of Rewards and Punishments,"--a work attributed to Lao-tseu, which
contains some four hundred anecdotes and traditions of the most curious
kind:--

Tong-yong, who lived under the Han dynasty, was reduced to a state
of extreme poverty. Having lost his father, he sold himself in
order to obtain ... the wherewithal to bury him and to build him a
tomb. The Master of Heaven took pity on him, and sent the Goddess
Tchi-Niu to him to become his wife. She wove a piece of silk for
him every day until she was able to buy his freedom, after which
she gave him a son, and went back to heaven.--_Julien's French
Translation_, p. 119.

Lest the reader should suppose, however, that I have drawn wholly upon
my own imagination for the details of the apparition, the cure, the
marriage ceremony, etc., I refer him to No. XCVI. of Giles's "Strange
Stories from a Chinese Studio," entitled, "A Supernatural Wife," in
which he will find that my narrative is at least conformable to Chinese
ideas. (This story first appeared in "Harper's Bazaar," and is
republished here by permission.)

"_The Return of Yen-Tchin-King._"--There may be an involuntary
anachronism in my version of this legend, which is very pithily
narrated in the _Kan-ing-p'ien_. No emperor's name is cited by the
homilist; and the date of the revolt seems to have been left wholly to
conjecture.--Baber, in his "Memoirs," mentions one of his Mongol archers
as able to bend a two-hundred-pound bow until the ears met.

"_The Tradition of the Tea-Plant._"--My authority for this bit of
folklore is the brief statement published by Bretschneider in the