Writing books and biographies
After the New Year, spring arrived.
Atractylodes macrocephala was assigned to a shift, covering half a day of Pan Cheng's consultations.
Just as it was time to end her shift, a female official arrived. Seeing that it was Bai Shu, a young woman, who was making house calls, she asked, "Is Lord Pan not here?"
“My senior sister has changed shifts and isn’t on duty today,” Bai Shu explained. “I’m her junior sister, Bai Shu. You can tell me whatever you need.”
The tall, slender female official looked Bai Zhu up and down a few times and said, "It was Ruan Yeting who sent me to see Lord Pan. It's not a serious illness, but I haven't been sleeping well lately. Please prescribe some calming medicine for me."
Bai Shu thought it was insomnia, and after asking a few questions, he was about to take her pulse and prescribe a calming medicine when he saw that the female official surnamed Cao was just standing to the side without sitting down. Bai Shu invited her to sit down, but the female official Cao said, "We who serve in front of the emperor are used to standing."
Bai Zhu said, "You need to take the pulse."
Left with no other choice, Lady Cao used a handkerchief as a pad and placed her wrist on the pulse pillow.
Bai Shu asked her, "Is your work always this meticulous, sir?"
Lady Cao said, “More than that. Serving before the Emperor allows no room for error. Even a needle and thread, a bottle and a painting must be done in a fixed and orderly manner. I can’t feel at ease unless I check them seventy or eighty times a day. Even after I’ve checked them, I still can’t put my mind at ease and can’t sleep well at night.”
As she looked around the room, Lady Cao frowned and said, "It's too messy."
"Huh?" Bai Shu looked around, not seeing anything wrong, and said, "Is everything alright?"
Seeing that Bai Zhu was feeling unwell, the female official Cao helped him adjust his posture and said, "The book should be on the bookshelf. What's the point of putting it on the table?"
"Eh..." Bai Shu wanted to say that those were the books she brought with her, and that she still needed to read them when there were no patients.
But as soon as she opened her mouth, Lady Cao frowned even more and scolded Bai Shu, "Is this a place for you to read? If you're going to read, do it after your shift. And take the teacup back. How can you keep your own things in a place where you're on duty?"
Bai Shu remained silent, watching as the female official Cao pointed and gestured around the room as if surveying her own territory.
"This stool needs to be placed directly opposite the desk. Look, where is it leaning? It needs to be in a fixed position!"
Bai Shu looked at the stool speechlessly. It had been tilted when the previous palace servant got up, and the cushion on the stool was probably still warm.
Lady Cao walked towards the cabinet again, but couldn't reach it with her arm, so she stood on tiptoe, touched the top of the cabinet with her finger, and said angrily, "Look at this, it's covered in dust. How does your Imperial Medical Bureau clean it on a daily basis? And look at your inkstone, you should put the lid on when you're not using it, so that dust doesn't accumulate."
Bai Shu: "..."
Bai Shu felt he roughly understood why this female official, Cao, couldn't sleep.
Bai Shu got up and quickly kicked the wastepaper basket to the corner of the wall—it contained medical records she had torn up and thrown away after making a mistake.
Bai Zhu used his body to block the wastebasket so that the female official Cao wouldn't see him, and replied, "You're right, sir. We will definitely rectify this. I'll prescribe a medicine for you to calm your nerves and soothe your liver."
This marks the end of an era for this great figure.
No sooner had Lady Cao left than Second Brother Yiqiancao arrived leisurely, carrying a walnut in his hand.
As soon as she entered the room, Yiqiancao asked Baizhu with a smile, "I've come to see how it went for Junior Sister's first day of seeing patients?"
Yiqiancao often had Baizhu attend meetings for him. He was easygoing, and Baizhu had a good relationship with him. She showed him the day's medical records and mentioned Lady Cao.
“I can prescribe some calming and sleep aids, but the root of her illness…” Bai Shu shrugged and pursed his lips. “I don’t know what to do.”
