Part 4

The evening came and she did not return, and Tsen-Tsze could not eat food or sleep that night from anxiety for his mother. And when the maid servant called him for the morning meal, he said, “No; I can not eat food until I see my mother’s face.” But his father said, “You must eat and go to school.”

“I can not eat food or study books until my mother comes,” said Tsen-Tsze, and word was sent his teacher who said, “You are not quite wise, Tsen-Tsze. If your mother should die, would you then no longer study? I hope to see you soon at school.”

At midday his mother came. Then he had food, and went to school and studied his lessons.

When he came home from school, he always went to see where his parents were before going to play. At meal time he would not take food until his father and mother began eating. When he met an old person on the street, he uncovered his head and stood aside respectfully to let him pass before he went on.

These and all other customs of courtesy were observed and honored by Tsen-Tsze. At school he studied his lessons faithfully, and never left tasks unfinished. Every day he asked his teacher, “Have I done any wrong to-day?”—so great was his desire to know the right and to do all that he knew.

One day Tsen-Tsze’s father beat him with a long Kia-Tsa (stick). [11] When he got up from the floor he came and took his father’s hand and asked, “Father, did I do wrong? Tell me what it was.” But his father’s face was red with anger, and he would not explain.

Tsen-Tsze went out to the schoolroom and took his music box and came again before his father’s face, and sat down on the floor and played and sang to him. He sang,

“Every father loves his son, Of this all men are sure. Each child will need the stick sometimes, To keep his nature pure.”

And he said, “I read in history about many famous men who were great because they were gentle. I hope I shall be like them. History says their fathers gave them the stick when young.” But the anger had not all left his father’s face, and he brought him a cup of tea and said, “Father, are you thirsty?”

Then he took his father’s hand and went to the garden where the birds were singing. He put a flower on his father’s breast and asked, “Father, do you like that? I do.”

All this caused Tsen-Tsze’s father to think, and in his heart he said, “This boy is not like other children of his age.” And so long as he had life, he never beat his son again.

Tsen-Tsze became a great scholar and finished all his studies when he was only twenty-five years old. And he was a wise and good man.

His own generation and all the generations of man that have come after him have studied about him, and have wished to be as he was.

WHAT THE YEN TZI TAUGHT THE HUNTER [12]

獵人受敎於鳥

One day a hunter was looking for a fox in the wilderness, when suddenly he saw thousands of birds coming towards the river, and he lay quite still and waited for them all to come.

The Yen Tzi, or Kind Birds, were talking together, and the hunter listened. One asked, “Is all our company here?”

And the Leader Bird said, “No, little One-Month-Old and Two-Month and Mrs. This-Year are not here yet.”

And the Leader Bird said to the Lookout Birds, “You must go after them and help them to the river before five days. Our boats are dried and ready to sail. It is growing cold and we must all go south together.”

So the Lookout Birds flew all around the country to hunt the lost birds. They found one with a broken wing, and a little one with not enough wing feathers to fly far, and one with a wound in his leg made by a hunter, and others that were tired or very hungry. They found every missing bird, and this great family of friends were soon all together again.

But while the Lookout Birds were seeking the lost ones from their own family, they heard another bird cry, “Save me! save me, too!” And they stopped and said, “Who is calling? Some one must be in trouble.” They flew to a lemon tree and saw a Tailor Bird with her leg all covered with blood. The Kind Birds said, “Friend, how came you in such trouble? What is your name and where do you live?”

The Tailor Bird said, “I live in the South Province, eight hundred miles away. I came here to see my friends and relatives. Three of my children are with me, and we were on our way home to the south. We had gone sixty miles, when I asked my children to stop and rest in this lemon tree, and now I do not even know where they are. I fear the hunter got them. I am hurt, too, and I do not think I shall ever see my home again. I shall lose my life here, I fear.”

The Yen Tzi heard all the Tailor Bird said. They talked together and were sorry for her who had no one to care for her, for they knew her children had been killed by the hunter. “If we do not save her life, she will surely die,” they said.

So they asked, “Would you like to go with us? We know you eat different food. We live on rice and fruit and a few bugs. We do not know that you can live as we do. And we must ride on our boats, many, many hours.”

The Tailor Bird answered, “Yes, I will go gladly, and will eat what you have and cause you no trouble.”

