By its aid
(assisted, indeed, by the spirits of my ancestors) I have discovered a
new and strange thing, for which I can find no word. By using this new
system of reckoning, your illustrious but exceedingly narrow-minded
and miserly father would be able to make five taels where he now makes
one. Would he not, in consideration for this, consent to receive me as
a son-in-law, and dismiss the inelegant and unworthy Li Ting?'
"'In the unlikely event of your being able to convince my illustrious
parent of what you say, it would assuredly be so,' replied Ning. 'But
in what way could you do so? My sublime and charitable father already
employs all the means in his power to reap the full reward of his
sacred industry. His "solid house-hold gods" are in reality mere
shells of clay; higher-priced images are correspondingly constructed,
and his clay gatherers and modellers are all paid on a "profit-sharing
system." Nay, further, it is beyond likelihood that he should wish for
more purchasers, for so great is his fame that those who come to buy
have sometimes to wait for days in consequence of those before them;
for my exceedingly methodical sire entrusts none with the receiving of
money, and the exchanges are therefore made slowly.
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