Henan

“ Yet it was from her I learned that evening that Margaret Henan had once been one of the island belles. Herself the daughter of a well-to-do farmer, she had married Thomas Henan, equally well-to-do. Beyond the usual housewife’s tasks she had never been accustomed to work. Unlike many of the island women, she had never lent a hand in the fields.
“But what of her children?” I asked.
“Two o’ the sons, Jamie an’ Timothy uz married an’ be goun’ tull sea. Thot bug house close tull the post office uz Jamie’s. The daughters thot ha’ no married be luvun’ wuth them as dud marry. An’ the rest be dead.” ”

“ Yen is the ancient name of a pretty extensive country, in which Peking stands. This prince of Yen built a city there, a league and [720] half south-west of the city King tching. This city was called Yen king, or the court of Yen. It became afterwards considerable; and the prince of Yen very powerful in the country of Petcheli and Leao tong. In the year 222 before Christ the emperor Tsin chi hoang destroyed the power of the princes of Yen, the defendants of Tchao kong, and seized their dominions. The founder of the dynasty Han destroyed the power of the family of Tsin chi hoang. ”

“ The wretch, now rendered furious at the danger of his victim's escaping him, and dizzy with the vertigo of crime, did not at first recognize Bridget. He flung Hena behind him, and seizing a heavy iron coal-rake from the fireplace, was about to use it for a club, not even recoiling before murder in order to free himself from an importunate witness. Already the dangerous weapon was raised when, by the light of the moon, the incestuous lad discovered the features of his mother.
"Save yourself, mother," cried Hena between her sobs; "he is gone crazy; he will kill you. ”

“ Thus the spoiler was spoiled, but, later on, the kingdom of Yen was again set up, and the rival states fixed their boundaries and made peace. The Han dynasty in B.C. 206 claimed the imperial power, and sent a summons to the king of Yen to become vassal. On his refusing, the Chinese emperor despatched an army against him, defeated his forces in battle, extinguished his dynasty, and annexed his kingdom.
One of the survivors of this revolt, named Wei-man, with one thousand of his followers, fled to the east. ”

“ CHAPTER III--OF THE TIGER AND THE FOXES Ling was a Northerner. He hailed from the province of Honan, a land of rugged hills and dark, inhospitable valleys, through which flows the unnavigable Hoang-Ho, the turbulent Yellow River that thrashes its way into the Gulf of Pe-chili, over cataracts and rocks, through dark, precipitous ravines.
The Honanese are a warlike race. From this province the viceroys of the north were wont to recruit the majority of their soldiers--wild, raw-boned men who, in the old days, guarded the sacred presence of the Emperor. ”

“ Albinik the mariner was the first to whom Hena offered her forehead to kiss after her father and mother; she had not seen her brother for a long time. Next came the turn of Guilhern and Mikael and then the swarm of children, whom, stooping to them, Hena, sought to hold all together in one embrace. The young priestess then tenderly greeted Henory, her brother Guilhern's wife, and expressed her regret at not seeing Albinik's wife Meroë. Nor were the other relatives forgotten; all, down to Stumpy, otherwise everyone's butt, had a kind word from her. ”

“ I leave thy shores--but weep the while-- GEM OF THE ORIENTAL SEAS!
D.L.R.
HENNA.
The henna or al hinna (Lawsonia inermis) is found in great abundance in Egypt, India, Persia and Arabia. In Bengal it goes by the name of Mindee. It is much used here for garden hedges. Hindu females rub it on the palms of their hands, the tips of their fingers and the soles of their feet to give them a red dye. The same red dye has been observed upon the nails of Egyptian mummies. In Egypt sprigs of henna are hawked about the streets for sale with the cry of "O, odours of Paradise; O, flowers of the henna!" ”

“ Hena! The moon is rising above the horizon...."
"You are right, Stumpy; this is the hour," she said, unwillingly taking her eyes from the faces of her beloved family. An instant later she added:
"Let my father and mother and all the members of my family accompany me to the sacred stones of the forest of Karnak.... The hour of the sacrifice has come."
Walking between Joel and Margarid, and followed by all the members of the tribe, Hena walked serenely to the forest of Karnak. ”

