ghosts gradually fade away either into non-existence or into a state of Nirvana-like quiescence. A childless old man who has property is in China, as in the West, the object of the most tender solicitude on the part of brothers and cousins with large families. They are continually impressing upon him the gravity of his offence in not providing for the succession and for the suitable disposal of his property, and unceasingly urge the claims of this nephew or that to formal adoption. If the old man has chosen a boy or young man for whom he happens to have affection, and if the choice meets with general approval, then every one is happy, and an adoption deed is drawn up and attested by all the near relatives. But if his choice falls on one who is considered to be too distant a connection for adoption, or if the elders of the clan for some other reason object to the proposal, then the old man is in a difficulty, for he is not entirely a free agent in the matter. He might get an adoption deed drawn up without consulting any one, but if it were not properly attested by his relatives it would be treated by them as null and void. Adoption, no less than the sale of land, is an affair not of the individual but of the family. Disputes of this kind are the not infrequent cause of lawsuits. An old man once complained before me that though the youth he wished to adopt belonged to the proper generation (that is, the generation immediately junior to that of the adopter) and was not an only son, and though both the youth and his father had agreed to the adoption, yet the other relatives had held aloof when they were invited to sign the adoption deed, and had absolutely refused to take any part in the proceedings. This implied, of course, that when the time came they would refuse to recognise the legality of the adoption. He therefore besought me to compel or persuade the obstinate relatives to come to a more reasonable frame of mind. "I am now eighty-one years old"--so ran the preamble of his petition--"and I do not know how long I have to live. When morning dawns I cannot be sure that I shall see the evening; in another day my eyes may be closed for ever; and if I die with the bitter knowledge that for me there will be no ancestral sacrifices, then, indeed, miserable shall I be down in the Yellow Springs [of death]." It is of course impossible to decide such cases without taking into full account the nature of the objections raised by the relatives: they are often selfish, but as a rule they are not baseless or frivolous.