"You're all now grown up," observed old lady Chia; "and you shouldn't allude to infant names."

But while she was chiding them, they noticed Pao-yu arrive.

"Cousin Yun, have you come?" he smiled. "How is it that you wouldn't come the other day when some one was despatched to fetch you?"

"It's only a few minutes," Madame w.a.n.g said, "since our venerable senior called that one to task, and now here he comes and refers to names and surnames!"

"Your cousin Pao," ventured Lin Tai-yu, "has something good, which he has been waiting to give you."

"What good thing is it?" asked Hsiang-yun.

"Do you believe what she says?" observed Pao-yu laughingly. "But how many days is it that I have not seen you, and you've grown so much taller!"

"Is cousin Hsi Jen all right?" inquired Hsiang-yun.

"She's all right," answered Pao-yu. "Many thanks for your kind thought of her."

"I've brought something nice for her," resumed Hsiang-yun.

Saying this, she produced her handkerchief, tied into a knot.

"What's this something nice?" asked Pao-yu. "Wouldn't it have been better if you'd brought her a couple of those rings with streaked stones of the kind you sent the other day?"

"Why, what's this?" exclaimed Hsiang-yun laughing, opening, as she spoke, the handkerchief.

On close scrutiny, they actually found four streaked rings, similar to those she had previously sent, tied up in the same packet.

"Look here!" Lin Tai-yu smiled, "what a girl she is! Had you, when sending that fellow the other day to bring ours, given him these also to bring along with him, wouldn't it have saved trouble? Instead of that, here you fussily bring them yourself to-day! I presumed that it was something out of the way again; but is it really only these things? In very truth, you're a mere dunce!"

"It's you who behave like a dunce now!" Shih Hsiang-yun smiled.

"I'll speak out here and let every one judge for themselves who is the dunce. The servant, deputed to bring the things to you, had no need to open his mouth and say anything; for, as soon as they were brought in, it was of course evident, at a glance, that they were to be presented to you young ladies. But had he been the bearer of these things for them, I would have been under the necessity of explaining to him which was intended for this servant-girl, and which for that. Had the messenger had his wits about him, well and good; but had he been at all stupid he wouldn't have been able to remember so much as the names of the girls!

He would have made an awful mess of it, and talked a lot of nonsense. So instead of being of any use he would have even muddled, hickledy-pickledy, your things. Had a female servant been despatched, it would have been all right. But as it happened, a servant-boy was again sent the other day, so how could he have mentioned the names of the waiting-girls? And by my bringing them in person to give them to them, doesn't it make things clearer?"

As she said this, she put down the four rings. "One is for sister Hsi Jen," she continued, "one is for sister Yuan Yang. One for sister Chin Ch'uan-erh, and one for sister P'ing Erh. They are only for these four girls; but would the servant-boys too forsooth have remembered them so clearly!"

At these words, the whole company smiled. "How really clear!" they cried.

"This is what it is to be able to speak!" Pao-yu put in. "She doesn't spare any one!"

Hearing this, Lin Tai-yu gave a sardonic smile. "If she didn't know how to use her tongue," she observed, "would she deserve to wear that unicorn of gold!"

While speaking, she rose and walked off.

Luckily, every one did not hear what she said. Only Hsueh Pao-ch'ai pursed up her lips and laughed. Pao-yu, however, had overheard her remark, and he blamed himself for having once more talked in a heedless manner. Unawares his eye espied Pao-ch'ai much amused, and he too could not suppress a smile. But at the sight of Pao-yu in laughter, Pao-ch'ai hastily rose to her feet and withdrew. She went in search of Tai-yu, to have a chat and laugh with her.

"After you've had tea," old lady Chia thereupon said to Hsiang-yun, "you'd better rest a while and then go and see your sisters-in-law.

Besides, it's cool in the garden, so you can walk about with your cousins."

Hsiang-yun expressed her a.s.sent, and, collecting the three rings, she wrapped them up, and went and lay down to rest. Presently, she got up with the idea of paying visits to lady Feng and her other relatives.

Followed by a whole bevy of nurses and waiting-maids, she repaired into lady Feng's quarters on the off side. She bandied words with her for a while and then coming out she betook herself into the garden of Broad Vista, and called on Li Kung-ts'ai. But after a short visit, she turned her steps towards the I Hung court to look up Hsi Jen. "You people needn't," she said, turning her head round, "come along with me! You may go and see your friends and relatives. It will be quite enough if you simply leave Ts'ui Lu to wait upon me."