The Kind Birds helped the Tailor Bird to their company and put her in one of their boats, and two or three birds fed her and cared for her until she was well.

The hunter who told this story said, “I have learned many things by watching and studying the habits of the Kind Birds. I will never kill birds again.”

Ee-Sze (Meaning): In time of trouble, man should help not only his own, but others.

A LESSON FROM CONFUCIUS

孔子之敎誨

Confucius once heard two of his pupils quarreling. One was of a gentle nature and was called by all the students a peaceful man. The other had a good brain and a kind heart, but was given to great anger. If he wished to do a thing, he did it, and no man could prevent; if any one tried to hinder him, he would show sudden and terrible rage.

One day, after one of these fits of temper, the blood came from his mouth, and, in great fear, he went to Confucius. “What shall I do with my body?” he asked. “I fear I shall not live long. It may be better that I no longer study and work. I am your pupil and you love me as a father. Tell me what to do for my body.”

Confucius answered, “Tsze-Lu, you have a wrong idea about your body. It is not the study, not the work in school, but your great anger that causes the trouble.

“I will help you to see this. You remember when you and Nou-Wui quarreled. He was at peace and happy again in a little time, but you were very long in overcoming your anger. You can not expect to live long if you do that way. Every time one of the pupils says a thing you do not like, you are greatly enraged. There are a thousand in this school. If each offends you only once, you will have a fit of temper a thousand times this year. And you will surely die, if you do not use more self-control. I want to ask you some questions:—

“How many teeth have you?”

“I have thirty-two, teacher.”

“How many tongues?”

“Just one.”

“How many teeth have you lost?”

“I lost one when I was nine years old, and four when I was about twenty-six years old.”

“And your tongue—is it still perfect?”

“Oh, yes.”

“You know Mun-Gun, who is quite old?”

“Yes, I know him well.”

“How many teeth do you think he had at your age?”

“I do not know.”

“How many has he now?”

“Two, I think. But his tongue is perfect, though he is very old.”

“You see the teeth are lost because they are strong, and determined to have everything they desire. They are hard and hurt the tongue many times, but the tongue never hurts the teeth. Yet, it endures until the end, while the teeth are the first of man to decay. The tongue is peaceful and gentle with the teeth. It never grows angry and fights them, even when they are in the wrong. It always helps them do their work, in preparing man’s food for him, although the teeth never help the tongue, and they always resist everything.

“And so it is with man. The strongest to resist, is the first to decay; and you, Tsze-Lu, will be even so if you learn not the great lesson of self-control.”

THE WIND, THE CLOUDS, AND THE SNOW [13]

I

(第一)風雲雪

Once there was a great quarrel between the winds, the clouds, and the snow.

And suddenly, without any warning, there came the angry roar of the thunder and the sharp cracking of the forked lightning as it separated the heavens.

Then the north winds, the south winds, the east winds, and the west winds came together a thousand and a thousand strong.

And the sun was no longer seen, for the earth was covered with a deep blackness as of the night. The clouds were coming to the east, but the wind drove them all back to the west side of the heavens and finally much hail and snow were thrown down to the earth.

The clouds said to the snow, “Why do you go to earth? You are not wanted there. In the warm south land you are never welcomed. Your people would be killed at once if they went there. Even here you are allowed to stay only for a short time.”

“We do not come to this earth for our own pleasure,” answered the snow. “It was pleasanter where we were. We came to earth to help its people.”

At this the clouds frowned until their faces became black and they said, “We can not believe that.”

“It is true,” answered the snow. “In the summer time you will see how the people cry for pressed snow. They pay three pennies for one little cup of water that we have made cold.

“You say we are not liked in the south land, but we tell you that the south-land people send many oxen, horses, and men to the north to find the snow.

“They pack us in the storehouses so that we may last until the hot weather, and when the summer fever comes all people need us.”

“You have been studying this one great need of man a long time, we think,” and the clouds bowed in scornful mock sympathy.

“We do many good things for man,” continued the snow. “Thunder and lightning do him much harm and he fears them greatly; but the Creator sends us to comfort him. The lightning disappears from the earth for a time when the season of our appearance comes.”

“You should wear a crown,” suggested the clouds sneeringly.

