ung to the portrayal of widely differing subjects. Into the
picture-room of one who might thus be described this person was recently
conducted, to pass an opinion upon a scene in which were depicted
seven men of varying nationalities and appropriately garbed, one of the
opposing sex carrying a lighted torch, an elephant reclining beneath a
fruitful vine, and the President of a Republic. For a period this person
resisted the efforts of those who would have questioned him, withdrawing
their attention to the harmonious lights upon the river mist floating
far below, but presently, being definitely called upon, he replied as
follows: "Mih Ying, who was perhaps the greatest of his time, spent his
whole life in painting green and yellow beetles in the act of concealing
themselves beneath dead maple leaves upon the approach of day. At the
age of seventy-five he burst into tears, and upon being approached for
a cause he exclaimed, 'Alas, if only this person had resisted the
temptation to be diffuse, and had confined himself to green beetles
alone, he might now, instead of contemplating a misspent career, have
been really great.' How much less," I continued, "can a person of
immature moustaches hope to depict two such conflicting objects as a
recumbent elephant and the President of a Republic standing beneath a
banner?"

Upon the temptation to deal critically with the religious instincts of
the islanders this person draws an obliterating brush. As practically
every traveller who has honoured our unattractive land with his
effusive presence has subsequently left it in a printed record that
our ceremonies are grotesque, our priesthood ignorant and depraved,
our monasteries and sacred places spots of plague upon an otherwise
flower-adorned landscape, and our beliefs and sacrifices only worthy to
exist for the purpose of being made into jest-origins by more refined
communities, the omission on this one's part may appear uncivil and
perhaps even intentionally discourteous. To this, as a burner of
joss-sticks and an irregular person, he can only reply by a deprecatory
waving of both hands and a reassuring smile.

With the two-sided memories of many other details hanging thickly around
his brush, it would not be an achievement to continue to a practically
inexhaustible amount. As of the set days when certain things are
observed, among which fall the first of the fourth month (but that would
disclose another involvement), another when f