The atmosphere in the Youyang Sheng household was harmonious and cheerful. The whole family, from top to bottom, shared similar temperaments — fond of talking and laughing, generous and warm with others. Minglan felt as though she were a prisoner who had served years of hard labor and had at last been granted early release; her entire being loosened and relaxed.
She and Lan were, it seemed, truly kindred spirits — they fell in step with each other almost instantly. One was an impulsive girl of action, the other a supplier of questionable ideas; and together they had Taisheng, an easygoing soul accustomed to being bossed around by his younger female cousins. These days, the Sheng household was genuinely lively: when Minglan went fishing, Lan helped dig up earthworms, while Taisheng stood to one side holding the fish bucket, fussing like a mother hen about “mind your step, it’s slippery” or “don’t go any farther out.” When Lan tried to catch sparrows, Minglan helped prop up the basket and scatter the grain, while Taisheng crouched behind the wall, holding the rope tied to the stick.
Li Shi was busy managing the household and preparing for the wedding, so she could only send her daughter-in-law Fang Shi to round the girls up — but Fang Shi had never been a match for her sister-in-law Lan to begin with, and Minglan was not in a position to help manage the situation either. All she could do was turn a blind eye.
“Let them be,” the Great Madam said with a gentle smile, smoothing things over. “Children at that age — let them play a little more while they can. Better to be full of life than to mope about like little wooden figures.” Sheng Lao looked at Li Shi’s pained expression and had been on the verge of giving Minglan a proper scolding, but when she looked over and saw the rosy color in Minglan’s cheeks after these few days of play — more color than she had seen at home — her heart softened, and she sighed instead: “A niece-in-law, of course, cares for her children — but these are girls, after all… If we don’t keep a firm hand on them now, I fear they’ll suffer for it later. Very well then, niece-in-law, please bear with it a little longer. Once Changwu’s wedding is over, we’ll get a good hold of these two little monkeys.”
Lan and Minglan, who had been brought there by Li Shi for a scolding and had been standing with bowed heads, both broke into looks of delight at these words. Li Shi shot her own daughter another sharp look.
Sheng Lao and Nanny Fang were both advanced in age; even back in Dengzhou, Sheng Lao had already had Minglan help Nanny Fang with certain matters. The long journey had already worn them both out, so now she had Minglan prepare the luggage and copy out the gift lists for relatives. Minglan and Lan had barely enjoyed two days of freedom before being put to work. Lan was deeply aggrieved and could only stand nearby pouting and grumbling — but as she watched maids both young and old reporting in with respectful propriety, and Minglan giving directions with authority that allowed no contradiction, not a single servant woman making the slightest fuss, Lan was greatly impressed.
“I’ve helped my sister-in-law manage the household too, but those servants always look for chances to slack off and cause me no end of grief. Mother wouldn’t stand up for me — in fact, she’d give me a good scolding instead. Is there… some sort of trick to it?” Lan was genuinely humble in asking.
Minglan had suffered her own share of difficulties in this regard. These past few days of play had given her a fair sense of Lan’s temperament, so she said: “Let me guess at your situation. Before taking on a task, did you first ask the head servants how it had always been done before?”
“No,” Lan answered without hesitation. “I asked Mother and my sister-in-law to explain the background and context — why would I need to ask the servants anything?”
Minglan pressed further: “Did you go directly through your own attendants to get things done, bypassing those senior servants and stewardesses?”
Lan nodded: “Those senior servants get away with things because they have some standing with the elder and the mistress, and they never take me seriously anyway. Besides, if a task can be done in one step, why route it through two sets of hands and create all that unnecessary trouble?”
Minglan assumed an expression of deep and knowing insight — the look of someone whose exact suspicions had been confirmed. Lan grew even more eager to know, pressing her with repeated questions. Minglan then smiled and said: “Those household servants all have their contracts held in the master’s hands — how would any of them dare to defy a young mistress? As long as you follow established custom, you will make few serious errors. From now on, before undertaking any task, call the head servants to you and ask thoroughly how things have always been done. Whatever the established practice, generally follow it as it is. If there is something you genuinely dislike and wish to change, do not act on your own judgment — and do not hint at your intentions before the elder either. First consult your mother or your sister-in-law to ask whether the change would be appropriate; then proceed.”
