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To make things worse, the weight of the sheng had been reduced with the times from twelve catties to five catties, and at the same time the relation of cash to silver had fallen from 1640 to 1250 cash the tael. The selling of its female children into slavery is the chief sorrow of this famine-stricken district.
Wang Ch'ang and Chao Shêng also jumped into the tree and stood one on each side of him. There Chang communicated to them the mysterious formula.
Chia Jung immediately replied that he would attend to his injunctions, and not much time elapsed before he brought a list mentioning the days on which the inmates were to be invited to partake of the new year wine. Chia Chen examined it. "Go," he then said, "and give it to Lai Sheng so that he may see its contents and invite the guests.
Other names by which Sun Hou-tzu is referred to are: Sun Hsing-chê, Sun Wu-k'ung, Mei Hou-wang, Ch'i-t'ien Ta Shêng, and Pi-ma Wên, the last-mentioned being a title which caused him annoyance by recalling the derisive dignity conferred upon him by Yü Huang. Throughout the remainder of this chapter Sun Hou-tzu will be shortly referred to as 'Sun.
A maiden holding in her hand a magic lotus-blossom, the flower of open-heartedness, or the peach of immortality given her by Lü Tung-pin in the mountain-gorge as a symbol of identity, playing at times the shêng or reed-organ, or drinking wine this is the picture the Chinese paint of the Immortal Ho Hsien Ku. She was the daughter of Ho T'ai, a native of Tsêng-ch'êng Hsien in Kuangtung.
Yu, having asked Chia Jung to come round, told him to direct Lai Sheng to make the usual necessary preparations for a banquet to last for a couple of days, with due regard to a profuse and sumptuous style.
I have given the crucible in which Huang Ti prepared the draught of immortality to my disciple Wang Ch'ang. Later on, a man will come from the East, who also will make use of it. He will arrive on the seventh day of the first moon." Exactly on that day there arrived from the East a man named Chao Shêng, who was the person indicated by Chang Tao-ling.
This ceremony is called "Fang Sheng." It is considered a very meritorious action and will not fail of reward in Heaven. One of the Court ladies asked me what I thought of the parrots that would not fly away, and I told her that it was really very strange. She said: "It is very simple and not strange at all.
Each disciple ate one, as also did Chang, who reserved the remaining one for Chao Shêng, whom he helped to climb up again. To do this Chang extended his arm to a length of thirty feet, all present marvelling at the miracle.
A few days later a young man named Ch'u Wang-sun arrived with the intention, as he said, of placing himself under the instruction of Chuang Shêng. When he heard that he was dead he went and performed prostrations before his tomb, and afterward took up his abode in an empty room, saying that he wished to study.
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