Then it was that the reason was revealed, both for the falling off in the receipts and for the increase in the orders.

The calculations of the unfortunate Yung Chang were correct up to a hundred, but at that number he had made a gigantic error--which, however, he was never able to detect and rectify--with the result that all transactions above that point worked out at a considerable loss to the seller.

It was in vain that the panic-stricken Ti Hung goaded his miserable son-in-law to correct the mistake; it was equally in vain that he tried to stem the current of his enormous commercial popularity.

He had competed for public favour, and he had won it, and every day his business increased till ruin grasped him by the pigtail.

Then came an order from one firm at Peking for five millions of the ninety-nine cash idols, and at that Ti Hung put up his shutters, and sat down in the dust.
"'Behold!' he exclaimed, 'in the course of a lifetime there are many very disagreeable evils that may overtake a person.