Hearing her wishes, each went her own way in quest of aunts, or sisters-in-law. There only remained but Hsiang-yun and Ts'ui Lu.

"How is it," inquired Ts'ui Lu, "that these lotus flowers have not yet opened?"

"The proper season hasn't yet arrived," rejoined Shih Hsiang-yun.

"They too," continued Ts'ui Lu, "resemble those in our pond; they are double flowers."

"These here," remarked Hsiang-yun, "are not however up to ours."

"They have over there," observed Ts'ui Lu, "a pomegranate tree, with four or five branches joined one to another, just like one storey raised above another storey. What trouble it must have cost them to rear!"

"Flowers and plants," suggested Shih Hsiang-yun, "are precisely like the human race. With sufficient vitality, they grow up in a healthy condition."

"I can't credit these words," replied Ts'ui Lu, twisting her face round.

"If you maintain that they are like human beings, how is it that I haven't seen any person, with one head growing over another."

This rejoinder evoked a smile from Hsiang-yun. "I tell you not to talk,"

she cried, "but you will insist upon talking! How do you expect people to be able to answer every thing you say! All things, whether in heaven or on earth come into existence by the co-operation of the dual powers, the male and female. So all things, whether good or bad, novel or strange, and all those manifold changes and transformations arise entirely from the favourable or adverse influence exercised by the male and female powers. And though some things seldom seen by mankind might come to life, the principle at work is, after all, the same."

"In the face of these arguments," laughed Ts'ui Lu, "everything, from old till now, from the very creation itself, embodies a certain proportion of the Yin and Yang principles."

"You stupid thing!" exclaimed Hsiang-yun smiling, "the more you talk, the more stuff and nonsense falls from your lips! What about everything embodying a certain proportion of the principles Yin and Yang! Besides, the two words Yin and Yang are really one word; for when the Yang principle is exhausted, it becomes the Yin; and when the Yin is exhausted, it becomes Yang. And it isn't that, at the exhaustion of the Yin, another Yang comes into existence; and that, at the exhaustion of the Yang, a second Yin arises."

"This trash is sufficient to kill me!" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed Ts'ui Lu. "What are the Yin and Yang? Why, they are without substance or form! But pray, Miss, tell me what sort of things these Yin and Yang can be!"

"The Yin and Yang," explained Hsiang-yun, "are no more than spirits, but anything affected by their influence at once a.s.sumes form. The heavens, for instance, are Yang, and the earth is Yin; water is Yin and fire is Yang; the sun is Yang and the moon Yin."

"Quite so! quite so!" cried out Ts'ui Lu, much amused by these explanations, "I've at length attained perception! It isn't strange then that people invariably call the sun 'T'ai-yang.' While astrologers keep on speaking of the moon as 'T'ai-yin-hsing,' or something like it. It must be on account of this principle."

"O-mi-to-fu!" laughed Hsiang-yun, "you have at last understood!"

"All these things possess the Yin and Yang; that's all right." T'sui Lu put in. "But is there any likelihood that all those mosquitoes, flees and worms, flowers, herbs, bricks and tiles have, in like manner, anything to do with the Yin and Yang?"

"How don't they!" exclaimed Hsiang-yun. "For example, even the leaves of that tree are distinguished by Yin and Yang. The side, which looks up and faces the sun, is called Yang; while that in the shade and looking downwards, is called Yin."

"Is it really so!" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed T'sui Lu, upon hearing this; while she smiled and nodded her head. "Now I know all about it! But which is Yang and which Yin in these fans we're holding."

"This side, the front, is Yang," answered Hsiang-yun; "and that, the reverse, is Yin."

Ts'ui Lu went on to nod her head, and to laugh. She felt inclined to apply her questions to several other things, but as she could not fix her mind upon anything in particular, she, all of a sudden, drooped her head. Catching sight of the pendant in gold, representing a unicorn, which Hsiang-yun had about her person, she forthwith made allusion to it. "This, Miss," she said smiling, "cannot likely also have any Yin and Yang!"

"The beasts of the field and the birds of the air," proceeded Hsiang-yun, "are, the c.o.c.k birds, Yang, and the hen birds, Yin. The females of beasts are Yin; and the males, Yang; so how is there none?"

"Is this male, or is this female?" inquired Ts'ui Lu.