Lan scrunched up her face and complained: “Mother is always finding fault with me — I can’t be bothered to ask her!”
Minglan reached over and pinched Lan’s face, pulling her scrunched-up expression flat. Then she said with a firm expression: “Every household has its own established ways of doing things. How do you know your method is necessarily better? Your great-aunt has managed affairs for a long time — she’ll know in an instant whether your idea is good or not, and that’s still better than making a mistake. That’s the first point. The second point: when a task passes through a person’s hands, that person has a stake in it. If you go straight over their heads and cut off their share from the very start, how would they be willing? Naturally they’ll trip you up openly or from behind. But if you’ve consulted with the elder and the mistress beforehand, even the most senior and respected stewardess cannot go and lodge complaints against you, the rightful young mistress of the house!”
Seeing that Lan still looked uncertain, Minglan offered one final thought: “Managing a household is no easy matter. Haven’t you heard the saying — ‘Even cats and dogs grow weary of the family head for a year’? If you’re afraid of the trouble, better not to get involved at all. But if you wish to manage, you cannot be afraid of difficulty and annoyance. Right now you still have your father and mother and grandmother to back you up — you’re a young miss with that support. Think of those who are daughters-in-law, having to answer to mothers-in-law, sisters-in-law, and unmarried sisters-in-law. Now that is truly difficult.”
There were things Minglan left unsaid. As a daughter born of a concubine, her own position was even more difficult than Lan’s. After all, Rulan and Molan were not ones to be trifled with, and Wang Shi would not necessarily stand up for her.
In Minglan’s view: the more one does, the more mistakes one makes; the less one does, the fewer mistakes one makes; and the only way to make no mistakes at all is to do nothing.
An employee’s wish is to do less work and earn more; an employer’s aim is to have the employee work more for less — this fundamental tension is the same in every era. No matter how skilled a mistress of the household may be at managing people, the moment she threatens others’ established interests, friction becomes inevitable.
If one were managing a household worth a hundred thousand taels as though it were only worth ten thousand — allowing servants lighter duties, doubling their monthly wages, paying double on holidays, distributing year-end bonuses, and arranging annual outings — then as long as the mistress was not grossly incompetent or deceived, she would generally be praised as compassionate and virtuous. But if one tried to run a household of ten thousand taels as though it were worth a hundred thousand — with the senior uncle buying a concubine for eight taels today, the young misses organizing a poetry society for five taels tomorrow, the grand elder making a thousand-tael incense offering the day after, the household keeping a thousand mouths fed, and the husband unable to earn — then even a heavenly immortal descending to earth could barely manage it. After all, immortals can turn stones into banknotes.
The sensible approach was to manage the household at a reasonable scale with reasonable resources: neither extravagant nor miserly, neither excessive in display nor so meticulous in accounting as to become oppressive to the servants. Where looseness was warranted, be loose; a little slipping through the fingers here and there was no great matter. On that foundation, establish firm household rules, regulate the behavior of the servants, teach the servants propriety and conduct, and maintain a well-ordered household atmosphere. That already counted as an excellent outcome.
Lan was, in truth, quite intelligent. The problem had simply been that Li Shi’s method of instruction had not suited her, and her words had not landed as well as Minglan’s. Fang Shi, as a daughter-in-law, was also one step removed and could not speak too directly. After turning things over carefully, Lan found Minglan’s reasoning quite sound. When she returned, she began quietly observing her mother as she managed household affairs — watching her direct servants in packing the trousseau, distributing gifts to household staff, setting up beds and preparing the banquet — while a dozen or more women surrounded her daily with endless questions, Li Shi spinning like a wheel. Lan suddenly felt her mother’s hardship more acutely, and dutifully followed Minglan in their daily lessons: practicing calligraphy and embroidery, behaving properly for several days in a row.
