literally translated, ran as follows:--


"To the stranger the gates of my house are not closed: the rice-jar is
on the left, and the sweetmeats on the right, as you enter.

Two sayings of the Master:--

Hospitality is the virtue of the son and the wisdom of the ancestor.

The Superior man is light hearted after the crop-gathering: he makes a
festival.

When the stranger is in your melon-patch, observe him not too closely:
inattention is often the highest form of civility.

Happiness, Peace, and Prosperity.

HOP SING."


Admirable, certainly, as was this morality and proverbial wisdom, and
although this last axiom was very characteristic of my friend Hop Sing,
who was that most sombre of all humorists, a Chinese philosopher, I must
confess, that, even after a very free translation, I was at a loss to
make any immediate application of the message. Luckily I discovered a
third enclosure in the shape of a little note in English, and Hop Sing's
own commercial hand. It ran thus:--