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"An iron kettle and an iron shovel," hastily chimed in Tai-yue with a smile full of irony. "To do what with them?" Pao-ch'ai inquired. "You ask for fresh ginger, soy and all these condiments, so I indent for an iron kettle for you to cook the paints and eat them." Tai-yue answered, to the intense merriment of one and all, who gave way to laughter. "What do you, P'in Erh, know about these things?"
As he defended himself, he casually looked round, and caught sight of Lin Tai-yue at the back of Pao-ch'ai laughing with tight-set lips, and applying her fingers to her face to put him to shame. But Lady Feng, who had been in the inner rooms overseeing the servants laying the table, came out at once, as soon as she overheard the conversation.
The second place was occupied by Pao-ch'ai; the third by Tai-yue; the fourth by Ying Ch'un. T'an Ch'un and Hsi Ch'un filled the lower seats, in their proper order; Pao-yue sat in the last place. The two teapoys assigned to Li Wan and lady Feng stood within the third line of railings, and beyond the second row of gauze frames.
But T'an Ch'un, Li Wan, Ying Ch'un, Pao-ch'ai and the other girls likewise congregated in her quarters, and sat with her when they were at leisure, as they could, in the first place, watch the progress of the painting, and as secondly they were able to conveniently see something of each other.
She then quickly continued, "It is, search for chrysanthemums; what's your idea about it?" Pao-ch'ai thought that too would do very well. "Let's choose ten of them first," she next proposed; "and afterwards note them down!" While talking, they rubbed the ink and moistened the pens. These preparations over, Hsiang-yuen began to write, while Pao-ch'ai enumerated the themes.
Hsueh Heng-wu chaffs Pao-yue by composing verses in the same style as his on the crabs. After Pao-ch'ai and Hsiang-yuen, we will now explain, settled everything in their deliberations, nothing memorable occurred, the whole night, which deserves to be put on record. The next day, Hsiang-yuen invited dowager lady Chia and her other relatives to come and look at the olea flowers.
Tzu Chuean meanwhile put the birds' nests away; and removing afterwards the lamps, she lowered the portieres and waited upon Tai-yue until she lay herself down to sleep. While she reclined all alone on her pillow, Tai-yue thought gratefully of Pao-ch'ai.
You and I are, in the first place, cousins on my father's sister's side; while sister Pao-ch'ai and I are two cousins on mother's sides, so that, according to the degrees of relationship, she's more distant than yourself.
As she uttered this remark, she too gave way to tears, but by this time, Tai-yue and Pao-ch'ai had also come over, and they set to work to reassure her. "You, old lady," they urged, "should bear with them a little, and everything will be right!"
Pao-yue and Hsiang-yuen hastened to examine what was written. "I can't write verses very well," Li Wan pleaded, "so all I'll do will be to devise three lines, and the one, who'll finish the task first, we'll have afterwards to pair them." "We should, after all," Pao-ch'ai urged, "make some distinction with regard to order."
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