Hopkinsville Kentuckian. [volume] (Hopkinsville, Ky.) 1889-1918, 1914-02-10
WUN AND sun JOY
Being a Story Of Love Staged In
the Far sway Orient.
BY WILLIAM X. OSBORNE.

by. Time flies ike the old invislDl'
she dragon who visits the temple
every hundred years. II Is not so lonl
ago that little wun Lung and his
neighbor. Fow Kee, sat at the feet o.
the smaller Sun Joy in the Street Of
the Six Hundred Full Blown Roses
Wun Lung and Fow Kee we're men
or thought they we're. Sun Joy was
woman. Their combined length did not
exceed nine feet. Sun Joy was demure
and coy and winsome. Wun Lung was
lively and good natured. Fow Kee was
burly and jealous and i'll natured. He
and Wun Lung kow-towed, as II were
at the shrine of Sun Joy-and at that
shrine, SO 1t would seem, Wun Lung
had the inside track. And for that Fow
Kee would pull Wun Lungs short, sort
pig tail-and wun Lung would simply
laugh.
But Wun Lung had something be-
side his good nature to recommend MIN
land that something made him much
admired by little Sun Joy and much
envied by Fow Kee. For Wun Lung
although he never realized it for many
years, was a natural born acrobat
Many believe that feet we're made to
walk upon. With Wun Lung it was an
even toss up as to hands, head or feet
| He could wriggle like a snake In the
grass. He could tie himself into
knot like a skein Of silk. And he didn't
keep all this to himself. For the first
great event in the lives Of Fow Kee
and Sun Joy hapTAled on the day
when, under the admirable tuition OF
Wun Lung. they each we're able to walk
from end to end of the bamboo pole in
the market place-the pole where the
richkshaws are all lined up. And when
they had learned they did the trick,
not once but 20 times day.
Wun Lung and Fow Kee, still bow
ing low at the shrine of Sun Joy, grew
up into young men-Sun Joy grew into
a young woman.
And one day something happened.
Fow Kee was In trouble. Over what no
one knew. He had looked upon the
glowing opium too often-he had lived
too hard. He had disregarded that
commandment which to us Is the
eighth. being also the three thousand
and first Injunction Of Confucius. In
other words, he disregarded the law
Of private property, and one night he
silently stole away. And that left
Wun Lung only to, kowtow before Sun
Joy. But one day he too vent-went
in the daytime, with the good VIII Of
his neighbors in the Street Of the Six
Hundred Roses. He went TO make his
fortune in the new land favored OF all
lands. But he went, as he said, bat to
return.
In a little side street in San Fran
cisco Wun Lung set up the inevitable
laundry. And as he washed and ironed
he thought Of little Sun Joy and his |
spirits rose and he sang in his mild, |
oriental voice, the songs of |
his home land. And many came to |
ook upon him, for he had one inter
,stirg popularity which others Of his
ace did not have. For If Wun Lung
vas on one side of his ironing board
md desired to reach the other side.rhe
merely vaulted high in the air-and
here he was. He made quick little
side steps over to the stove, and he
vhirled round and round on the ball
IF one foot, like top. And he laughed
IS he did 1t.
One day scowling, skulking China
nan, attracted by the crowd, stuck his
head inside and uttered a cultural
Wun Lung responded
with a smile and kind word His Wis
tor was Fow Kee. Fow Kee came in.
he explained that he was rich and pros
porous. He did not explain why his
clothes we're slightly ragged, but he
lid suggest that If Wun Lung could
put up twenty-five American dollars he
could make Wun Lung a rich man.
Wun Lung put them up and waited to
become rich. Fow Kee disappeared. |
Time few. Wun Lung moved to Chi |
cago. The crowd there admired him |
also. He explained that his name, Wun |
Lung, really meant Agile Gibbon. 1t |
was in Chicago that he again met Fow |
Kee. This time Fow Kee looked pros |
porous, but he still scowled. If Wun |
Lung had not become rich on that |
twenty-five it was apparent that Fow |
Kee had. Fow Kee watched some of |
Wun Lungs antics about the laundry |
with considerable interest. In the gath
ering dusk he whispered in Wun
Lung'F ear. Wun Lung grew wide
eyed in surprise. The next day Wun
Lung shut up shop.
In the Imperial theater in the me
tropolis, the headliners were the Kee-
Lung troupe-the Chinese mot Jap
anese mind, but Chinese) grotesque
acrobats. They had been running
for four weeks and were still popu-
lar. The troupe consisted only OF
Wun Lung and Fow Kee. The stage
was rugged up like Chinese laundry
and what they did was done there
even to the mild quavering songs of
the inimitable Wun Lung. When