Weird Tales/Volume 30/Issue 2/The Mandarin’s Ear

TheMandarin's Ear
By Frank Owen
An odd and curious Story about a Chinese mandarin who had the ear of a thief grafted in place of the ear he had lost
The mandarin Wang Mok was distraught.
He had gone hunting in
the hills west of Peking. Not only
had he returned without any game, but he
had returned without one of his ears.
Where the ear had been, there was now a
jagged wound which his numerous doctors
bustled about in an effort to heal. Not
only was the pain excruciating, but Wang
Mok considered that he had lost face. Now
he would not be able to be buried in completeness
on that day when earth should
cease to need him more. And another
thing disturbed him. Now when he
walked in the garden among his numerous
slender slave-women, they might turn
their heads that he would not behold
them smiling. No longer was the face of
Wang Mok round and bland as a full
moon. It was a broken moon. Saurin the
poet could no longer write sonnets about
him.
How he lost his ear ever remained a
mystery. Some said that it had been shot
off accidentally, others that a wild beast
of the mountains had attacked Wang
Mox in savage fury, resentful of his desire
to spread death through the mountains.
But those in

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