Lacking in virtues meet the azure skies to mend,
In vain the mortal world full many a year I wend,
Of a former and after life these facts that be,
Who will for a tradition strange record for me?

K'ung K'ung, the Taoist, having pondered over these lines for a while,
became aware that this stone had a history of some kind.

"Brother stone," he forthwith said, addressing the stone, "the concerns
of past days recorded on you possess, according to your own account, a
considerable amount of interest, and have been for this reason
inscribed, with the intent of soliciting generations to hand them down
as remarkable occurrences. But in my own opinion, they lack, in the
first place, any data by means of which to establish the name of the
Emperor and the year of his reign; and, in the second place, these
constitute no record of any excellent policy, adopted by any high
worthies or high loyal statesmen, in the government of the state, or in
the rule of public morals. The contents simply treat of a certain number
of maidens, of exceptional character; either of their love affairs or
infatuations, or of their small deserts or insignificant talents; and
were I to transcribe the whole collection of them, they would,
nevertheless, not be estimated as a book of any exceptional worth."

"Sir Priest," the stone replied with assurance, "why are you so
excessively dull? The dynasties recorded in the rustic histories, which
have been written from age to age, have, I am fain to think, invariably
assumed, under false pretences, the mere nomenclature of the Han and
T'ang dynasties. They differ from the events inscribed on my block,
which do not borrow this customary practice, but, being based on my own
experiences and natural feelings, present, on the contrary, a novel and