Through a lot of money, the owner of Kyushu and the local officers of the Tang Dynasty formed a friendship.

Fei Xuechun said to Tang Zhangwei: "The gold mining area of Kyushu Island is very important, and a lot of gold Kaiyuan Tongbao has been minted there, and these hard currencies are very good for stabilizing the financial order of the Tang Empire. I think the hillbillies on Boar Island are a threat. ”

Tang Zhangwei said expressionlessly: "I know." ”

Bai Cunxiao said: "Emotionally, I want to kill all those damn Fuso warlords on Kyushu Island." However, the feudal lords of Kyushu Island are the nobles of Fuso, and the residents of those wild boar islands are indeed in trouble. ”

Tang Zhangwei said: "What do you mean? ”

Bai Cunxiao said: "Emotionally speaking, we should support the people of those wild boar islands, but in terms of interests, we should immediately arm those warlords of Kyushu Island." ”

It's a suffocating, foolish world where every word and every thought is watched. In the UK, it's hard to imagine such an atmosphere. In England, everybody is free, and we sell our souls in public, but we can redeem them in private, when we're with friends. However, if every white person is a cog, even friendship is hardly possible. Freedom of speech is unimaginable, and all other freedoms are allowed, and you are free to be a drunkard, a slacker, a coward, a slanderer, an adulterer, but you are not free to think for yourself. Your opinion on all issues, as long as it makes some sense, is governed by the norms of the white man.

Eventually, the rebellious emotions that lie within you will poison you like a mysterious illness. Your whole life is a life full of lies. Year after year, you're sitting in Kipling's haunted little clubs, with whisky on your right

When you hear your Oriental friends called "oily little Indians", you can only obediently admit that they are indeed oily little Indians; You see the idiots who have just left school kicking the gray-haired servants with their feet. At this point, your heart burns with anger against your fellow countrymen, and as time passes, Flory finds himself more and more strange in the world of the white man, and whenever he seriously talks about any subject, he becomes more and more prone to trouble, so he learns to live an inward, secret life, in books, in an ineffable inner world. Even his conversation with the doctor was a kind of self-talk, because the doctor, though he was a good man, understood very little what he was saying. However, the real life has to be lived in secret, which is really depraved. People should go with the flow of life, not against the current. It's also much better to be a thick-brained white man who burps and says "in another forty years" than to live in a secluded and boring world in silence, loneliness, and self-pity.

Flory never went back to his home in England to see it. He didn't explain the reason, but he actually knew it very well. At first, it was due to an accident that made it possible. The first was the world war, and after the war, the company was short of trained manpower, which led to their refusal to let him go for another two years. Then he finally set off. He was very eager to go back to England, although he was a little afraid to face it, just as a man without a collar and an unshaved beard would not dare to face a beautiful girl. When he left home, he was still a boy, with a bright future and a handsome appearance, although there was a **** on his face; Now, only ten years have passed, but he has a yellow complexion, a heavy alcohol, and looks like a middle-aged person, both in terms of habits and appearance. But he still longed to return to England. The ship sailed westward on the rough sea, like a piece of rough-forged silver, with a winter trade wind blowing behind it. As a result of eating well and smelling the sea, the thin blood in Flory's body sped up. He suddenly remembered one thing—something he had almost forgotten in the stagnant air of Burma—and that was that he was still young and could start all over again. He's going to spend a year in the civilized world, and he's going to find a girl who doesn't care about his ****—a cultivated girl, not some white wife—and he'll marry her and go back to Burma for another ten or fifteen years. And then they retire — maybe 12,000 pounds or 15,000 pounds. They bought a farmhouse in the countryside, surrounded by friends, books, their children, and animals. They will forever get rid of those trivial and boring old fashions. He would have forgotten Burma, the terrible country that almost ruined him. Three people in the company died suddenly from the Blackwater fever. The company was sorry but asked him to return to Yangon immediately. He should have left sooner rather than later.

Flory boarded the next boat back to Yangon, cursed himself for his bad luck, and then took the train back to the company's headquarters. At that time he was not in Keoktada, but in another city in Northern Burma. All the servants were waiting for him at the platform. He had already handed over all of them to his successor, but the other party was dead. It feels so uncomfortable to see these faces again! Only ten days ago, he was on his way to England, and even felt like he was in England, but now he was back in this dilapidated place, and saw the black coolies arguing over their luggage, and the Burmese yelling at their cattle on the road.

The servants gathered around him and offered him gifts, and he was really a friendly brown face. Kosra held a black deerskin, the Indians brought some sweet meat and a garland of calendula, and Babe, who was a child at the time, presented a wicker cage containing a baby squirrel. Flory walked all the way back, the big wreath dangling around her neck, looking weirdly funny. On this cold night, the light is dim and intimate. At the door, an elderly Indian was mowing the grass with a small scythe, while the wives of the cook and gardener knelt in front of the servants' room, grinding curry sauce on a stone slab.

Flory was thinking inside. Often at such times, a person begins to realize the great changes and depravities that have taken place in his life. He suddenly realized that, deep down, he was happy to be back. This country, which he hated so much, has now become his motherland and his home. He lived here for ten years, and every piece of his skin was stained with Burmese soil. The dim night, the old Indian mowing the grass, the creaking wheels, the chirping of egrets, in his eyes, this scene was more intimate than that of England. He has taken deep roots in another country, perhaps his deepest.

Since then, he has not even taken a return leave.

(End of chapter)