The Poor Clan

On a snowy night, during a severe drought, a man with nothing, armed with a blunt knife, saved the last half of a jar of food for his family. He smashed half a piece of jade and distributed it to the disciples, saying: Even if the Wei family is begging for food, they must provide a scholar to earn back their family status. In the following more than a hundred years, five generations of the Wei family came one after another. They started their fortunes through speculation in troubled times, and climbed up inch by inch in Yancao, imperial examinations, and court, but there was always a century-old powerful family weighing on their heads. Can this humble man who crawled out of the mud earn his hairpin? And how many people will it take to pave this upward road? Essay on Group Portraits of Our Lady of the Farm