It is better that I died. In a moment we'll be eating supper, and yet she is eating toasted beans. She'll eat us poor!"
Her great-granddaughter Six Pounds, who was just then coming toward the supper table, thought better of it at the sight of the querulous woman. She ran to the river's edge and hid behind a tallow tree. Then she put out her little head adorned with two hornlike braids and said in a loud voice, "The old Would-Not-Die!"
Though old Mrs. Nine Pounds was of venerable age, she was not very deaf. However, she did not seem to have heard her granddaughter, and continued, "This proves that each generation is worse than the last!"
This village has a peculiar custom. When a baby is born, it is usually weighed and the weight in pounds[1] becomes the milk name[2] of the infant. After old Mrs. Nine Pounds had celebrated her fiftieth birthday she gradually became one of those who mourn for the good old times. When she was young, she said, the weather was not as hot as now, nor were the beans quite as hard. Her perpetual theme was that the world today is all wrong. Moreover, Six Pounds weighed three pounds less at birth than her great-grandfather, and one pound less than her father Seven Pounds. To the old lady these were indisputable proofs of her contention. Therefore she repeated with emphasis, "Truly, each generation is worse than the last!"
Her grand daughter-in-law Sister Seven Pounds came up with the rice basket as this sentiment was repeated and emphasized. She plumped down the basket on the table and said
