One of our novelists relates that one of the favourites of the Emperor fell in love with a young man of letters who lived in the capital, and whose garden was traversed by a brook which flowed out of the imperial park. The young woman being shut up in the palace, jealously watched, had no means of corresponding with him whom she loved. But love will always suggest ways and means, and it came to her to write a poem on the petal of a peony and to confide it to the stream. The young man of letters was lucky enough to find the peony-petal, and thus learned that in spite of the separation he was still loved. This feeling gave him so much courage that he set to work with great diligence and an extraordinary ardour, so that he was soon able to pass all his examinations, and to become a celebrated statesman. In reward of numerous services, he asked the Emperor to accord him the hand of the young woman, a request which his sovereign was unable to refuse. Thus a simple flower gave a great minister to the empire, and united two beings who thought themselves for ever separated.
This is the Feast of the Three Beginnings—that of the year, the months, and the days.
From break of day, which is saluted in every house with formidable detonations of crackers, all the functionaries of the capital betake themselves to the Imperial Temple to present their respective congratulations to the Sovereign in person before the tablet which bears the name of His Majesty. This duty accomplished, they present their homages in order to the temples of Heaven, of Confucius, of the God of Literature, and of the God of War. After this they pay calls to each other, an exchange of courtesies which lasts for four or five days.
On entering a relation’s house, it is the rule, first of all, to salute the tablets which represent the ancestors. If the visitors are newly married, besides tea and cakes, a bag of oranges and water-melon seeds is offered to them. Both these signify that it is hoped they may be blessed with a large family.
Parties are given every day in turn at the different houses of friends, and these are made the occasion for games of every description. At the same time presents are distributed amongst the servants of one’s friends and relations, whilst to the children of one’s acquaintance one gives ingots of silver or pieces of silver coin wrapped up in red paper, or coins threaded on red strings, which are called lucky coins. I may mention here, since I am speaking about children, a striking peculiarity, which is specially noticeable in the case of very young children; that is, that in China we don’t count people’s ages by the number of their days, but from year to year. Thus a child born on the 31st of December is two years on the evening of the next day, that is, on January 1st of the following year.