Tales of Three Hemispheres | Page 7

went by.
The man in the second cab was dressed the same as the first, he was
wetter than the first, for the sleet had fallen all night, but evening dress
is evening dress all the world over. The driver wore the same oiled hat,
the same waterproof cape as the other. And when the cab had passed
the darkness swirled back where the two small lamps had been, and the
slush poured into the wheel-tracks and nothing remained but the
speculations of the shepherd to tell that a hansom cab had been in that
part of China; presently even these ceased, and he was back with the
early legends again in contemplation of serener things.
And the storm and the cold and the darkness made one last effort, and

shook the bones of that shepherd, and rattled the teeth in the head that
mused on the flowery fables, and suddenly it was morning. You saw
the outlines of the sheep all of a sudden, the shepherd counted them, no
wolf had come, you could see them all quite clearly. And in the pale
light of the earliest morning the third hansom appeared, with its lamps
still burning, looking ridiculous in the daylight. They came out of the
East with the sleet and were all going due westwards, and the occupant
of the third cab also wore evening dress.
Calmly that Manchu shepherd, without curiosity, still less with wonder,
but as one who would see whatever life has to show him, stood for four
hours to see if another would come. The sleet and the East wind
continued. And at the end of four hours another came. The driver was
urging it on as fast as he could, as though he were making the most of
the daylight, his cabby's cape was flapping wildly about him; inside the
cab a man in evening dress was being jolted up and down by the
unevenness of the plain.
This was of course that famous race from Pittsburg to Piccadilly, going
round by the long way, that started one night after dinner from Mr.
Flagdrop's house, and was won by Mr. Kagg, driving the Honourable
Alfred Fortescue, whose father it will be remembered was Hagar
Dermstein, and became (by Letters Patent) Sir Edgar Fortescue, and
finally Lord St. George.
The Manchu shepherd stood there till evening, and when he saw that no
more cabs would come, turned homeward in search of food.
And the rice prepared for him was hot and good, all the more after the
bitter coldness of that sleet. And when he had consumed it her perused
his experience, turning over again in his mind each detail of the cabs he
had seen; and from that his thoughts slipped calmly to the glorious
history of China, going back to the indecorous times before calmness
came, and beyond those times to the happy days of the earth when the
gods and dragons were here and China was young; and lighting his
opium pipe and casting his thoughts easily forward he looked to the
time when the dragons shall come again.

And for a long while then his mind reposed itself in such a dignified
calm that no thought stirred there at all, from which when he was
aroused he cast off his lethargy as a man emerges from the baths,
refreshed, cleansed and contented, and put away from his musings the
things he had seen on the plain as being evil and of the nature of
dreams, or futile illusion, the results of activity which troubleth calm.
And then he turned his mind toward the shape of God, the One, the
Ineffable, who sits by the lotus lily, whose shape is the shape of peace,
and denieth activity, and went out his thanks to him that he had cast all
bad customs westward out of China as a woman throws household dirt
out of her basket far out into neighbouring gardens.
From thankfulness he turned to calm again, and out of calm to sleep.

A PRETTY QUARREL
On one of those unattained, and unattainable pinnacles that are known
as the Bleaks of Eerie, an eagle was looking East with a hopeful
presage of blood.
For he knew, and rejoiced in the knowledge, that eastward over the
dells the dwarfs were risen in Ulk, and gone to war with the demi-gods.
The demi-gods are they that were born of earthly women, but their sires
are the elder gods who walked of old among men. Disguised they
would go through the villages sometimes in summer evenings, cloaked
and unknown of men; but the younger maidens knew them and always
ran to them singing, for all that their elders said: in evenings long ago
they had danced to the woods of the oak-trees. Their children