It is clear that at an early date wood was regarded as preferable to pottery as a material for sepulchral furniture, for the _Yin-yang tsa tsu_,[36] written in the eighth century, states that "houses and sheds, cars and horses, male and female slaves, horned cattle, and so forth, are made of wood." Indeed, the decree of 741 notwithstanding, wood seems to have become the standard material for grave implements from this time onward. Thus, Chu Hsi of the Sung dynasty taught in his Ritual of Family Life "the custom of burying the dead with a good many _wooden_ servants, followers, and female attendants, all holding in their hands articles for use and food"; and the contents of the Ming graves included "a furnace-kettle and a furnace, both of _wood_, saucer with stand, pot, or vase, an earthen wine-pot, a spittoon, a water basin, an incense burner, two candlesticks, an incense box, a tea-cup, a tea-saucer, two chopsticks, two spoons, etc., two _wooden_ bowls, twelve _wooden_ platters, various articles of furniture, including bed, screen, chest, and couch, all of wood; sixteen musicians, twenty-four armed lifeguards, six bearers, ten female attendants; the spirits known as the Azure Dragon, the White Tiger, the Red Bird, and the Black Warrior; the two Spirits of the Doorway and ten warriors--all _made of wood_ and one foot high." These were among the implements permitted in the tombs of grandees; the regulations of 1372 allowed only one kind of implement in the tombs of the common folk. From the foregoing passages it may be inferred that wood superseded pottery to a very great extent in the funeral furniture of the Sung and Ming periods, and consequently that the tombs in which a full pottery equipment has been found are most probably not later than the first half of the T´ang dynasty. Needless to say, the wooden paraphernalia rapidly perished under the ground, and while the pottery implements have preserved their original form and appearance, the wooden objects have mostly disintegrated. An amusing fragment of folklore, translated by de Groot[37] from the _Kuang i chi_, "a work probably written in the tenth century," will form a fitting conclusion to this note, revealing as it does the thought of the Chinese of this period with regard to the burial customs which we have discussed:--