. A'Chu and other stories. y families that had 165 166 AGhu and Other Stories held court from earliest times, while the presentgreat nations of Europe were as yet but half-savage,roving tribes. Once the boys teacher had shown him a map ofChina. From this map he got several ideas strangeto us, but no doubt they Were just what the mapwas intended to represent. The earth appeared tobe a flat surface, spread out like a great lay at the very center of the earth, and wasshown to occupy the greater part of its dry land area. His country, The Flowery Land,as seen from this map,was the grea
. A'Chu and other stories. y families that had 165 166 AGhu and Other Stories held court from earliest times, while the presentgreat nations of Europe were as yet but half-savage,roving tribes. Once the boys teacher had shown him a map ofChina. From this map he got several ideas strangeto us, but no doubt they Were just what the mapwas intended to represent. The earth appeared tobe a flat surface, spread out like a great lay at the very center of the earth, and wasshown to occupy the greater part of its dry land area. His country, The Flowery Land,as seen from this map,was the greatest coun-try on the whole flatearth. His heartswelled with pride thathe, Chang Shiu Meng,son of the salt mer-chant, was also a sonof the greatest, mosthighly civilized nationof the world. Com-pared with China, othernations were but small,barbarous tribes on itsoutlying borders. To this Chinese boy,the Great Wall at thenorth, the great oceanon the east and south,with the towering, al-chinese schoolboy most impassable Hima-. A Genuine Chinese Boy 167 layas and the trackless desert of Gobi on the west,seemed to encircle in sacred inclosure what is worthwhile of the whole earth. Within this favored circlehave lived the great and wise kings and the mightywarriors who founded and developed this vast empire. Here in this favored land lived and died Con-fucius, Chinas greatest, wisest philosopher. Here, also,lived Mencius, his most illustrious pupil. Beforethese two names, of the wisest of her wise men,a great nation of 400,000,000 people bow in rever-ence. These, the boy thought, were the truly nobleand wise, whose teachings had made China the greatnation she had been for twenty-five centuries, fromtheir day to his own time. One of the first stories Shiu Meng heard at schoolwas of this Confucius, who lived B. c. 500. When aboy, Confucius set his heart on learning. Like KingSolomon of the Bible, he prized wisdom above every-thing else. Like Solomon, and like every boy who hasbeen will
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