slaves displaying innumerable changes of raiment to prove the rank and
consequence of their master, umbrella carriers and fan wavers, and
finally, preceded by incense burners and surrounded by servants who
cleared away all obstructions by means of their formidable and heavily
knotted lashes, the unworthy and deceitful Mandarin Ping Siang, who
sat in a silk-hung and elaborately wrought chair, looking from side to
side with gestures and expressions of contempt and ill-restrained
cupidity.

At the sign of this powerful but unscrupulous person all those who
were present fell upon their faces, leaving a broad space in their
midst, except Yang Hu, who stepped back into the shadow of a doorway,
being resolved that he would not prostrate himself before one whom
Heaven had pointed out as the proper object of his just vengeance.

When the chair of Ping Siang could no longer be observed in the
distance, and the sound of his many gongs had died away, all the
persons who had knelt at his approach rose to their feet, meeting each
other's eyes with glances of assured and profound significance. At
length there stepped forth an exceedingly aged man, who was generally
believed to have the power of reading omens and forecasting futures,
so that at his upraised hand all persons became silent.

"Behold!" he exclaimed, "none can turn aside in doubt from the
deliberately pointed finger of Buddha. Henceforth, in spite of the
well-intentioned suggestions of those who would shield him under the
plea of exacting orders from high ones at Peking or extortions
practised by slaves under him of which he is ignorant, there can no
longer be any two voices concerning the guilty one. Yet what does the
knowledge of the cormorant's cry avail the golden carp in the shallow