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Updated: May 27, 2025
How shall I set about making known my thought to him?" Ya-nei, for his part, looked in vain for some means of speaking to his neighbor. When the meal was finished, he returned to his ship and lay down on his bed. But Elegant was so much occupied in thinking of the young man that she could not touch her dinner.
Elegant's mother at once shut the door and, quickly stooping to look under the bed, saw the young man asleep. "Alas, how could you do this thing? And then frighten us with your illness? Now everybody will know of it. Where does he come from? May Heaven strike him dead!" Elegant's face was purple with shame. "It is all your child's fault. He is the son of the Lord Wu." "Ya-nei?
He then called his confidential steward and, explaining all to him, gave him a letter. After this he went to see his daughter, who hid herself under the blanket when she beheld him. He spoke no word to her; but in a stern tone called out Ya-nei, who crept from his hiding-place, saluted the older man, and said: "My crime deserves death." "How could a young man of your education commit such an act?
Ya-nei was standing on the other ship, and immediately leaped to her side, and boldly took her in his arms. Between joy and alarm, she did not dare to resist. He drew her into her cabin and embraced her. At that moment one of the slaves passed before the cabin and, seeing the door open, cried out: "The door is open! O thieves!"
Ya-nei was watching, and came out from his hiding. On the dish there were only two small bowls of vegetables mixed with meat, a bowl of cooked green-stuff, and a little rice. Naturally, the young girl was not in the habit of taking large quantities of food; but for her lover, with his three bushels of rice a day, the matter was otherwise.
As their faces were red, their ears burning and their legs unsteady, they were only too glad to retire; and soon their snores were heard over the ship. Little by little all other sounds died away in both the junks. Then she gently knocked on her port-hole with her scissors. Naturally Ya-nei was waiting for the signal; as soon as he heard it, his body was as if it had been shaken to pieces.
They had been at their destination for two days when Ya-nei arrived; you may suppose that their surprise was only equalled by their joy. They read Ho Chang's letter, and understood everything. They scolded their son, and made a feast for Ho Chang's envoy. When the betrothal gifts were ready, they sent them in charge of their steward, to whom Ya-nei entrusted a secret letter for his Elegant.
Ya-nei perceived the youthful beauty, and thought her so seductive that he immediately composed the following poem: Her soul has the tenderness of Autumn rivers And her pure bones are made of jade. The rose of the hibiscus lightens her, Her eyebrows have the curve of willow leaves. Is she not an Immortal from the Jasper Lake Or from the Moon Palace?
But when the young girl said that she needed about ten bowls, the good woman was startled. She again wished to remain near her daughter. "If you stay here, mama, I shall not be able to take anything. Leave me alone, and I shall eat more comfortably." Everybody indulged her caprice. When the cabin was empty, she shut the door and Ya-nei came out.
She went out, without seeing anything which might confirm her suspicion, and, coming back again after breakfast, began gently to question her daughter on her ideas of marriage. As they were talking, there suddenly came a snore from under the bed. Ya-nei, after his efforts in the night and his morning meal, had gone to sleep in his hiding-place.
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