水陸之珍 Delicacies of Water and Hill
漁翁道：「你山青不如我水秀，受用些好物。有一《鷓鴣天》為證：渔翁道：「你山青不如我水秀，受用些好物。有一《鹧鸪天》为证：
樵夫道：「你水秀不如我山青，受用些好物。亦有一《鷓鴣天》為證：樵夫道：「你水秀不如我山青，受用些好物。亦有一《鹧鸪天》为证：
逐句解 Line by line
Said the fisherman: 'Your green hills are no match for my clear waters — and mine yield the better things to enjoy. I have a lyric to Partridge Sky to prove it:'
Round two, and the fisherman narrows the argument to dinner. 受用 is to enjoy the use of a thing, to get the good of it, and the 些好物, 'some fine things,' are the delicacies the lyric is about to reel off. 《鷓鴣天》 (Zhègūtiān, 'Partridge Sky') is another well-worn 詞牌. (為 in 為證 is wéi.)
In this immortals' country of cloud and water, a livelihood is easily had; ply the oars, moor the boat athwart the stream, and there is home.
仙鄉, 'land of immortals,' gilds what is in fact a working river. 足生涯 is 'enough to live on,' 擺櫓 is to work the sculling-oar, and 便是家 is the shrug that ends the line: and that is home.
Fresh-scaled fish cut open live and green turtle stewed; on the instant, purple crabs steamed and red shrimp boiled.
鮮鱗, 'fresh scales,' stands in for the fish itself; 綠鱉 is the green-shelled soft-shell turtle; 旋 is 'on the spot, straight away.' The line is less description than menu.
Green reed-shoots, sprouts of floating-heart, and better still, water-chestnuts and gorgon-fruit.
荇 (xìng) is floating-heart, an aquatic herb, and 菱角 the water caltrop. 雞頭, literally 'chicken head,' is the seed-pod of the gorgon plant, named for the shape of the thing. 可誇 is 'worth boasting of,' which is after all the whole point of the exercise.
Tender lotus-root and ripe lotus, the young leaves of water-celery; arrowhead tubers, wild-rice stems, and the blossoms of the marsh-flower.
慈菇 (cí gū) is arrowhead, an edible tuber, and 茭白 the swollen stem of wild rice, still sold as a vegetable today. 鳥英花 names a marsh blossom nobody has securely identified; it is glossed here simply as a water-flower. The 」 closes the fisherman's lyric.
The woodcutter said: 'Your clear waters are no match for my green hills, and mine too yield the better things. I also have a lyric to Partridge Sky to prove it:'
亦有, 'I also have,' is the formula that opens every rejoinder. The woodcutter will now meet the water-catalogue phrase for phrase with a catalogue of the hills. (為 in 為證 is wéi.)
Towering ranges and steep ridges run out to the edge of the sky; a thatched hut, a grass hermitage — that is my home.
崔巍 is towering, lofty, and 草舍茅庵 a thatched hut and grass hermitage. The move is to answer a boat-home with a mountain hut.
Salted and cured fowl and geese outdo your crabs and turtles; river-deer and wild sow, hare and deer, beat your fish and shrimp.
The competitive verbs carry the line: 強 and 勝 both mean 'to beat, to outdo,' and both are aimed straight across the road at the fisherman. 醃臘 is salt-cured, winter-preserved meat; 豝 (bā) is a wild sow and 獐 the musk-deer.
Leaves of fragrant toon, sprouts of the golden chinaberry, and better still, bamboo shoots and mountain tea.
香椿 is the toon tree, whose young leaves are still eaten in spring, and 楝 (liàn) the chinaberry. Hill-plants capping water-plants, phrase against phrase.
Purple plums and red peaches, ripe mume and apricot; sweet pears, sour jujubes, and the blossom of the sweet-olive.
梅杏 is the Chinese plum, or mume, together with the apricot; 木樨 (mù xī) is the sweet osmanthus, the fragrant olive whose scent still announces autumn across southern China. Orchard and hillside close the round, and the 」 ends the lyric.
Round two swaps Butterflies in Love with Flowers for Partridge Sky, and the argument narrows from the general ease of the recluse's life to the specific question of what is on the table. The fisherman recites the bounty of the water, fish and turtle and crab and shrimp and a long train of edible water-plants; the woodcutter answers, phrase against parallel phrase, with the yield of the hills: cured fowl and game, wild greens, bamboo shoots, orchard fruit.
Most of the pleasure here is in the names themselves, and many of them belong to humble marsh and mountain foods that rarely get into serious poetry. The verbs 強 and 勝, 'to outdo, to surpass,' keep the rivalry on the surface, so that each catalogue arrives not as description but as rebuttal. This delight in listing the sheer plenty and particularity of the natural world is one of the novel's signature habits, and it returns every time the story stops to look at something.