Wang Lan (206-278) was born in Lin-i, in modern Shantung Province. Lan's father Wang Jung had one wife who bore a son named Wang Hsiang before she died. Then the father remarried; the second wife was Lan's mother. The second wife made her stepson do all the dirty chores like cleaning up cattle droppings, and hard work like carrying water. She also found excuses to scold him. Lan respected and loved his older brother, and always thought his mother picking on his stepbrother for no reason wasn't fair. He would tell his mother to be better to Hsiang.
Also, when his mother found an excuse for hitting Hsiang, Lan would stand next to his stepbrother to be hit himself. His mother would stop hitting to keep from hitting her own beloved son. Besides this, Lan went out of his way to help his brother with the chores. Even after the brothers got married, Lan's mother still favored Lan's wife, and always ordered Hsiang's wife to do all the women's chores. When this happened, Lan would have his own wife help out her sister-in-law.
After the brothers' father died, Hsiang, because he had great ability, became a government official. The stepmother was very jealous of Hsiang's success and fame, and once when they were eating put poison in a cup of wine for Hsiang, to kill him. Lan knew the wine had poison in it, and grabbed away the cup and brought it near his mouth to drink it; Hsiang was afraid his innocent brother would die, and quickly grabbed the cup to drink it; the brothers pitied each other and each didn't want his brother to die from the poison; so the cup was pulled back and forth. When the mother saw that, she thought of her own son drinking the poisoned wine, so she pulled so the wine was spilled on the floor, stopping the fight.
People today still praise Wang Lan, who not only helped his brother with the chores, but took up his own life to save his brother.
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