Page:The Overland Monthly, volume 1, issue 1.djvu/88



This official had so attracted the regards of the famous and powerful Mr. Young, that by a solemn act, called by the Chinese "adoption of ancestry," they had formed a relationship, strictly so regarded in China. Time passed, and with it arose the fortunes of the Young family, while the Kaous seemed never deserted by evil fortune. The present head of the latter family, retiring from the capital, took up his abode in a humble hamlet, where he contrived to exist in a wretched and hopeless poverty. He had married a Miss Lew, who had brought him a son and daughter, not to mention a mother-in-law, an old lady of shrewdness and simplicity, both sides of whose character are perfectly delineated in the various adventures which befal her, as related in this veracious history.

Matters of late had been unprosperous, touching the fortunes of Mr. Kaou. Farming had not paid, and winter was approaching before the least provision had been made to meet its inclemency, or support the family at a season when necessities double and resources dwindle. The anxious farmer, discouraged and dejected, took to drink, and family affairs seemed on the brink of some dreadful crisis, when Madame Lew resolved to put up no longer quietly with her son-in-law's unhappy course of conduct, and she addressed him in the following style:

"My honored son! don't fly in a passion if I should address you in an outspoken fashion, after the manner of honest country folk. As our dish is, so is the amount of rice we eat. When a youth, you had the old man's bin to dip out of, and an easy art then was eating and drinking! Matters forsooth have changed since then; now you get into a fury because you know nothing of gaining money, or keeping it, if even you could obtain it. What a fine fellow—what a noble hero. you will turn out at this rate! Listen! Though living outside of Pekin, we are not as far from Court after all; that

CHINESE NOVEL. [Juty, very city has the ground covered with money, if we only knew how to bring some of it away. Folding yourarms will never solve the question, take my word for it!"

"You old harridan! what do you mean? Would you have me betake myself to the road as a cut-throat?"

"Now who told you to take to the highway? Listen! Do you think that money will know of itself to come running into our house? If we could put our heads together, we might light on some plan that would do our business, just as it ought to be done."

" Do you think now if I had a plan on foot, that I should have waited for your sagacity before putting it into execution? I can but think of powerful friends who have long ago forgotten me; and why, too, should they bother their heads about such as we?"

"Man forms the plan,' and Heaven gives the issue; there is a good deal in a happy chance—let me try my hand in sketching out a project for you.

The rich and powerful family of the Youngs, however distant, are indisputably your relations; the aged and venerable Lady Fung presides with great dignity over the ancestral mansion, and people say that as she advances in years she more than ever compassionates the poor, and pities the aged and needy. If she has forgotten you, there is no one to blame but yourself; striving as you are with a foolish false pride, you don't fancy bending, bowing and scraping to these big people, who know so well how to be cool and distant to the proud and egotistic poor. Heaven has blessed this Lady Fung, who may still remember old friends; take a turn in that direction, and you may find that a hair of her head

is thicker than our waist. The farmer's wife overhearing this

scheme of her mother, now interposed her view of the question.

"Dear old mother! What you say is truth itself, but let me ask you how such countryfied folk as we_are should dare to