“That’s how it is for people who work in the inner court,” Yiqiancao said, having seen it all before. She instructed Baishu, “Remember this: we imperial physicians are in a service profession. Whatever problem we are asked to solve, we solve it. That’s what it means to do our job well.”
Bai Zhu asked, "Isn't that just treating the head when it hurts and the foot when it hurts?"
The moneywort asked in surprise, "It can cure a headache and a foot ache, and you're still not satisfied?"
Bai Shu was speechless for a moment, then said after thinking for a while, "Yes, I'm content."
As she spoke, Yiqiancao finished reading through Baizhu's medical records and shook her head, saying, "Junior Sister, you can't treat patients like this."
Is something wrong?
"When you write a prescription, don't follow the example of Senior Sister Pan and Senior Sister Qiu. They're like immortals who only need to feed themselves; they have businesses to support themselves on top of their salaries. You're not planning to rely on your family to supplement your income while you're working, are you?" Yiqiancao placed the two prescriptions side by side in front of Baizhu and said, "If you write prescriptions like those two, no amount of salary will be enough to cover the costs. Revise them."
Bai Zhu, puzzled, asked, "How do I change it?"
Pointing to the two prescriptions, Yiqiancao asked her, "Look at these two people, what's the difference?"
Very... different.
Symptoms, diagnoses, and syndrome differentiations all differ, making it difficult to identify Atractylodes macrocephala.
Yiqiancao said, "This prescription should be for the Lady Cao you just mentioned, the official who serves in the Imperial Palace. And this prescription, for cold and dampness syndrome caused by washing clothes in cold water all year round, should be for the laundry servants in the Inner Palace. But you prescribed Suanzaoren Decoction for Lady Cao and Duhuojisheng Decoction for the laundry girl. Did you even consider the cost?"
Bai Shu shook his head blankly.
“And your dialectic is not good either.” Yiqiancao only said it was not good, not wrong. He said, “Put those medical books aside and go to Fang Cheng to borrow the details of the Palace Relief Order. Only after you have studied it thoroughly can you be considered a doctor. You should know that the knowledge in the palace is not within the ‘Prescriptions Worth a Thousand Pieces of Gold’, but outside of the prescriptions.”
Bai Shu asked in confusion, "Senior Sister Pan and Senior Sister Qiu didn't say that, and neither did Senior Sister Shen, Senior Sister Fang, Senior Sister Lang, and Senior Sister Su."
"You compare yourself to them?" Yiqiancao smiled at Baizhu while holding a glossy, round walnut. "Do you even know who they are?"
Bai Shu naively said, "I only know that the Su in Senior Sister Su is the Su from the Duke of Huai's Mansion. Her father is the Palace Gate Sima Ling. Senior Sister Fang should be the grand-nephew of Fang Gongfeng?"
Yiqiancao clicked her tongue at Baizhu's ignorance: "You know, Dianxian's ancestor was the Marquis of Changning, the Grand Marshal. Even a starved camel is bigger than a horse; Xiaofu's mother's surname is Jin, the paper-making Jin of the wealthy merchants in Jiangnan; Senior Sister Pan is the orphan of Pan Gongfeng, receiving annual government relief. As for Shen Gongfeng, just think about her surname, there's no need to say more."
Bai Zhu was dumbfounded. So, they were all second-generation rich kids with connections in higher places?
Yiqiancao patted Baizhu on the shoulder and admonished her, "Junior Sister, remember this well: we imperial physicians are in the service industry. We serve patients below and the court above. There are no meetings that are not worthwhile. You should study Fang Cheng's things thoroughly first."
Bai Shu knew that her second senior brother was also teaching her how to do things.
But Bai Shu also understood why her master, Wan Gongfeng, wouldn't let her learn her second senior brother's "sly" methods.
Bai Shu thanked Qian Yicao and said, "I remember, senior brother."
From that day on, Bai Zhu learned that a physician must not only remember the properties and flavors of medicinal herbs, but also the price of each herb; and that prescriptions should not only be composed of principal, assistant, adjuvant, and guide herbs, but also of cold, warmth, heat, and cold.
