Tuen, seeing this, threw herself at his feet and cried out impetuously:
"O wisest and best among men, I would like to learn to read."
"What?" he ejaculated so sharply that her new-found courage instantly deserted her, and she hid her face, and wondered at her own audacity.
In truth the Viceroy was not so much displeased as he was astonished, for he had never dreamed of such a strange request, and could hardly believe his ears.
"You, a girl, learn to read!" he finally exclaimed contemptuously. "What nonsense! You couldn't learn if you tried. You haven't sense enough."
"Indeed, I think I have," she said in a tearful voice, "and I do so want to know about things."
"There is no one to teach you," he answered shortly. "Go back to your sewing, your gossip among the women, and know that it was for that you were made, else had you been born a man."
"I can't help what I was born," she sobbed. "The gods made me a woman, and I just have to make the best of it."