“If the high-souled company is satisfied, then it must be, for there is no conclusive right or wrong--only an unending search for that which is most gem-set and resourceful,” replied this person, with an ever-deepening conviction of no enthusiasm towards the sit-round game. “But,” he added, resolved to raise for a moment the canopy of a mind swan-like in its crystal many-sidedness, and then leave them to their own ineptitude, “for five centuries nothing has been judged equal to the solution offered by Li Tang. At the time he was presented with a three-sided banner of silk with the names of his eleven immediate ancestors embroidered upon it in seven colours, and his own name is still handed down in imperishable memory.” “Oh, do tell us what it was,” cried many. “It must have been clever.” “‘The Dragon painted upon the face of the fan: When the fan is shaken the Dragon flies upwards,’” replied this person. It cannot be denied that this was received with an attitude of respectful melancholy strikingly complimentary to the wisdom of the gifted Li Tang. But whether it may be that the time was too short to assimilate the more subtle delicacies of the saying, or whether the barbarian mind is inherently devoid of true balance, this person was panged most internally to hear one say to another as he went out, “Do you know, I really think that Herbert’s was much the better answer of the two--more realistic, and what you might expect at the pantomime.” A like inability to grasp with a clear and uninvolved vision, permeates not only the triviality of a sit-round game but even the most important transactions of existence. Shortly after his arrival in the Island, this person was initiated by the widely-esteemed Quang-Tsun into the private life of one whose occupation was that of a Law-giver, where he frequently drank tea on terms of mutual cordiality. Upon such an occasion he was one day present, conversing with the lesser ones of the household--the head thereof being absent, setting forth the Law in the Temple--when one of the maidens cried out with amiable vivacity, “Why, Mr. Kong, you say such consistently graceful things of the ladies you have met over here, that we shall expect you to take back an English wife with you. But perhaps you are already married in China?” “The conclusion is undeviating in its accuracy,” replied this person, unable to evade the allusion. “To Ning, Hia-Fa and T’ain Yen, as the matter stands.” “Ning Hia-Fa An T’ain Yen!” exclaimed the wife of the Law-giver pleasantly. “What an important name. Can you pardon our curiosity and tell us what she is like?” “Ning, Hia-Fa AND T’ain Yen,” repeated this person, not submitting to be deprived of the consequence of two wives without due protest. “Three names, three wives. Three very widely separated likes.”