The Belted Seas

a berth; and I came on a neat-looking, three-masted ship, named the Good Sister, which appeared to me

he says. "It's the

rk," I says, "who

ler of Salera

liar," I says, sur

ys, climbing down the stays, "that I can lick," he says, being m

and doesn't like to remember the days before it was regenerated. At that time some of it was M

apore, called "Shan Brothers," whose name is well known on bills of lading, and Fu Shan was connected with them. But a man wouldn't have thought to find Sadler a partner in banking, mercantile, and shipping business, with a Chinaman. He'd been the wildest of us all in the Hebe M

as a pleasant Oriental with a mild, squeaking voice, and had more porcelain jars than you would think a body would need, and fat yellow cheeks, and a queue down to his knees. He wore cream-coloured silk, and was a picture of calmness and culture. Irish hadn't changed, but Sadler was l

e following entertainments: three-card monte at the Blue Light Saloon; a cockfight at Pasquarillo's; two alien sheriffs in town looking for horse thieves, and had one corralled on the roof of the courthouse; finally some other

no satisfacti

nd eaves of the porch. Seemed to me it was a good enough place. Fu Shan smoked scented and sugared tobacco in a porcelain pipe with an ivory stem. The fel

says Fu Shan, aristocratic

siatic. Doesn't anything make any difference to him. Got any nerves? Not one. Got any

an ch

em. I been in Saleratus five years, partner with Fu Shan. Sometimes I had a good time.

s the

cco and spit

s the

its up here on my porch, and I says, 'What is it but a dream? Fu Shan,' I says, 'this here life's a shadow!' Then that forsaken, conceited, blank heathen, he says one of his ancestors discovered the same three thousand years ago. But, he says, another ancestor, pretty near as distinguished, he discovered that, if you put enough curry on your rice, it gives things an appearance of reality. Which, says he, they discovered the usel

chuckl

. You hustle around the circle. You might as well have sat down on the circumfere

other have joss house by Langoon. Velly good joss house, velly good ploperty. Tlee hundred

him," says Sadler, and looked at Fu Sha

uckled a t

s of his. They seemed to be a profitable combination, but I didn't make out to unders

or because he might happen to be convinced I was good enough for it. I told him the experiences I'd had. What had happened

last. "That's a lyric poem," he sa

r, and I decided to hang around till he did,

papers, Tom

h?" I

and I was that scared I signed my name so it looked like a rail fence. I contracted to be

he crew," he says. "I'm coming my

long ago, but the pride

the man that called me a "tallow little runt," which he got misled, there, and he went by the name

nd after him, carrying a valise, was Irish, and after Irish was an old Burmese ser

d what for, and I thought maybe Sadler was thinking he'd see me safe through the firs

a Dala and Irish cleared the table. The oil lamp swung overhead with the lift and fall of the

on and China. Remarkable holy place. Old Lo Tsin, he drops down there one day and looks around. His fishy feelin's got interested, and he says to himself, 'Guess I'll come into this.' He went sailin' up the river till he found a king somewhere, who appeared to own the whole country. This one's pastime was miscellaneous murder, but his taste for tea was cultured and accurate. Then Lo Tsin got down on the floor and kowtowed to this king for an hour and a half, the way it comes natural if you have the right kind of clothes. Then he bought a temple of him. It stands at the foot of the south stairway of the Shway Dagohn. Fu Shan ain't sure what the old man's idea was, whether it was pure business or not. Anyway he worked up the reputation of the temple, till there was none in the place to equal it, except the Shway Dagohn, which he didn't pretend to compete with. He advertised it on his tea. 'Shan Brothers' have a brand still called 'Green Dragon Pagoda Tea.' There wasn't no real doubt but the income of the temple was large, and yet it didn't appear at Lo Tsin's death that he'd ever drawn anything out of it. The whole thing was gold-leafed from top to bottom, and full of bronze and lacquer statues, and two green dragons at the gate, and ministerin' angels know what besides. Maybe Fu Shan's information ain't complet

Irish were gone. I asked, "Are you learn

s temple business. Where was the profit

eir credit on some celestial record. Their next existence will be the better to that extent anyway, now. Suppose the temple's gilded all over, and lumber rooms packed to the roof with bronze images already. Do they care what becomes of these things? Don't seem to. Why should they? They're credited on one ledger. You credit the same to the business on anothe

e monastery schools, that the "Giver acquires merit only by his action and the spirit of his giving, wherefore are the merits of the poor and rich equal." Why should they care what became of their gifts? From Maya Dala's talk one seemed to catch a glimpse of the idea, which occurred to old Lo Tsin Shan, that fishy Oriental, one day forty years before, and sent him up the river to interview King Tharawady on his gold-lacquer and mosaic throne. Ye

at, and drew nearer the East. The East is a muddy sea with no

n a half gale was blowing, and he sat smoking with his feet hitched over the rail. He appeared to be trying

d that o

ers, an

e of th

touch of

ler, a

eathery

ered an

ary of

in't no

ort of

my ap

r of

ere I'm

as a

' and

the

winds com

owed and

pin' and

at of t

ays, it's

rels and

is the so

sorry h

d of the

berin'

ome of yo

some an

t in th

lin,' an

hink you

e you d

l an

quirt in

where

runnin

start an

same in

damnab

titled

d that o

e and we

nt fool

upward

hy sight

r rabbl

member

ft of T

d Sister at Singapo

om the letter heads of "Sadler and Shan." They read

sia of the soul. Sometimes that dyspepsia took him bad, and when he had one of those spells he'd light out into poetry scandalous. Some folks are built that way, some not. J. R. Craney, for instance, he was a romantic man, and gifted according to his own line, and had airy notions ahead of him that