Li Shi was greatly relieved to see her daughter settling down. She had recently observed Minglan directing the household staff to check through the luggage and organize items with remarkable efficiency. And when Minglan did her tallying, she used no abacus at all — just counted on her fingers and made a few marks on paper, and everything was accounted for. How old was this girl? Li Shi was astonished. She turned to look at her own daughter, who was trailing behind Minglan calling out “Are you done yet? Let’s go play!” — and could not help feeling a quiet pang of worry.
Seeing that Lan had now grown somewhat sensible, Li Shi felt genuinely heartened. But looking at Lan’s dejected and despondent expression, she felt a surge of tenderness, and reached out to stroke her daughter’s hair: “Your younger cousin Minglan lives under strict rules back at home. Now that she’s come to us, as long as you don’t go too far out of line, it’s fine to take her for a walk in the garden — that would be a good thing for her.”
On the day of the wedding reception, the Sheng household was decorated and renewed from top to bottom. Even the servants were each dressed in newly made long coats and sleeveless outer garments. Lan dragged Minglan about from place to place watching the excitement. To the sound of gongs and drums, Changwu arrived in a great red celebratory robe, riding a tall white horse, coming to receive the bridal sedan chair.
“Second Brother is really too embarrassing — look how he’s smiling, his mouth pulled all the way back to his ears!” Lan murmured to Minglan with her arm around her. Minglan nodded. Changwu was indeed grinning like a great big gourd today — though he was entirely forgiven for it.
Because the Great Madam did not permit the taking of concubines, and to prevent adolescent boys from making regrettable mistakes, the sons were married off relatively young. Changwu had begun the search for a bride at fifteen and encountered endless setbacks — one unsuitable candidate after another had come forward. The Great Madam and Li Shi had high standards and would not settle for a daughter-in-law of lesser family background, so Changwu had not found a wife until he was twenty-one. Was it any wonder he was jubilant?
Minglan also caught sight of Taisheng’s father. This uncle by marriage went by the impressive name of Hu Erniu. Minglan had assumed that if there was an Erniu, there must logically be a Daniu above him — but this turned out not to be the case. It was said that on the night before Hu Erniu’s birth, the Hu family elder had dreamed that someone had presented his family with two oxen as a gift, and so he had named his son “Second Ox.” This uncle by marriage was a good-natured man who followed after Big Uncle Sheng Wei, busying himself in and out all day long.
But Shulan’s husband, Sun Zhigao, Minglan did not particularly care for. His features were fine and delicate enough, yet his eyes seemed to sit atop his forehead — a look of pervasive arrogance about him. She learned only later that this brother-in-law Sun had been considered a child prodigy in Youyang, having passed the preliminary examination at the age of twelve — though he was, as of the present, still merely a licentiate. Upon learning that Sheng Lao had come from a marquis’s household, and that her sons and grandsons had all entered official service through the proper examinations, he immediately shed his former haughtiness and became fawningly deferential.
Young ladies could not properly show their faces in public, so they were forbidden from attending the wedding ceremony in the main hall or mingling among the outside guests. Lan made several attempts to break through and push toward the front to watch the excitement, and each time was firmly suppressed by Minglan. Instead, she was pulled to the back garden to look at the freshly erected flower-decorated trees. Li Shi, knowing her daughter’s nature, hurried to send someone to summon her to the inner hall to keep Sheng Lao and the female relatives company.
“Have all the young misses from the other branch come?” Lan asked. The maid smiled: “All of them — even Cousin Xiulan and Cousin Yuelan have come from the neighboring county.” Lan’s face immediately fell, and she flatly refused: “Then I’m not going.”
The maid was flustered: “Young Miss, you really cannot do that — the order has come from above…” Minglan, seeing the little maid nearly sweating with anxiety, said: “You go ahead. Our Young Miss and I will be along in just a moment.”
