THE SEVENTH MANDARIN

In some phantasmal Eastern realm where only what is written in the books and scrolls is credited in the king's court and his soul is thought to fly into the sky each night on the wings of a dragon kite, the seventh and youngest mandarin, who has charge of the kite, loses it one night in a storm and, in recovering it, sees the hovels and hears the cries that are not in the books and scrolls. The king, awakening pale and shaken, has dreamed of such things, and the seventh mandarin confirms his vision; he should be punished for failing the king, for damaging the kite, for saying that what is not written is so), but he will be excused "for discovering the truth and not fearing to reveal it." The wails around the palace will be taken down. and the king will listen and look as well as read. This is all pretty rarefied and remote, and the vaporous to hazy to murky illustrations do nothing to actualize it. A kind of hushed confidence that's not likely to get much of a hearing.