Go Ek Ju went forward and received the eight strokes. As he stood trembling with pain before the schoolmaster’s desk, he felt a small hand grasp his foot. His lip tightened. Then he returned to his seat, sore, but undaunted, and unconfessed. In like manner also his schoolmates received the rattan. When the fifteen aching but unrepentant scholars were copying industriously, “He who thinks only of good things to eat is an inferior man,” and the schoolmaster, exhausted, had flung himself back on his seat, a little figure in red emerged from under the schoolmaster’s desk and attempted to clamber on to his lap. The schoolmaster held her back. “What! What!” he exclaimed. “What! what!” He rubbed his head in puzzled fashion. Then he lifted up the little red figure, turning its face around to the schoolboys. Such a chubby, happy little face as it was. Dimpled cheeks and pearly teeth showing in a gleeful smile. And the hands of the little red figure grasped two sticky balls of red and white peppermint candy—unfragrant sugar. “Behold!” said the teacher, with a twinkle in his spectacles, “the inferior man!” Whereupon the boys forgot that they were aching. You see, they loved the little Ku Yum and believed that they had saved her from eight strokes of the rattan. THE MERRY BLIND-MAN The little finger on Ah Yen’s little left hand was very sore. Ah Yen had poked it into a hot honey tart. His honorable mother had said: “Yen, you must not touch that tart,” but just as soon as his honorable mother had left the room, Yen forgot what she had said, and thrust the littlest finger of his little left hand right into the softest, sweetest, and hottest part of the tart. Now he sat beside the window, feeling very sad and sore, for all the piece of oiled white linen which his mother had carefully wrapped around his little finger. It was a very happy-looking day. The sky was a lovely blue, trimmed with pretty, soft white clouds, and on the purple lilac tree which stood in front of his father’s cottage, two little yellow eyebrows were chirping to each other. But Yen, with his sore finger, did not feel at all happy. You see, if his finger had not been sore, he could have been spinning the bright-colored top which his honorable uncle had given him the day before. “Isn’t it a lovely day, little son?” called his mother. “I think it is a homely day,” answered Yen. “See those good little birds on the tree,” said his mother. “I don’t believe they are good,” replied the little boy. “Fie, for shame!” cried his mother; and she went on with her work.