latives following the bier. In due course, paper money and
other articles were burned for the use of the deceased, and fire
crackers were exploded to ensure the soul and the mortal remains
against the attacks of demons. The next year in early spring on the day
known as _Pure Brightness_, in accordance with national custom, Wang,
dressed in white, again visited and repaired the grave. For three years
he wore signs of mourning in his dress, and abstained from all
festivities. Thus he strove to leave undone nothing which filial piety
could contrive, to make easier to his mother her sojourn in those
mysterious realms whither she had passed.

For the next few years he worked as a silversmith in his uncle's shop,
this latter being a generous, kindly man, on whom the responsibilities
of business life sat only too lightly, for an illness revealed the fact
that the profits were not sufficient to meet the interest due on the
rapidly accumulating debts.

Moreover, the sick man, with failing health, had gradually acquired the
use of the fatal drug known as "foreign smoke," which some years
previously had been first introduced from distant lands, and was gaining
ground every year as a profitable crop in the best soil. One ounce a day
had become the necessary allowance for the sick man, and to Hwochow the
nephew constantly went in order to buy the needful supply. He tells how
he walked between the poppy fields and heard the chant which always
accompanied the sowing of the plant:

"Of ten acres, fateful plant, thou claimest eight,
Thus only two are left for ripening grain;
From distant lands thou wert brought here,
And hast devoured the best of China's sons."

Of famine, of typhus, and of the raids of wild beasts, the inhabitants
of Shansi had tasted the full terrors, but now this more insidious foe
was working havoc in their midst. Amongst the villagers it already
counted its victims: one young man had recently died as a direct result
of its use, for after taking his accustomed dose he had so lain down
that a portion of his wadded clothes was touching the lighted stove.
Shortly after, his mother entered the cave to find this, her only son,
burned to death, the charred corpse being all that remained to tell the
tale. Another neighbour had gradually parted with all his possessions,
and when nothing else remained on which to raise money, he took his
young wife and sold her to an innkeeper i