of remaining in the long narrow rooms until they are driven forth at a certain gong-stroke, can you supply them with the smallest portion of that invigorating rice spirit for which alone they crave?  From this simple and homely illustration, specially conceived to meet the requirements of your stunted and meagre understanding, learn not to expect both grace and thorns from the willow-tree.  Nevertheless, your very immature remarks on the art of story-telling are in no degree more foolish than those frequently uttered by persons who make a living by such a practice; in proof of which this person will relate to the select and discriminating company now assembled an entirely new and unrecorded story—­that, indeed, of the unworthy, but frequently highly-rewarded Kai Lung himself.”

“The story of Kai Lung!” exclaimed Wang Yu.  “Why not the story of Ting, the sightless beggar, who has sat all his life outside the Temple of Miraculous Cures?  Who is Kai Lung, that he should have a story?  Is he not known to us all here?  Is not his speech that of this Province, his food mean, his arms and legs unshaven?  Does he carry a sword or wear silk raiment?  Frequently have we seen him fatigued with journeying; many times has he arrived destitute of money; nor, on those occasions when a newly-appointed and unnecessarily officious Mandarin has commanded him to betake himself elsewhere and struck him with a rod has Kai Lung caused the stick to turn into a deadly serpent and destroy its master, as did the just and dignified Lu Fei.  How, then, can Kai Lung have a story that is not also the story of Wang Yu and Hi Seng, and all others here?”

“Indeed, if the refined and enlightened Wang Yu so decides, it must assuredly be true,” said Kai Lung patiently; “yet (since even trifles serve to dispel the darker thoughts of existence) would not the history of so small a matter as an opium pipe chain his intelligent consideration? such a pipe, for example, as this person beheld only today exposed for sale, the bowl composed of the finest red clay, delicately baked and fashioned, the long bamboo stem smoother than the sacred tooth of the divine Buddha, the spreading support patiently and cunningly carved with scenes representing the Seven Joys, and the Tenth Hell of unbelievers.”

“Ah!” exclaimed Wang Yu eagerly, “it is indeed as you say, a Mandarin among masterpieces.  That pipe, O most unobserving Kai Lung, is the work of this retiring and superficial person who is now addressing you, and, though the fact evidently escaped your all-seeing glance, the place where it is exposed is none other than his shop of ’The Fountain of Beauty,’ which you have on many occasions endowed with your honourable presence.”

“Doubtless the carving is the work of the accomplished Wang Yu, and the fitting together,” replied Kai Lung; “but the materials for so refined and ornamental a production must of necessity have been brought many thousand li; the clay perhaps from the renowned beds of Honan, the wood from Peking, and the bamboo from one of the great forests of the North.”