Inscription:
“If untutored about bamboo and orchids, the paintings will not come; facing the winter window (one sees) the early plum-blossom open. In this painting of blossoming plum I studied the plum and came close to capturing its nature, inscribing a small poem in sixteen characters at the beginning.
On flowing water at Crescent Village, eternal beauty is reflected. Within the women’s quarters spring brings trouble; buying grass shoes they go to enjoy the blossoms. Children love them but do not speak of them, for close friends are few. The grasses speak but those who understand them are few. Distinguished clearly at a single glance, emotions are overturned; as in a dream unreality is produced, sweeping regrets away. When lonely, inspect them beneath the eaves of the house, fondle them with a laugh, and then draw them on the basis of a loving draft. I painted this on the basis of my loving draft, using an old tune to lodge my extreme affection for them.
During the twelfth lunar month of the year 1734 during the Yongzheng reign-era, I painted this in a cottage in the east of Panghua Village. Zheng Xie, the man from Xinghua called Banqiao.”
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