KONG HO.
LETTER VI
Concerning this person's well-sustained efforts to discover
further demons. The behaviour of those invoked on two occasions.
VENERATED SIRE,--In an early letter I made some reference to a variety
of demon invoked by certain of the barbarians. As this matter aroused
your congenial interest, I have since privately bent my mind
incessantly to the discovery of others; but this has been by no means
easy, for, touching the more intimate details of the subject, the
barbarians frequently maintain a narrow-minded suspicion. Many whom I
have approached feign to become amused or have evaded a deliberate
answer under the subterfuge of a jest; yet, whenever I would have
lurked by night in their temples or among the enclosed spaces of their
tombs to learn more, at a given signal one in authority has approached
me with anxiety and mistrust engraved upon his features, and,
disregarding my unassuming protest that I would remain alone in a
contemplative reverie, has signified that so devout an exercise is
contrary to their written law.
On one occasion only did this person seem to hold himself poised on
the very edge of a fuller enlightenment. This was when, in the
venerable company of several benevolent persons, he was being taken
from place to place to see the more important buildings, and to
observe the societies of artificers labouring at their crafts. The
greater part of the day had already been spent in visiting temples,
open spaces reserved to children and those whose speech, appearance,
and general manner of behaving make it desirable that they should be
set apart from the contact of the impressionable, halls containing
relics and emblems of the past, places of no particular size or
attraction but described as being of unparalleled historic interest,
and the stalls of the more reputable venders of merchandise.
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