Chinese Fairy Tales and Fantasies (Pantheon Fairy Tale and Folklore Library) (29 page)

The ghosts ascended the hall of justice to report on their mission. They were commanded to reunite the body and present it. The ghosts pushed the halves together, rejoined Hsi, and dragged him along the street. He could feel the strain on the seam where he had been sawed, for it ached and threatened to split open again. He stumbled and fell before he could move a step. One of the ghosts took a silk ribbon from his waist and gave it to Hsi, saying, “In recognition of your filial piety.” Hsi tied it on, and
instantly his body felt vigorous and free of pain. He ascended the hall and prostrated himself.

There the king of the dead repeated his question. Afraid to incur further suffering, Hsi answered simply, “I shall not press the charges.” The king immediately ordered him sent back to the world of the living. Escorts led him out the north gates, showed him the way home, and left. Hsi concluded that the officers of the dead were even more lawless than those in the world of the living. He could think of no way that he might reach the ear of the Highest, but he was determined to try.

It was widely held in the world that the god Erh Lang of Kuank’ou township in Szechuan was a relative of the Highest—of God in Heaven. Hsi Fang-p’ing decided that if he could appeal to Erh Lang, who was regarded as both astute and upright, a miracle was still possible. Glad to be free of the two escorts, Hsi turned and went south. But two men caught up with him and said, “The king guessed that you would not go home, and he was right.” They bundled him back to the king of the dead.

Hsi expected the king to be angrier than ever and the consequences to be even worse. But the king’s expression was not severe at all. “Your intentions are sincerely filial,” he told Hsi. “I have already redressed the wrong your father suffered. By now he has been reborn into a family of wealth and status. You will not have to appeal any further. We’re sending you home with one thousand pieces of silver and a guarantee that you will live to the age of one hundred years. Are you satisfied?”

The king recorded this in the registry of life and death and set his huge seal upon it. Hsi was invited to inspect the entry personally. He expressed his appreciation and withdrew. The two ghosts accompanied him, but when they reached the road they began to drive him along and curse him. “What a cunning villain you are! Making us dash all over the place until we’re nearly dead! Any more trouble from you, and we’ll throw you in the mill and grind you to bits.”

Hsi opened his eyes wide and yelled at them, “What’s this madness, you devils? You think I can endure being sawed in half but not the sting of your lashes? Let’s go back to see the king. If he has ordered me home, you need not trouble yourselves to escort me.” Hsi started running back the way they had come. This alarmed the ghosts, who spoke gently to him and persuaded him to resume his journey. As they went, Hsi purposely slowed
his pace and rested often by the roadside, but the ghosts did not complain.

In about half a day they reached a hamlet. The ghosts sat down to rest in front of a house with a door that was slightly ajar. Hsi seated himself on the threshold, and the ghosts caught him un-awares and pushed him inside the door. When he had gotten control of himself, he discovered that he had been born again an infant. He cried in indignation, refused his mother’s breast, and perished in three days.

Separated from his reincarnated body, Hsi Fang-p’ing’s nebu-lous soul wavered. Yet he did not forget about Erh Lang, the god from Kuank’ou. Hsi’s soul had moved a dozen miles along the road when it was surprised by an approaching cavalcade: banners and spears blocked the way. Ducking across the highway to avoid it, he ran into the bearers of the imperial regalia and was seized by the front horsemen. They bound him and brought him before a chariot, which held a magnificent young man. “Who are you?” he asked Hsi.

Since the young man seemed to be a great minister, Hsi related his woes in detail. He ordered Hsi freed and told him to follow the chariot. Presently they arrived at a place where a dozen officials greeted them by the side of the road. The minister questioned each of them, then pointed to Hsi and told one official, “Here is a man from the world below who wishes to lodge a complaint. The matter should be resolved quickly.”

Only then did Hsi learn from the entourage that the god in the chariot was the Ninth Imperial Prince of Heaven and that he had assigned Erh Lang to the case. Hsi examined Erh Lang closely. He was tall and slender and had a great beard, quite different from what the world of men pictured. After the Imperial Prince had gone, Hsi followed Erh Lang to a courthouse, where he found his father Lien, and Old Yang, together with the underlings from the kingdom of the dead.