The little maid, knowing that this Young Miss Ming, though she had not been here long, was Lan’s closest confidante and could usually talk some sense into her, thanked Minglan with relief and left.
Lan glared at Minglan: “What kind of guarantee did you give? I’m not going.” Minglan replied coolly: “It makes no difference to me. But since your great-aunt is worried about you, she’ll just send more people to fetch you. Whether you’re asked four times or dragged there in the end, the only difference is between being offered wine with good grace or being made to drink it as a penalty.”
Lan thought of her mother’s formidable manner and felt deflated: “It’s just that I really don’t want to see those people from the other branch! Cousin Xiulan is tolerable enough, but you’ve met Huilan — and then there’s Cousin Yuelan, the one born of a concubine. Hmm… the less said about her, the better.”
Minglan led Lan slowly toward the main hall, walking and talking, drawing Lan’s attention along the way as they went: “What deep grudge do you hold? You remember it so clearly.”
Without quite noticing, Lan fell into step with Minglan toward the front of the house. She said with indignation: “You all lived away from here all this time and don’t know what a nuisance those people from the other branch are! When we were small, that aunt over there would claim the family was hard up and say that daughters needed to be raised well, so she would push one daughter after another into our house — my elder sister and I suffered no small amount at their hands! Cousin Xiulan only knew how to protect herself, so she was bearable enough. But that Yuelan — every time gifts were distributed at the New Year or holidays, she’d make a scene. It was either taking my clothes or stealing Sister’s hairpins; and when I went to report it, she’d go around sobbing with that shameless face of hers, crying that we’d bullied her!”
“She actually stole things?” Minglan had genuinely not expected that.
Lan bristled at the memory, a stomach full of indignation: “It wasn’t stealing — it was outright robbery! Any time no one was in my elder sister’s room, she’d go right in and rummage through everything, pick out the nicest things to put on, and never give them back. My elder sister was too mild-mannered to ever say a word, so Yuelan grew bolder and bolder. There were even several occasions when she dared go into Mother’s room and go through her things. At first, Mother endured it, saying they were just hair ornaments and that girls grow up liking to dress nicely, so let her be. But when Mother later discovered that several property deeds had gone missing — including the deed to this very ancestral home — she finally panicked.”
“And then? Were the deeds recovered?” Minglan pressed on with rather too much relish.
Lan was thoroughly animated by this question. She said with triumphant delight: “At the time, Yuelan was just two months away from her wedding day. She was counting on already being engaged to a family to protect her — figuring that her own family wouldn’t dare touch her. But who knew — Mother went over to the other branch first, invited her over with perfect cordiality, then sent word to the prospective in-laws saying Yuelan had caught a chill and the wedding date would need to be postponed by half a year. Then she had Yuelan locked up. No matter how much the other branch came to make a fuss, Mother wouldn’t budge — though they didn’t dare cause too much of a scene either, for fear of being dumped by the in-laws if things got out of hand. Ha! Yuelan was locked up for several dozen days. She handed over the deeds, and only then was she released. It turned out she hadn’t even told her own father — she’d hidden them in her own bodice, planning to take them away to her husband’s family!”
Lan recounted this with eyes dancing and gestures animated. Minglan listened with her mouth open. In her heart she raised a great thumb of respect — truly, one could not judge a book by its cover. Who would have thought that the round-faced, amiable Great Madam was capable of such ruthlessness?
Lan’s storytelling appetite was well and truly roused. She continued: “And as for Huilan — I don’t know how many times she and I have come to blows since we were children. Look here — this scar! She pushed me onto a rock five years ago and I cut myself on it. Lucky I caught myself with my arm, or I don’t know what my face would have looked like!” She rolled up her sleeve and thrust it in front of Minglan’s face. Minglan leaned in to look, and sure enough, there was a great long scar, winding and twisted like a centipede, a pinkish-peach color.
“And then she was sent back to her own family,” Lan said with bitter satisfaction. “Hmph! Ingrates, the lot of them!”