“A king who wore one—the old King Dai-Sung—once said of us, ‘Oh, snow, snow, how beautiful you are. It is good for flowers, good for grass, and good for trees that you are here.’

“And he said to the rose bushes, shrubs, and trees who were asleep, ‘If you wish beauty in the spring time, you must have our friend the snow in the winter.’

“He laid his hand gently on his horses’ necks and said, ‘True helpers that are both feet and legs to me, it will soon be time for the green grass to appear. You will have plenty this year, for we had a thick cover of snow this winter.

“‘It will soon be hot weather, but I do not fear the heat, for I have plenty of hard snow, pressed and packed for the summer time.’

“So you see the snow is useful to man. We could have stayed where we were in the sky and kept clean, and we need not have worked hard flying all the way down to the ground.

“We never hear that the clouds do any good thing,” said the snow.

“The time may come when you will have finished talking,” said the clouds. “Then we can tell you some things.”

“We saw the big Ti-San Mountain to-day,” continued the snow, “and many of the cloud children were playing around its summit, but what good did they do? None.

“A hunter was looking for wild beasts and your children were naughty and covered his eyes so that he could not see. Do you remember how he scolded your children and said, ‘I do not like these cloudy, foggy days’?

“Once the General San Chi led his soldiers to fight against his nation’s enemy, and one night he went out to learn how many of the enemy could be seen.

“The moon and stars tried to help him, but you came and covered them and it grew so dark that he lost his way. Then the enemy took his horse and gun and he nearly lost his life.

“He hid in a cave and said, ‘Those clouds have caused my death, I fear.’ He lay in the dark cave until the morning came and he could see to find his way.

“We do not see why the Creator made clouds to hang around in the sky from north to south, and east to west,” said the snow, angrily.

II

(第二)風雲雪

Just then the clouds’ lawyer, the wind, came to defend them. “Whom are you scolding?” he asked.

“You think the Creator should have made the snow king of a world, I suppose, and that there is no place or use for the clouds.

“You talk so much that we can not find opportunity to tell what we are good for. You are not the only helper of man and of growing things in the hot summer time.

“Do you remember when the great General Dhi-Sing led five thousand soldiers to battle? They traveled over mountains and through wild places until they were worn and weary.

“They found water to drink by the Gold Mine Mountain and stopped there to rest; but there were no trees or growing things on that mountain and they could find no shade.

“The sun sent down great heat and they suffered so that they could not rest. Then they held their faces up to heaven and in anguish they cried, ‘Oh, sun, why shine so hot to-day?’

“Then they looked to the east and saw our brother, the cloud, beginning to appear.

“‘Why do you not come to us, and cover the face of the sun that we may have shade and rest?’ they pleaded of the cloud; and so our brother came and stood between the earth and the sun.

“‘Oh, this is rest, rest,’ said the soldiers in great relief. ‘How we wish that the cloud might always shield us from the burning fire of the sun.’

“And not only the soldiers, but all the farmers and woodcutters ask us to help them in the time when the sun comes close.”

“Can you do only this one thing?” asked the snow, coldly.

“Who carries the rain and the snow through the sky?” asked the wind.

“I tell you there would be no rain nor snow but for the help of the wind and the clouds.

“You know well that the rain is made from the ocean water.

“One day the water said to the cloud, ‘Friend, I should like to journey around and around the sky, but I have no wings, and can not fly. My body is so heavy that I can not move it, and I never expect to take this trip unless you, my friend, help me.’

“And so we lifted the water and helped it step by step until we floated it through the air. Our first cloud faces were very light, but after we had traveled five or six miles through the sky our faces changed to gray, and when we had gone one thousand miles our faces became black and the farmers said, ‘We shall soon have rain.’

“Do you know why the faces of clouds grow black?” asked the wind.

“Anger makes things black,” said the snow, “but why should we know, for of ourselves we never change color.”

“It was because great strength was being put forth to travel through the sky,” argued the wind, “for soon the drops of water said, ‘We are tired and want to go back to earth again.’

“Then we said to the water, ‘The earth people need you and all growing things need you. It is good that you go.’

“And on the place where that water fell there had been no rain for three years.

“The king had bowed his head a thousand times before our father and mother and had cried, ‘Oh, rain cloud, why are you so long in coming?’

