Su,
"The stars are indeed small, but their light carries as far as that of
the full moon."

At the steps of the pagoda so great was the throng of those who would
have overwhelmed me with their gracious attention, that had not this
person's neck become practically automatic by ceaseless use of late, he
would have been utterly unequal to the emergency. As it was, he could
only bestow a superficial hand-wave upon a company of gold-embroidered
musicians who greeted his return with appropriate melody, and a glance
of well-indicated regret that he had no fuller means of conveying his
complicated emotions, in the direction of the uppermost tier of maidens.
Then the awaiting Sir Philip took him firmly towards the inner part of
the pavilion, and announced, so adroitly and with such high-spirited
vigour had this one maintained the conflict, that it had been resolutely
agreed on all sides not to make a test of his competence any further.

Thereupon a band of very sumptuously arrayed nymphs drew near with
offerings of liquid fat and a variety of crimson fruit, which it is
customary to grind together on the platter--unapproachable in the
result, certainly, yet incredibly elusive to the unwary in the manner of
bruising, and practically ineradicable upon the more delicate shades
of silk garment. In such a situation the one who is now relating the
various incidents of the day may be imagined by a broad-minded and
affectionate sire: partaking of this native fruit and oil, and from time
to time expressing his insatiable anguish that he continually fails
to become more proficient in controlling the oblique movements of the
viands, while the less successful crickets are constrained to persevere
in the combat, and the ever-present note of evasive purport is raised
by a voice from behind a screen exclaiming, "Out afore? That he may have
been, but do he think we was a-going to give he out afore? No, maaster,
us doant a-have a circus every day hereabouts."

Thus may this imagination of competitive locusts be set forth to
the end. If a fuller proof of what an unostentatious self-effacement
hesitates to enlarge upon were required, it might be found in the
barbarian printed leaf, for the next day this person saw a public record
of the strife, in which his own name was followed by a numerical emblem
signifying that he had not stumbled or proved incompetent in any one
particular. Sir Philip, I beheld with pained surprise, had obtusely
suffered h