Soon some prisoners came out of the cage-carts: the city god, the governor, and the king of the dead himself! They were interrogated then and there in each other’s presence, and all Hsi Fang- p’ing’s charges were confirmed. The three officials trembled in fear, cowering like rats. Erh Lang drew his pen and immediately passed sentence, and the text was shown to all the parties:

The god Erh Lang turned to Hsi Lien and said, “We are mindful of your son’s devotion and your own gentle nature and therefore grant you a thirty-year extension among the living.” Erh Lang assigned two officers to escort father and son home to their hamlet. Hsi Fang-p’ing copied the text of the decision and read it with his father on the way.

When they reached home, Hsi Fang-p’ing came to himself first. He had his father’s coffin opened and the body examined. It was stiff and icy, but after a few days it gradually warmed and at last revived. Hsi searched for the copy of Erh Lang’s writ, but it had vanished into the Unseen.

The Hsi household prospered. Within three years they had extended their fertile acres throughout the countryside, while the fortunes of Yang’s descendants declined until their buildings and farms came into the possession of Hsi. Once a villager bought one of the Yang fields. That night he was scolded in his dreams by a god for taking what belonged to Hsi. The villager ignored the warning, but after he had planted the field and reaped less than a peck of grain, he resold the land to Hsi. Hsi Lien himself lived beyond ninety years of age.

The Recorder of Things Strange says: Everyone speaks of paradise, forgetting that the living and the dead are worlds apart, and that every sense or thought is lost in death. Not knowing whence he comes, how can man know whither he goes, much less the events of repeated deaths and rebirths? Thus how great the accomplishment of young Hsi Fang-p’ing, whose loyalty and filial love stayed firm through an eternity!

—
P’u Sung-ling

Toward the end of the Ming Dynasty the Shantung region was filled with bandits, and every township had to post soldiers for protection. Whenever a bandit was caught, he was swiftly executed. In one township called Chanch’iu there was a soldier who carried an extremely sharp sword. When he struck, it seemed as if he were drawing the blade through empty air, touching neither flesh nor bone.

It happened that ten bandits were captured and brought to the Chanch’iu authorities. One of the prisoners recognized the soldier with the sharp sword and sidled up to him. “They say your sword is so sharp it can cut off a man’s head in a single stroke,” he ventured. “I wonder if you would execute me.”

“Very well,” replied the soldier. “But take care to stay close to me. Don’t get separated.” The bandit followed the soldier to the execution grounds. The soldier drew his sword, flourished it, and in a flash cut the prisoner’s head off. It rolled several feet and was still turning when it exclaimed admiringly, “Some sharp sword!”

—
P’u Sung-ling

When Chuang Tzu was going to Ch’u he saw a hollow skull, a shape gleaming white. He stirred it with his whip and spoke, “Have you come to this, good sir, lusting for life and losing all order and reason? Was it through the overthrow of your state? Or through the executioner’s axe? Was it bcause of misconduct that brought shame to your entire family? Or perhaps from hunger and cold, or simply the length of your years?”

With these words Chuang Tzu took up the skull, made himself a pillow with it, and went to sleep. During the night the skull appeared to him in a dream and said, “You spoke to me like a pedantic debater. And what you described were the heavy cares of human life, which the dead do not have. Would you like to know the meaning of death, my friend?”

Chuang Tzu said yes, and the skull continued, “The dead have no king above them and no subjects below them; neither have they the toil of the seasons. Only heaven and earth limit their span of time. Even the southward-facing sovereigns have no pleasures surpassing these.” Doubtfully, Chuang Tzu said, “Suppose I were to have the fates restore your physical form—the bones, the flesh, the skin—and return you to your family, your neighbors, and your friends. Would you be willing?”

The skull seemed to frown as it said, “Do you think I would throw away the pleasures of sovereignty to go back to the wearisome world of men?”