Minglan reflected that Huilan had to have been at least several years older than Lan, and yet she had been capable of striking her that hard. Looking at that five or six inches of scar, she could well imagine how much pain young Lan had suffered. She helped Lan smooth her sleeve back down and offered some comfort: “I’ve often heard the Great Madam speak of Cousin Xiulan — she says she’s a good one, devoted in serving her husband and raising her children, with a harmonious marriage. So the Great Madam didn’t raise them entirely in vain.”
Lan at last broke into a smile: “That’s all because of what my mother did! That year, Cousin Xiulan came to our house in the middle of the night, weeping and kowtowing until her head bled, begging my father and mother not to let our uncle force her into marriage as a replacement wife for some black-hearted old moneybag. My mother managed with great difficulty to protect her, and then arranged her marriage herself to her current husband. After her husband passed the preliminary examination but kept failing the provincial ones, it was my father who used his connections to arrange for him to serve as a school instructor in a neighboring county.”
Minglan nodded repeatedly: “The Great Madam and Great Uncle are truly good people — to go to such lengths on behalf of a niece. Oh, wait — then why didn’t Uncle also help Brother-in-law Sun get a similar post as instructor?”
Lan let out a cold snort: “When Brother-in-law Sun was a boy, some fortune-teller at a stall told him he was destined to be a chief minister — and from that moment he made up his mind to become a two-examination presented scholar. He would never stoop to something as lowly as a backwater minor post in a small, clean government role. He repeatedly declined my father’s kind offers. Hmph — let’s just hope his ambitions don’t exceed his talents!”
Listening to Lan vent, Minglan couldn’t help but smile. She thought to herself: if Lan had been born in modern times, she could have opened a thread on a web forum titled “An Exposé on My Cousins, Their Husbands, and My Various Uncles and Aunts” — how satisfying and dramatic it would have been! It would certainly have gone viral.
Once Lan had reached the end of her tirade, the two of them had already arrived at the door of the main room. A maid out front was craning her neck, watching for them. Catching sight of them from a distance, she was overjoyed and walked quickly forward to meet them: “My good young misses, you’ve finally come! Inside, the elder has already asked for you several times — if you’d been any later, she’d have sent people to search for you again.”
“Stop your fussing — aren’t we here now?” Having unburdened herself of her long-stored grievances, Lan was in considerably better spirits. She took Minglan by the hand and stepped briskly inside. The maid by the door had just lifted the curtain when a strange elderly woman’s voice came floating out from within: “…just betroth your Minglan to my nephew!”
Lan startled, and reflexively turned to look at Minglan. She was surprised to find that Minglan looked, if anything, as though a weight had been lifted from her — a faint expression of relief. She heard Minglan smile and say: “What was it you said the last time the great-aunt punished you with copying books? Ah yes — whether you extend your neck or pull it in, the blade falls all the same. Come on then — let’s go in.”
[Author’s Note: Generally speaking, government posts at the fourth rank or above require a presented scholar degree to rise to — but there have been many exceptions, such as those with powerful family backgrounds or outstanding ability, though these remain the minority. The most famous example would be the case of the official Hai Rui.
After reading the section on Hai Rui in “Those Events of the Ming Dynasty,” I couldn’t help but sigh quietly — the ancestral tombs of the Hai family must surely have been smoking with fortune. A licentiate like Hai Rui who regularly offended colleagues and superiors, who broke established unspoken rules at every turn, who scolded even the emperor himself in the most blistering of terms — and yet after a turn through prison he came out perfectly unscathed, rising from county magistrate to prefectural judge to Ministry of Revenue Minister, Ministry of War Minister, Vice Minister, Right Vice-Censor-in-Chief, and other positions, dying at what I believe was the second rank or from the second rank.
I am sincerely awed. The good karma of Hai Rui must have been extraordinary — though might this not also suggest, indirectly, that the governance of the Ming Dynasty was not as corrupt as the “History of Ming” compiled by Qing-era authors made it appear?]