When Bai Zhu wasn't on duty, she would still visit Tai Shi Yi, who was busy moving books and was panting heavily.
"Ouch, slow down, slow down." Seeing Taishi Yi carrying a tall stack of books, Bai Shu was afraid she would hurt her back, so he helped her out. "What are you doing?"
Taishi Yi rubbed his lower back and said, "It's all because of those six detailed rules from a while ago. Everything has to be put in its designated place. Not even a pen or piece of paper can go out of bounds. It's so troublesome."
Bai Shu thought of Lady Cao and asked the Grand Historian, "Then what about you..."
"As for the inspection," said Taishiyi, "these books will be placed on the shelf when they are inspected, and then brought back after the inspection is complete."
“This is physically demanding work,” Bai Shu commented.
Taishi Yi shrugged. "Who can argue with that?"
Taishi Yi invited Bai Shu to sit down, poured her tea, and served her food.
Bai Shu, holding his teacup, asked thoughtfully, "Shi Xiaoyi, I feel that the world is not quite what I expected."
Taishi Yi remarked with deep feeling: "I also feel that the words of noble people are too difficult to understand. I feel like I can't even speak properly anymore. Sometimes I think it would be better to just get married."
Bai Shu and Tai Shi Yi talked about the palace servants' relief order, and also about the "account" that her senior brother Yi Qian Cao had calculated for her.
Each had their own difficulties, and the two sighed in unison.
“Sister,” Taishi Yi slapped her thigh, mysteriously rummaged through the chests and cabinets, and brought out a small booklet to show Bai Shu, saying, “I thought of the young lady from the Zheng family who made tofu. As a female historian, I am to record the history in red ink and the words and deeds of the empresses and concubines. But the vast harem has three thousand women, and it’s not just the empresses and concubines. I want to write about young lady Zheng, I want to write about my Shangguan, I want to write about you and me, and I want to write about the thousands upon thousands of ordinary people who are not recorded in the history books.”
Bai Shu's eyes lit up, and she praised Tai Shiyi's idea repeatedly. "There's also Lady Cao and the laundry maids," she added to Tai Shiyi's list one by one, "not limited to the palace, but also the Jiaofangsi, and my neighbor Wang the butcher's sister... Come with me to the Imperial Medical Academy, I have many senior sisters, Senior Sister Pan, Senior Sister Qiu, Senior Sister Su, Senior Sister Fang, and also Xiao Fu, Qing Yan, Shao Yin, Zhi Fang, and my master and senior brothers, you can write about them all!"
"My sisters understand me perfectly!" Tai Shiyi clapped her hands, exclaiming with delight, "You help me think of a name, how about 'Chronicles of the Palace'?"
Bai Shu thought for a moment and shook his head, saying, "Too young. The world is full of all kinds of people, and we should not be bound by the confines of the palace."
"Too."
The two whispered among themselves for a long time, but couldn't come up with any extraordinary name, so they had to put it aside.
"Forget it, forget it, I don't want to think about it anymore." Taishi Yi crumpled up some waste paper and threw it into the wastebasket. "I'm hungry, let's go eat."
April arrived in the blink of an eye, and the Imperial Medical Bureau recruited new staff.
"Junior Sister" Bai Zhu has a "Little Junior Sister". One day, Bai Zhu had just finished her shift when Xiao Fu grabbed her and started gossiping: "Did you know that Yang Gongfeng's granddaughter came to our Imperial Medical Academy!"
The news that Yang Gongfeng's granddaughter was going to join the Imperial Medical Bureau spread like wildfire, and within half a day, all the female physicians knew about their new colleague.
Lang Dianxian said, "I heard that Miss Yang started learning at the age of three, recognized the properties of medicinal herbs at the age of four, and could compose prescriptions at the age of five!"
Xu Qingyan and Lin Shaoyin clicked their tongues in amazement as they cracked sunflower seeds: "So amazing?"
Chang Zhifang exclaimed, "It's a family tradition of learning."
Bai Shu: "..."
These words sounded familiar, and Bai Shu didn't want to comment. It was as if she saw herself from last year, and she covered her face.
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