(whether in the nature of bodily disorder, fire,
or demoniacal upheaval, a warning omen, or the death of some of our
chief antagonists), but before doing so I was desirous of understanding
how this contest, which had hitherto remained outside my experience, was
waged.

There is here one of benevolent rotundity in whose authority lie the
cavernous stores beneath the house and the vessels of gold and silver;
of menial rank admittedly, yet exacting a seemly deference from all
by the rich urbanity of his voice and the dignity of his massive
proportions. In the affable condescension of his tone, and the
discriminating encouragement of his attitude towards me on all
occasions, I have read a sympathetic concern over my welfare. Him I now
approached, and taking him aside, I first questioned him flatteringly
about his age and the extent of his yearly recompense, and then casually
inquired what in his language he would describe the nature of a cricket
to be.

"A cricket?" repeated the obliging person readily; "a cricket, sir, is a
hinsect. Something, I take it, after the manner of a grass-'opper."

"Truly," I agreed. "It is aptly likened. And, to continue the simile, a
game cricket--?"

"A game cricket?" he replied; "well, sir, naturally a game one would be
more gamier than the others, wouldn't it?"

"The inference is unflinching," I admitted, and after successfully
luring away his mind from any significance in the inquiry by asking him
whether the gift of a lacquered coffin or an embroidered shroud would be
the more regarded on parting, I left him.

His words, esteemed, for a definite reason were as the jade-clappered
melody of a silver bell. This trial of sportiveness, it became
clear,--less of a massacre than most of their amusements--is really
a rivalry of leapings and dexterity of the feet: a conflict of game
crickets or grass-hoppers, in the somewhat wide-angled obscurity of
their language, or, as we would more appropriately call it doubtless,
a festive competition in the similitude of high-spirited locusts. To
whatever degree the surrounding conditions might vary, there could no
longer be a doubt that the power of leaping high into the air was
the essential constituent of success in this barbarian match of
crickets--and in such an accomplishment this person excelled from the
time of his youth with a truly incredible proficiency. Can it be a
reproach, then, that when I considered this, and saw in a vision the
contem