DONGJING MENG HUA LU / 卷五
民俗
The city reads its people.
Volume V opens with custom — the closest Meng comes to sociology. What a seller carried and wore announced the work before a word was spoken; a tea bottle marked the neighborly round; and a restaurant would lend silverware valued in the hundreds of taels to a customer it recognized.
READ THE STREET ↓00 / THE RECOGNITION TABLE
Dress was the occupation, worn.
The entry names trades and their tells, then closes with its own thesis: among the hundred households of the walks, clothing kept to its proper form, and anyone on the street could identify what they were looking at (便認得是何色目). The rows below are the entry's own examples.
The wrappers of the incense shops.
頂帽披背The clerks of the pawnhouses.
皂衫角帶 · 不頂帽Drug sellers and diviners — each fully capped and belted.
皆具冠帶Even beggars had their standards; visible slack was not tolerated by the street.
亦有規格The thesis row: every walk and household kept to its own dress, daring not to cross outside it.
各有本色 · 不敢越外01 / THE TEA NETWORK
Neighbors, tea, and strangers.
The entry then turns from reading people to standing by them: crowds defending outsiders from bullying, mediators throwing themselves into disputes, newcomers lent gear and guided to goods — and the daily round of the tea bottles.
提茶瓶之人
The tea-bottle carriers, going door to door on the neighborhood round.
互相支茶
Neighbors drew tea from one another daily — exchange as contact.
相問動靜
And asked after one another's comings and goings — the network's quiet purpose.
The silver ladder
正酒店戶
The proper wine house observed a petty shop drawing wine three or so times — repeated dealing, the text's own measure of familiarity.
見腳店三兩次打酒借與三五百兩銀器
Then it dared lend silver implements whose transmitted value reads 三五百兩 — hundreds of taels, in the text’s own approximate phrasing — the reading the Siku witness supports and this page locks.
COLLATION / 三五百兩 · NOT 二五百兩貧下人家
Poor households calling for wine at a shop were likewise served in silver; for overnight drinking, the silverware was collected the following day.
亦用銀器供送1. Dress, defects, and the daily round.
凡百所賣飲食之人，裝鮮淨盤合器皿，車簷動使，奇巧可愛，食味和羹，不敢草略。其賣藥賣卦，皆具冠帶。至於乞丐者，亦有規格。稍似懈怠，眾所不容。其士農工商諸行百戶衣裝，各有本色，不敢越外。謂如香舖裹香人，即頂帽披背；質庫掌事，即著皂衫角帶不頂帽之類。街市行人，便認得是何色目。加之人情高誼，若見外方之人為都人凌欺，眾必救護之。或見軍鋪收領到鬥爭公事，橫身勸救，有陪酒食簷官方救之者，亦無憚也。或有從外新來，鄰左居住，則相借動使，獻遺湯茶，指引買賣之類。更有提茶瓶之人，每日鄰里互相支茶，相問動靜。
WORKING TRANSLATION
Vendors of every kind of food kept their trays, vessels and gear fresh and clean, delightful and ingenious; the flavors of their cooking were harmonious, never careless. Drug sellers and diviners all wore caps and belts. Even beggars had their standards: any slackness was not tolerated by the crowd. Among the hundred households of the walks, farmers, artisans and merchants alike, dress kept to its proper form, none daring to cross outside it — as when the incense wrappers of the incense shops wore caps over their backs, or the pawnhouse clerks wore black shirts with belts and no cap. People in the street could tell at a glance what they were. And the human warmth ran high: if an outsider was bullied by the capital's people, the crowd would certainly defend him; if a dispute was taken in at a military post, some would throw themselves into the mediation — there were even those who brought wine and food to see the matter settled, without fear. Newcomers living next door were lent implements, offered tea, and told where to buy. And there were the tea-bottle carriers: every day the neighbors drew tea from one another and asked after one another's news.
GALOK READING
The entry's sociology runs on visibility. A trade declared itself at a distance — gear, dress, bearing — so a stranger could be placed before any words were exchanged. The same visibility governs the moral economy: slackness is 眾所不容, intolerance by the crowd, and the outsiders who touch the capital's people find the crowd on the other side. The page keeps the boundary between what the text states (dress signaled category) and what it never states (any statute requiring it).
2. Silver, lent on recognition.
凡百吉凶之家，人皆盈門。其正酒店戶，見腳店三兩次打酒，便敢借與三五百兩銀器。以至貧下人家，就店呼酒，亦用銀器供送。有連夜飲者，次日取之。諸妓館只就店呼酒而已，銀器供送，亦復如是。其闊略大量，天下無之也。以其人煙浩穰，添十數萬眾不加多，減之不覺少。所謂花陣酒池，香山藥海。別有幽坊小巷，燕館歌樓，舉之萬數，不欲繁碎。
WORKING TRANSLATION
For households holding any celebration or mourning, the doors were always full. When the keeper of a proper wine house saw a petty shop drawing wine from him three or so times, he dared lend it silver implements valued in the text’s own phrasing at three hundred to five hundred taels — an approximate figure, not a modern quotation. Even poor households calling for wine at a shop were served from silver; for overnight drinking, the silverware was collected the following day. The singing houses only called for wine at the shops, and were served from silver all the same. Such breadth and largeness existed nowhere else under heaven. So dense was the human smoke that adding tens of thousands made the city no fuller, and subtracting them left it no thinner. What they called a parade ground of flowers and a sea of wine, a mountain of incense and an ocean of drugs. And besides all this were the hidden lanes and small alleys, the banquet halls and singing towers, numbering ten thousand — too many to recount.
GALOK READING
The silver ladder is the entry's quietest argument. Nothing is signed; the loan is triggered by observation — three or so purchases — and its security is the borrower's face. The page presents this as the text's own picture of commercial trust while refusing to convert 三五百兩 into modern money: the figure is the entry's own estimate of value at stake. The closing hyperboles — ten thousand towers, a city that cannot be filled — are Meng's, and the page lets him keep them.
Where the witnesses divide.
The Siku witness prints 三五百兩; Gutenberg prints 二五百兩. The page adopts the stronger Siku reading per the research lock and records the split.
The dispute-mediation clause contains a phrase both witnesses transmit identically but which resists clean segmentation. The page quotes it as transmitted and keeps its translation conservative — no invented bureaucratic role.
Gutenberg prints 車簷; the Siku transcription prints 車檐. The page follows the Gutenberg working text here, consistent with the load-word choice collated in Entry 39.
The walks and trades of the city, each with its proper dress.
The category a stranger's appearance announced.
The carriers on the neighborhood tea round — contact, not mail.
Licensed great houses and the small shops that drew wine from them (Entry 13).
Three to five hundred taels of silverware lent on recognition.
Meng's own name for the city's abundance; quoted, not unpacked.
Entry 40 begins Volume V with the city's operating surface: dress that identified you, neighbors that stood by you, silver that moved on a familiar face. Nothing here is legislated and nothing is licensed — the order is made of recognition, repetition and reputation, and Meng records it as simply the way the capital behaved.
所謂花陣酒池，香山藥海。04 / SOURCE TRAIL
The observations are textual. The sociology is editorial.
The primary text is read against the Siku-family witness (Kanripo KR2k0111, 卷五) and the Gutenberg transcription #24137. The 三五百兩 reading follows the Siku witness per the research lock; the dispute-mediation phrase remains unresolved and is translated conservatively.