called Ying Ch'un; the third is T'an Ch'un, the child of Mr. Cheng's
handmaid; while the fourth is the uterine sister of Mr. Chen of the Ning
Mansion. Her name is Hsi Ch'un. As dowager lady Shih is so fondly
attached to her granddaughters, they come, for the most part, over to
their grandmother's place to prosecute their studies together, and each
one of these girls is, I hear, without a fault."

"More admirable," observed Yue-ts'un, "is the regime (adhered to) in the
Chen family, where the names of the female children have all been
selected from the list of male names, and are unlike all those
out-of-the-way names, such as Spring Blossom, Scented Gem, and the like
flowery terms in vogue in other families. But how is it that the Chia
family have likewise fallen into this common practice?"

"Not so!" ventured Tzu-h'sing. "It is simply because the eldest daughter
was born on the first of the first moon, that the name of Yuan Ch'un was
given to her; while with the rest this character Ch'un (spring) was then
followed. The names of the senior generation are, in like manner,
adopted from those of their brothers; and there is at present an
instance in support of this. The wife of your present worthy master, Mr.
Lin, is the uterine sister of Mr. Chia. She and Mr. Chia Cheng, and she
went, while at home, under the name of Chia Min. Should you question the
truth of what I say, you are at liberty, on your return, to make minute
inquiries and you'll be convinced."

Yue-ts'un clapped his hands and said smiling, "It's so, I know! for this
female pupil of mine, whose name is Tai-yue, invariably pronounces the
character _min_ as _mi_, whenever she comes across it in the
course of her reading; while, in writing, when she comes to the
character 'min,' she likewise reduces the strokes by one, sometimes by