Zhai Zhong monopolized the government of Zheng, to the great trouble of the earl, who employed Zhong's son-in-law, Yong Jiu [this Yong Jiu had come to Zheng with Tu from Song, and married a daughter of Zhai Zhong] to kill him. Jiu proposed doing so at a feast which he was to give Zhong in the suburbs, but Yong Ji [Jiu's wife, and Zhong's daughter] became aware of the design, and said to her mother, "Whether is a father or a husband the nearer and dearer?" The mother said, "Any man may be husband to a woman, but she can have but one father. How can there be any comparison between them?" She then told Zhai Zhong, saying, "Yong is leaving his house, and intends to feast you in the suburbs and there kill you; I got him to tell me by guile." On this Zhai Zhong killed Yong Jiu, and threw away his body by the pool of the Zhou family. The earl took it with him in his carriage, and left the State, saying, "It was right he should die, who communicated his plans to his wife!" Thus in summer duke Li quitted Zheng, and fled to Cai.
Once upon a time a countryman came into the town on market-day, and brought a load of very special pears with him to sell. He set up his barrow in a good corner, and soon had a great crowd round him ; for everyone knew he always sold extra fine pears, though he did also ask an extra high price. Now, while he was crying up his fruit, a poor, old, ragged, hungry-looking priest stopped just in front of the barrow, and very humbly begged him to give him one of the pears. But the countryman, who was very mean and very nasty-tempered, wouldn't hear of giving him any, and as the priest didn't seem inclined to move on, he began calling him all the bad names he could think of. " Good sir," said the priest, " you have got hundreds of pears on your barrow. I only ask you for one. You would never even know you had lost one. Really, you needn't get angry." "Give him a pear that is going bad ; that will make him happy," said one of the crowd. "The o
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