Yesterday this person possessed no secret store of silver or
gold, nor had he knowledge of any special amount of jade hidden among
the mountains, but to his call there responded four score goats, the
most select and majestic to be found in all the Province, of which,
nevertheless, it was his yearly custom to sacrifice one, as those here
can testify, and to offer another as a duty to the Yamen of Ping
Siang, in neither case opening his eyes widely when the hour for
selecting arrived. Yet in what an unseemly manner is his respectful
piety and courteous loyalty rewarded! To-day, before this person went
forth on his usual quest, there came those bearing written papers by
which they claimed, on the authority of Ping Siang, the whole of this
person's flock, as a punishment and fine for his not contributing
without warning to the Celebration of Kissing the Emperor's Face--the
very obligation of such a matter being entirely unknown to him.
Nevertheless, those who came drove off this person's entire wealth,
the desperately won increase of a life full of great toil and
uncomplainingly endured hardship, leaving him only his cave in the
rocks, which even the most grasping of many-handed Mandarins cannot
remove, his cloak of skins, which no beggar would gratefully receive,
and a bright and increasing light of deep hate scorching within his
mind which nothing but the blood of the obdurate extortioner can
efficiently quench.
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