clung to the plough-handles with an inspired tenacity, his body
assumed every variety of base and uninviting attitude. Encouraged by
this inelegant state of affairs, the evil spirits which are ever on
the watch to turn into derision the charitable intentions of the
pure-minded entered into the bodies of the oxen and provoked within
their minds a sudden and malignant confidence that the time had
arrived when they might with safety break into revolt and throw off
the outward signs of their dependent condition. From these various
causes it came about that Quen was, without warning, borne with
irresistible certainty against the majestic person of the sacred
Emperor, the inlaid box of Imperial silkworms, which up to that time
had remained safely among the folds of his silk garment, alone serving
to avert an even more violent and ill-destined blow.

"Well said the wise and deep-thinking Ye-te, in his book entitled
/Proverbs of Everyday Happenings/, 'Should a person on returning from
the city discover his house to be in flames, let him examine well the
change which he has received from the chair-carrier before it is too
late; for evil never travels alone.' Scarcely had the unfortunate Quen
recovered his natural attributes from the effect of the disgraceful
occurrence which has been recorded (which, indeed, furnished the
matter of a song and many unpresentable jests among the low-class
persons of the city), than the magnanimous Empress reached that detail
of the tree-planting ceremony when it was requisite that she should
deposit the living emblems of the desired increase and prosperity upon
the leaves. Stretching forth her delicately-proportioned hand to Quen
for this purpose, she received from the still greatly confused person
in question the Imperial silkworms in so unseemly a condition that her
eyes had scarcely rested upon them before she was seized with the
rigid sickness, and in that state fell to the ground. At this new and