“We heard the earth king’s cry, and that night the mother of clouds said to us, ‘My children, you must go down to earth and help its people or they will perish.’ So we called all our brothers and sisters to go at the same time, and we went to earth and saved a million and a million lives.

“The greatest wrong you have done is to forget who helped you when you were needy,” continued the wind.

“Do you remember that you once lived in the ocean, river, or lake? At that time I do believe that you were not well liked. In the sea you were in the lowest class and worked hard every day and night.

“When the wind came and blew you into waves you would always call out in a big rough voice, ‘Muh; Muh; Spsh; Sph -s -s.’

“You were restless and unhappy, and tried and tried to escape from that place, and the cloud mother pitied you.

“She said, ‘I am very sorry. We will bring them up here with us,’ and she asked the sun’s help to do it.

“For a day and a day, a night and a night, you were carried up, up to the first section. But you were not satisfied then, and you were taken to very high seats.

“You wanted the best places and would do no work unless the winds pushed and the clouds carried you. So we took you up high where we lived and had a happy time.

“Now you have forgotten all this. Who helped you up? Who made you pure?” But the snow did not answer.

Finally the snow said, “Yes, our family is from the rivers and seas. We had forgotten. If we had only thought, we should have been more grateful.”

The sun was judge, and he said, “We decide this case in favor of the wind and the clouds.”

THE FISH AND THE FLOWERS

魚花異味

Once there was a Chinese merchant who sold flowers and fish. In the winter time the flowers and fish each had a separate house to live in, but one very cold winter the merchant said to his servants, “I think we must put the lily bulbs in the house with the fish. It is warmer there.”

And a thousand and a thousand narcissus bulbs which were growing for the great feast of the New Year were moved into the house with the fish.

This made the fish angry and that night they scolded the narcissus.

“Friends,” said the fishes, “this is not your place and we will not have you here.

“We do not like your odor. You will spoil our people. When men pass by our door they will see only you.

“They will never see our family. You can not help or do any good here; so you must go.

“Every day a hundred and a hundred merchants and students come to visit us. If you stand by our door they will surely think the fish are all gone and there is nothing but flowers left.

“We do not want our place to smell so strongly of flowers. We do not like it. It is very bad and makes us sick.”

The narcissus answered, “Strange, but we were thinking of that same thing.

“Some people say that fishes have a bad odor, but I never heard it said of our flowers. I think I will say no more about it. Let others decide.”

Then another flower spoke and said to the one who had been talking, “Hush, sister, this is not our house. We will go to-morrow. Let the fishes say what they will about us, and do not quarrel with them. All people know we are not bad and that our fragrance is sweet.”

When the morning sunshine came, the doors were opened, and a thousand and a thousand flowers had blossomed in the night, and the people said, “Oh, how sweet! Even a fish house can be made pleasant. We wish it could be like this all the time.”

And one visitor said, “How sweet this place is! Do fishes or flowers live here?” And when he saw, he said, “It is too bad to put delicate flowers in evil smelling places.”

Then three students came to buy flowers. The servants brought three pots from the fish house, and the students said, “We do not want pots from the fish house. Give us others. These have a disagreeable smell, like the fishes.”

The fishes heard all and were even more angry at the flowers. But the flowers heard and were happy, and they said, “How foolish to quarrel and try to put evil on others.”

Ee-Sze (Meaning): The good need no defense. Their best defense lies within themselves.

THE HEN, THE CAT, AND THE BIRDS

雞猫鳥

Once a farmer’s boy caught three young wood larks. He took them home and gave them his best and largest cage to live in. Soon they were happy and sang almost all day long.

Every one liked the birds very much, excepting the cat and the hen.

One day the sun shone very hot and the birds tried to get out of the cage. They wanted to fly in the trees and bushes.

The farmer’s boy knew what they wanted and hung their cage in the tree.

He said to himself, “I think my birds will like this. They can get acquainted with other birds. I know birds should go with birds. That is their happiness.”

Then the wood larks sang loud and long, for they were glad to be in the trees.

An old hen was sitting on some eggs near by, and her little ones were just beginning to come out of the shells. The singing of the birds made her angry and she said to them, “Will you stop that noise for a time so that I may hear my little ones call? I can not hear a word my children say. That is not a pretty song, anyway. When other birds sing, their songs are sweet; but your noise hurts my ears. Why do you sing all the time? No one likes to hear you.