Whenever she began to cry a Lady-In-Waiting knelt in front of her and caught her tears in a golden bowl, for it never would have done to let them run down her cheeks, like an ordinary person’s tears; they would have washed such deep roads through the thick white powder on her face. Every morning Princess Autumn Cloud (and, indeed, every lady in the Court of the Little Emperor) covered her face with honey in which white jasmine petals had been crushed to make it smell sweet, then when she was all sticky she put on powder until her face was as white as an egg. Then she painted on very surprised-looking black eyebrows and a little mouth as red and round as a blob of sealing wax. It looked just as if her mouth were an important letter that had to be sealed up to keep all sorts of secrets from escaping. Princess Autumn Cloud and Princess Gentle Breeze and Lady Gleaming Dragon Fly and Lady Moon Seen Through The Mist and all the rest of them would have thought it as shocking to appear without paint and powder covering up their faces as they would have thought it to appear without any clothes. So Princess Autumn Cloud leaned over as if she were making a deep bow, and let her tears fall in a golden bowl, and then, because they were Royal tears, they were poured into beautiful porcelain bottles that were sealed up and placed, rows and rows and rows of them, in a room all hung with silk curtains embroidered with weeping willows. “Oh, _what_ shall be done to amuse the Little Emperor?” sobbed Princess Autumn Cloud. “Perhaps he would like some music!” And she clapped her hands, with their long, long fingernails covered with gold fingernail protectors. So four fat musicians, dressed in vermilion silk and wearing big horn-rimmed spectacles to show how wise they were, came and kowtowed to the Little Emperor. That is, they got down on their knees, which was hard for them to do because they were so fat, and then, all together, knocked their heads on the floor nine times apiece to show their deep respect. Then one beat on a drum, boom boom, and one clashed cymbals of brass together, crash _bang_, and one rang little bells of green and milk-white jade, and the oldest and fattest beat with mallets up and down the back of a musical instrument carved and painted to look like a life-sized tiger with glaring eyes and sharp white teeth. The Little Emperor sprawled back in his big dragon throne under the softly waving peacock feather fans, stretched out his arms and legs, and yawned harder than ever. [Illustration: Four fat Chinese musicians.] “Oh! Oh! Oh! _What_ shall be done to amuse him?” wailed Princess Autumn Cloud, bursting into tears afresh. “Can _no_ one suggest anything?” And although the Mandarins and the Court Ladies thought to themselves that what they would really like to suggest for such a spoiled little boy would be to send him to bed without his supper, they none of them dared say so, but tried to look very solemn and sympathetic.