Chapter 395 — The Great Hall
Purple Streets of Chang'an · Page 1 of 4
The Empress Dowager laughed softly and beckoned Dou Yan over. She had a palace maid bring a small stool and set it before her couch, then took Dou Zhiwei's hand and spoke to the assembled company: "You have no idea. The late Emperor was determined to model himself on Emperor Wu of Han, to spread the glory of our Han people, and he was not the least bit soft on the bandits to the west. In twelve years on the throne he fought nine years of war, and drained the treasury so dry that even his own private silver went into the war. He could not even produce gifts for his ministers. There was nothing I could do but scrape together what I could, from east and west, to ease the late Emperor's burdens. That is why both the late Emperor and the present Emperor remember the old Duke of Ying with such gratitude. No sooner had the late Emperor bestowed something than the old Duke would send in a gift in return—and the gift would be richer than the original bestowal. In the end, the Ying Estate of the Pillar of State was dragged into the water as well." Here the Empress Dowager's expression turned grave and dignified.
"When the Emperor ascended the throne and the realm was at peace, the Ying Estate's property was returned. And yet there are still those who, fearing the world is not troubled enough, say the Emperor's favor toward the old Duke of Ying is too great. They do not stop to think—what is the Ying Estate? The adopted son of the founding Emperor, and the Emperor's own clansman!"
To be thin—in physiognomy it usually means a person has no fortune.
The Empress Dowager had summoned Dou Ming before the assembly, only to leave her with such a reputation—better she had never been summoned at all.
Dou Ming resented the whole world, but the one who had said it was the Empress Dowager. Even if she said such things of the Emperor himself, the Emperor could only listen with a smile. Would Dou Ming dare to show impatience?
She could only lower her head in meek compliance.
But the Empress Dowager had reigned supreme in the inner palace too long; there was nothing she did not dare say. A minor consort's wife from outside the palace was, in her old ladyship's eyes, being honored merely by the fact that the Empress Dowager deigned to speak to her at all.
So after meeting Dou Ming she began discussing physiognomy with the Empress: "Why do the portraits of beauties through the ages always show a melon-seed face? Because the truly great ladies were all raised in seclusion, and those scribbling men of letters never saw them. They had to make models of lowborn women instead. What is so fine about a melon-seed face?" As she spoke, the Empress Dowager touched her own cheeks. "Heaven is round and earth is square. The forehead governs fortune, prosperity, longevity, and joy, and if the face tapers from top to bottom with nothing to support it, then the good fortune cannot stay. But look at the portraits of the Empresses and Empress Dowagers of past dynasties enshrined in the Hall of Imperial Ancestry—which one of them does not round out here, her whole face like a full moon, looking so benign and prosperous? Fortune, prosperity, longevity, and joy could not escape her. So a woman is better raised with a little fullness."
What sort of theory was this!
But who in this great hall would dare say the Empress Dowager was wrong?
No one!
Not only that—Lady Changxing Hou immediately thrust her face forward, wreathed in smiles, and said, "I never knew Your Majesty understood such things! Look at me—would you say I count as a face like a full moon?"
She was past forty, and whatever melon-seed or peach-blossom face she had once had had gone slack into a round one.