All these sounds I know, and they disturb me not.
The sound that is to me most terrible,
That snatches slumber from me,
Is the sound that is most common:
The scream of a child at night.
Reproof and Approbation
Because I gave a piece of silk
To my friend of the golden curls,
One (may the dogs devour him) threw a stone at my window,
And hooted and jeered and made base noise with his mouth.
Nay, worse, this son of a sea-slug (may his line perish)
Hurled hard names at my friend,
Calling her Tart, and Flusey, and Tom; and, as we walked together,
Cried: `Watcher, Nancy, who's yer friend with the melon face
And the bug-eaten cabbage-leaf on his head?'
The lean and scurvy dog that slinks about Pennyfields
Flew in great fear at sight of this reprover of our doings,
And came to me, and rubbed itself against my shoe.
The Feast of Go Nien
We are now in the Pepper Month;
And soon will come the Feast of Go Nien.
Then I will pay my debts, and gather in my dues.
I will walk in the great procession;
And afterwards I will hang up my devil-chasers
And will proceed to the restaurant of Ng Tack,
And drink spring wine with him and meet my friends.
That evening I shall eat of the best:
Of chicken cream and pigeon in soy-ed,
With a brown noodle of pork and prawn,
And a curry of fish and a large Chung Goun,
Sweet onions, and black eggs and chow chow.
And when we have done,
We will have cakes and tea, and music and songs,
And call in our white friends to sit with us.
For this one day we shall be each to the other,
What the other would desire.
Perhaps it is well that this day
Occurs but once in the year's calendar;
For if we always so behaved, one to the other,
There would be no business done.
Directions for Making Tea
In making tchah for table, each man has his own way.
Some serve it dashed with lemon, and some with bamboo shoot,
And some with sugar, in the English way,
And some with spot of sam-shu.;
But when one offers tchah to distinguished visitor,
One offers the noble suey sen, and flavors it
With the dried bud of the noble chrysanthemum.