The following story was given_me by Dr. of the Li Dispensary. He says that he heard it on good authority. The ast part of the fourth month a band of some thirty or forty burglars entered the house of a wealthy man named Hu Soo-koh who lives at Hsuch'en, one hundred and twenty li from Liichoufu. Now it happened that Mr. Hu had a very brave son who armed himself and the servants with loaded muskets and boldly attacked the robbers, killing two and. wounding two. cape the two wounded men confessed that they belonged to a branch of the Big Sword Society which consisted of a thousand members and which had been organised by a Buddhist priest in the Chonghuan, temple. The priest was arrested but denic any knowledge of the matter. The hsien then proceeded to the Chén; huang temple, lighted the candles and incense before the ido] and requested him to reveal to his mind who these robbers were. As the idol made no response the hsien put a rope around his neck and said: 'I'll never let you go until you tell me." With that, in his he jerked the rope a little too hard and over came the idol flat on his face. Strange to say, concealed underneath the idol was curious bundle of yellow papers which contained the very information the hsien wanted. The result was that the priest was kept in'prison and search is being made for all the ot/er members of the society.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.