[66] See No. IV., [note 46].
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[67] Borrowed from Buddhism.
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[68] Alluding to a similar story, related in the Record of the Immortals, of how these two friends lost their way while gathering simples on the hills, and were met and entertained by two lovely young damsels for the space of half-a-year. When, however, they subsequently returned home, they found that ten generations had passed away.
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[69] Besides the above, there is the story of a man named Wang, who, wandering one day in the mountains, came upon some old men playing a game of wei-ch‘i (see [Appendix]); and after watching them for some time, he found that the handle of an axe he had with him had mouldered away into dust. Seven generations of men had passed away in the interval. Also, a similar legend of a horseman, who, when riding over the hills, saw several old men playing a game with rushes, and tied his horse to a tree while he himself approached to observe them. A few minutes afterwards he turned to depart, but found only the skeleton of his horse and the rotten remnants of the saddle and bridle. He then sought his home, but that was gone too; and so he laid himself down upon the ground and died of a broken heart.
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[70] See [Appendix][ A].
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[71] If there is one institution in the Chinese empire which is jealously guarded and honestly administered, it is the great system of competitive examinations which has obtained in China now for many centuries. And yet frauds do take place, in spite of the exceptionally heavy penalties incurred upon detection. Friends are occasionally smuggled through by the aid of marked essays; and dishonest candidates avail themselves of “sleeve editions,” as they are called, of the books in which they are to be examined. On the whole, the result is a successful one. As a rule the best candidates pull through; while, in exceptional cases, unquestionably good men are rejected. Of the latter class, the author of this work is a most striking instance. Excelling in literary attainments of the highest order, he failed more than once to obtain his master’s degree, and finally threw up in disgust. Thenceforward he became the enemy of the mandarinate; and how he has lashed the corruption of his age may be read in such stories as [The Wolf Dream], and many others, while the policy that he himself would have adopted, had he been fortunate enough to succeed, must remain for ever a matter of doubt and speculation.
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[72] The Infernal Regions are supposed to be pretty much a counterpart of the world above, [except] in the matter of light.
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[73] The visitor to Canton cannot fail to observe batches of prisoners with chains on them sitting in the street outside the prisons, many of them engaged in plying their particular trades.
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[74] The judge in a Chinese court is necessarily very much dependent on his secretaries; and, except in special cases, he takes his cue almost entirely from them. They take theirs from whichever party to the case knows best how to “cross the palm.”
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[75] The whole story is of course simply a satire upon the venality and injustice of the ruling classes in China.
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