“Why have you never mentioned her?” asked Wei, with animation. “What is she like? Is she anything like you?”
“She is the very image of me.”
“What! In height and features and ways?”
“The very image, so that people have often said that if we changed clothes each might pass for the other.”
“What a good-looking girl she must be!” said Wei, laughing. “But, seriously, I have not, as you know, yet set up a household; and if your sister has not received bridal presents, I would beg to be allowed to invite her to enter my lowly habitation. What does my elder brother say to my proposal?”
“I don’t know what my sister would feel about it,” said Jasmine. “I would never answer for a girl, if I lived to be as old as the God of Longevity.”
“Will you find out for me?”
“Certainly I will. But remember, not a word must be mentioned on the subject to my father, or, in fact, to anybody, until I give you leave.”
“So long as my elder brother will undertake for me, I will promise anything,” said the delighted Wei. “I already feel as though I were nine-tenths of the way to the abode of the phenix. Take this box of precious ointment to your sister as an earnest of my intentions, and I will keep the arrow as a token from her until she demands its return. I feel inclined to express myself in verse. May I?”
“By all means,” said Jasmine, laughing.