“ To die fighting the Romans is a duty.... What shall I do?"
"Ask to-morrow one of the druids of Karnak."
"And our sister Hena," said Albinik the mariner to his mother. "It is nearly a year I have not seen her.... She is surely still the pearl of the Isle of Sen? My wife Meroë charged me to remember her to Hena."
"You will see her to-morrow," answered Mamm' Margarid; and laying down her distaff she arose. It was the signal for the family to retire. Mamm' Margarid looked around and said:
"Let us retire, my children; it is late; to-morrow at break of day we must begin our war preparations;" ”

“ But one day, the mother did not watch the boy, and he fell to playing with some earth children. They grew angry as they played, and struck the boy. Instantly these earth children fell dead to the ground. Then the mother laid hands on the boy, to punish him, and he fell to earth.
At this, there came a great rumbling and roaring through the sky, and Heno appeared. He took the lifeless child in his arms, crying, "You have disobeyed. No longer shall you have this great power I gave you. You shall remain on earth and be simply an earth woman. ”

“ I am the object of constant surveillance. Suspicion and hatred mount guard around me. How is Hena's family to be apprized of the constraint she is placed under? The days are passing away. I shudder at the thought of the Mother Superior compelling her to pronounce the vows, regardless of the observations I made to her that Hena's religious instruction is not yet sufficiently advanced. Were I sufficient of a wretch to listen to the voice of an execrable selfishness, I would rejoice at the thought that Hena, not being granted to me, would be none else's after her ordination as a nun. ”

“ Why should that deprive us of the very happiness which such love gives?"
"Because it cannot be happy, my Helen," answered her father; "because he is a gentleman of high degree, and you the daughter of no better than a yeoman."
"My father," said Helen, rising, and laying the hand that was uninjured on her father's arm, "have I not heard you say that the blood of the yeoman Clive is as pure as that of the noble house of Adelon, and perhaps of older strain? Is not the land you cultivate your own, as much or more than his that he farms to others? ”

“ Henna is also said to have been held in repute amongst the Hebrews, being considered to be the plant referred to as camphire in the Bible (Song of Solomon i. 14, iv. 13) . “The custom of dyeing the nails and palms of the hands and soles of the feet of an iron-rust colour with henna,” observes Dr J. Forbes Royle, “exists throughout the East from the Mediterranean to the Ganges, as well as in northern Africa. In some parts the practice is not confined to women and children, but is also followed by men, especially in Persia. ”

“ For those large black eyes were so blackly fringed,
The glossy rebels mock'd the jetty stain,
And in their native beauty stood avenged:
Her nails were touch'd with henna; but again
The power of art was turn'd to nothing, for
They could not look more rosy than before.
LXXVI
The henna should be deeply dyed to make
The skin relieved appear more fairly fair;
She had no need of this, day ne'er will break
On mountain tops more heavenly white than her:
The eye might doubt if it were well awake,
She was so like a vision ”

“ Even the babies, and the shrill-tongued babbling women, meditate in China.
“Where there is no vision the people perish.”
Though he was dining alone in his own sitting-room, Sên dressed for dinner as scrupulously as if he’d been an English subaltern alone in a remote dâk bungalow about to dine off half-roasted but wholly grown goat and undergrown plantains, washed down by criminal and luke-warm beer. There was not a little of the English gentleman in Sên King-lo, not a few English characteristics, habits and traits that in no way clashed with Chinese—or that were Chinese as well. ”

“ A few weeks later the rabble of Rouen stood before an iron cage suspended from a tower. Derisive epithets and cruel insults passed from lip to lip and were greeted with indecent laughter. In a corner of the cage sat a cowering figure bound with fetters. Her face could not be seen, for her head was bowed in anguish. One of the mob thrust his lance toward her to make her look up. He was successful. She slowly raised her head, and the crowd looked upon eyes full of sorrow, eyes full of purity and beauty,—the eyes of Joan. The Duke of Luxemburg had completed his infamous bargain. ”

