DOGS OF CHINA AND JAPAN 



twenty thousand frogs, the same number of ants, ten thousand 

 earthworms and horrid flies. The culprit was to " godly and 

 piously give to godly men " a set of priestly instruments, a 

 set of war implements, of husbandmen's implements, the 

 price of a stallion in silver, and of a camel in gold, a rill of 

 running water, the depth of a dog and the breadth of a dog, a 

 house with ox-stalls, goodly beds with cushions, a virgin 

 maid, fourteen head of small cattle. He was to bring up twice 

 seven whelps, and to throw twice seven bridges over canals.* 



Confucius, the chief of China's sages, who was born in 

 the year 551 B.C., favoured simplicity, and was the enemy of 

 all hypocrisy such as that which would not allow the price of 

 a dog to be brought into the House of the Lord.f Con- 

 fucius " smiled, and exclaimed, ' True, true,' in amusement " 

 at the aptness of the simile when likened to a homeless dog 

 at the gate of the City of Chen.J Literary Chinese will to this 

 day, spontaneously borrow similar allusions from the classics. 

 In introducing his son a scholar will use a strictly classical 

 term which can only be translated by some refined English 

 phrase, finally reducible to " puppy." Another, in offering 

 his services, will state his willingness to be the " dog and the 

 horse " of his master. 



The Province of Shantung, of which Confucius was a 

 native, appears always to have been famous for its dogs. 

 " In first-class houses there are fierce dogs that watch the 

 doors to the halls of singing-girls. Men who are not regular 

 customers are not allowed to enter unceremoniously. If they 

 enter, the dogs bite them to death. Their warning is like 

 that of a spirit, their fierceness like that of a tiger. They are 

 dogs from Meng hai in Ts'ao chou." 



* Zend Avesta, " Sacred Books of the East," vol. iv, p. 166. 

 f Deuteronomy xviii. 18. J Shih Chi. 



A prefecture in Western Shantung. Ko chih ching yuan and T'u shu chi ch'eng, 

 vol. dxciv, Laufer, p. 265. 



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