The noise which still fills his ears, also, resembles rather the
despairing cries of the Ten Thousand Lost Ones at the first sight of
the Pit of Liquid and Red-hot Malachite, yet without question both
proceed from the same cause. Laying aside further ceremony, therefore,
permit this greatly over-estimated person to disclose the object of
his inopportune visit. Long have your amiable virtues been observed
and appreciated by the high ones at Peking, O Quen-Ki-Tong. Too long
have they been unrewarded and passed over in silence. Nevertheless,
the moment of acknowledgement and advancement has at length arrived;
for, as the Book of Verses clearly says, "Even the three-legged mule
may contrive to reach the agreed spot in advance of the others,
provided a circular running space has been selected and the number of
rounds be sufficiently ample." It is this otherwise uninteresting and
obtrusive person's graceful duty to convey to you the agreeable
intelligence that the honourable and not ill-rewarded office of
Guarder of the Imperial Silkworms has been conferred upon you, and to
require you to proceed without delay to Peking, so that fitting
ceremonies of admittance may be performed before the fifteenth day of
the month of Feathered Insects.
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