“ Merely to humor the councillor, Prince Chin mounted a horse and galloped away with his troops.
Han Hsin put his best foot foremost, hurrying toward the border. He longed to trudge the turf of his own country once more. It was not that homesickness urged his steps. Han felt reasonably sure that his friends, the soldiers, would shortly take the road again. The next time they might not be so easily deluded. Therefore, he hastened. But it was useless. His own country was still miles distant when he beheld the dust of men who whipped their horses.
It is not pleasant to have one’s head lopped off. ”

“ The bard and the two druids were the only ones left. The three rushed together in a final embrace, they raised their faces and their hands towards heaven, and intoned in a loud voice the song of Hena, the virgin of the isle of Sen, uttered at the hour of her voluntary sacrifice on the rocks of Karnak, that song which had been the signal for the rising of Brittany against the Romans:
"Hesus, Hesus! By the blood which is about to flow, clemency for Gaul!" ”

“ They did not dash over the walls, calling on their sea to follow, and so drown all the people of Kua Hai. Demons though they be, the Shen that time had mercy in their hearts. While the night dew lay upon the fields of Wa Tien, those demons, to the number of seven, made their way into Kua Hai. There they waited in the garden of the palace.
“When King Chieh Chung, who ruled over Wa Tien, took him to the garden for an early morning stroll, he discovered the demons waiting. He knew at once they were no ordinary men. Not once did they kou tou (knock their heads on the ground) as men should do. ”

“ When I got back to Geneva I went to spend the evening with the three friends, but I took good care not to tell the syndic anything about my victory with Helen. It would only have served to renew his hopes, and he would have had this trouble for nothing. Even I would have done no good without the young theologian; but as Helen admired her she did not like to appear her inferior by refusing to imitate her freedom.
I did not see Helen that evening, but I saw her the next day at her mother’s house, for I was in mere politeness bound to thank the old lady for the honour she had done me. ”

“ She ran into them joyously and offered him her forehead, as she also did her mother. The children of the family loved Hena dearly and contested with each other the privilege of being the first to kiss her hands—sought with greed by all the little innocent mouths. Even old Deber-Trud gamboled and barked with joy at the arrival of his young mistress. ”

“ Was Miss Thusa forgotten? Did she sleep in her lonely grave unhonored and unmourned?
In a corner of Helen’s own room, conspicuous in the mids of the elegant, modern furniture that adorns it, there stands an ancient brass-bound wheel. The brass shines with the lustre of burnished gold, and the dark wood-work has the polish of old mahogany. Nothing in Helen’s possession is [238] so carefully preserved, so reverently guarded as that ancestral machine. ”

“ Overcome by such generosity, Jean pressed the knight’s proffered hand to his lips. His heart was too full for words. La Hire understood his silence, and admired him all the more. “You are from the neighborhood of Rouen, and are acquainted there?” he resumed.
“I know every village thereabouts, noble sir. Alas! they are nearly all ruined.”
“Yes! God and the saints pity them. But, further, do you know the Bishop of Beauvais?” ”

“ It was the white man who had been born in China and had lived all his life there; the one who had so held Jeanne’s attention and had all but drawn from her the secret of the three-bladed dagger and the chest of Oriental embroideries. Surely here was some one it was hard to overlook. The tone in which he spoke was matter-of-fact. Yet a strange light shone from his eyes.
There are meetings that appear to have been ordered by some power outside ourselves. The instant the thing has happened we know it. With a simple flash of an eye one soul says to the other: “We are kindred spirits. ”

“ HELEN, or Helena (Gr. Ἑλένη) ,in Greek mythology, daughter of Zeus by Leda (wife of Tyndareus, king of Sparta) , sister of Castor, Pollux and Clytaemnestra, and wife of Menelaus. Other accounts make her the daughter of Zeus and Nemesis, or of Oceanus and Tethys. She was the most beautiful woman in Greece, and indirectly the cause of the Trojan war. When a child she was carried off from Sparta by Theseus to Attica, but was recovered and taken back by her brothers. When she grew up, the most famous of the princes of Greece sought her hand in marriage, and her father’s choice fell upon Menelaus. ”