore," continued Cho-kow, with patient craft, "I am a man of
barbarian tongue, the full half of my speech being foreign to your
ear. The history of the much-accomplished Tian and the meaning of the
dreams that mark those of his race require for a full understanding
the subtle analogies of an acquired style. Now that same Kai Lung whom
you have implicated to my band--"

"Excellence!" protested Ming-shu, with a sudden apprehension in his
throat, "yesterday our labours dissolved in air through the very
doubtful precedent of allowing one to testify what he had had the
intention to relate. Now we are asked to allow a tomb-haunter to call
a parricide to disclose that which he himself is ignorant of. Press
down your autocratic thumb--"

"Alas, instructor," interposed Shan Tien compassionately, "the
sympathetic concern of my mind overflows upon the spectacle of your
ill-used forbearance, yet you having banded together the two in a
common infamy, it is the ancient privilege of this one to call the
other to his cause. We are but the feeble mouthpieces of a benevolent
scheme of all-embracing justice and greatly do I fear that we must
again submit."

With these well-timed words the broad-minded personage settled himself
more reposefully among his cushions and signified that Kai Lung should
be led forward and begin.

The Story of Ning, the Captive God, and the Dreams
that mark his Race

i. THE MALICE OF THE DEMON, LEOU

When Sun Wei definitely understood that the deities were against him
(for on every occasion his enemies prospered and the voice of his own
authority grew less), he looked this way and that with a
well-considering mind.

He did nothing hastily, but when once a decision was reached it was as
unbending as iron and as smoothly finished as polished jade. At about
the evening hour when others were preparing to offer sacrifice he took
the images and the altars of his Rites down from their honourable
positions and cast them into a heap on a waste expanse beyond his
courtyard. Then with an axe he unceremoniously detached their
inc