RATS IN THE STATUE. — " What is most to be dreaded
in a state ?" dee manded Hoang Kong of his Minister Koang Tschong. " Prince," re. plied he, according to my idea, nothing is more to be dreaded than what is called rats in the statue." Hoang Kong did not understand this metaphor, and Koang Tschong explained it to him in the following manner :—You know, Prince, that in many places statues are erected in honour of the tutelar saint of the place ; these wooden images are hollow within and painted without. Now, by some chance or other, a rat had penetrated into such a statue, and nothing could be thought of or devised to drive it thence. To set fire to it they did not dare, fearful that the wood would catch ; neither did they dare to place the image* water, lest the colours might thereby be effaced, Thus the rat _remained protected through the respect they had for the image." " And. who are those rats in the state ?" asked Iloang Kong. They-are," said he, " people who tOSSHSS neither virtue nor merit, and yet share. the, fevourS. of their Prince : these are the rats in the statue.
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