Thus in 711
B.C. two states (both of the _Ki_ surname, and thus both such
as ought to have known better) effected an exchange of territory;
one giving away his accommodation village, or hotel, at the
capital; and the other giving in exchange a place where the
Emperor used to stop on his way to Ts'i when he visited Mount
T'ai-shan, then, as now, the sacred resort of pilgrims in Shan
Tung. Even the Emperor could not give away a fief in joke. This,
indeed, was how the second Chou Emperor conferred the (extinct or
forfeited) fief of Tsin upon a relative. But just as
_Une reine d'Espagne ne regarde pas par la fenetre,_
so an Emperor of China cannot jest in vain. An attentive scribe
standing by said: "When the Son of Heaven speaks, the clerk takes
down his words in writing; they are sung to music, and the rites
are fulfilled." When, in 665 B.C., Ts'i had driven back the
Tartars on behalf of Yen, the Prince of Yen accompanied the Prince
of Ts'i back into Ts'i territory. The Prince of Ts'i at once ceded
to Yen the territory trodden by the Prince of Yen, on the ground
that "only the Emperor can, when accompanying a ruling prince,
advance beyond the limits of his own domain.
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