A DAUGHTER OF THE PRESENT
In Manchuria, not far from Mukden, lived a well-to-do farmer by the name of Lee. For some years the country had been much troubled by mounted banditti who terrorized the people, stealing from them right and left.
Mr. Lee called his neighbours together and after talking over the existing conditions, they bound themselves together to act as watchmen and resist the thieves even to the death.
Mr. Lee then went to the neighbouring villages and helped them to form little companies of volunteers for the same purpose. This, in time, reached the ears of the robbers, and they laid their plans accordingly.
One night in the midst of the autumn harvest, while the farmers were celebrating with wine and music the “harvest festival,” the bandits came upon the village. Mr. Lee called his followers together and a great fight took place in the moonlight. At last the robbers set fire to several houses in the village, and after stealing all they could carry away with them, departed.
Every one was left weeping—grain and clothing gone, and some with their homes in [[107]]ashes. Every one was so busy with his own losses that it was daylight before it was known that Mr. Lee was missing. After much searching in the fields and at the near villages, they decided that he must have been taken captive and carried to the robbers’ stronghold in the mountains.
Now, Mr. Lee had a little daughter, thirteen years old, called “Jade.” She was devoted to her father, and his constant companion. When, as the day wore on, he did not return she refused to be comforted. She pleaded with her mother and brothers to go with her to the neighbours and get them to form a rescue party, but the neighbours were so full of their own losses and fearful of another visit from the robbers that they refused. They said, “If we go, we shall certainly be captured, and either killed or held for a big ransom.”
Little Jade and her family knew it would do no good to appeal to the magistrate, as such raids were frequent, and nothing was done to prevent or punish; and all the family but the little daughter made up their minds that nothing could be done, and they must await whatever the gods had in store for them.
“Not so,” thought little Jade; “I will either save my father or die with him.” Without saying anything to the other members of the [[108]]family she learned from questioning the villagers the location of the “Tigers’ Nest,” as the fastness of the thieves was called. She then started off alone and after miles of weary walking she reached the place at nightfall. She made direct for the cave and prostrating herself before the entrance she began to weep and wail for her father. The robbers came and looked fiercely at her. How she pleaded with those hard-hearted men! They offered her food and money to go away; but she only pleaded the harder. They then became angry and tried to drive her away. For two days and nights she knelt in front of the cave; she would neither eat nor sleep. Many of the robbers were fathers and their hearts grew tender toward the little maid as hour after hour her wail fell upon their ears, and they saw her little face swollen and drawn with long weeping and fasting.
At last the robber captain could endure it no longer, and after one final effort to drive her away, he commanded that Mr. Lee be set free, and that he and his little daughter be escorted beyond the hill region by the robber band. At the close of the fourth day they arrived at their home, where there was great rejoicing and much praise for brave little Jade.