Our tale relates that Tripitaka took his leave of the king of Purpuria, put saddle and horse in order, and pressed on westward. They travelled over hills and plains past counting, wore their way through waterways without end, and before they knew it autumn had gone and winter worn thin, and the bright beauty of spring had come round once more.
Master and disciples were walking the road, treading the green and taking in the view, when all at once a grove with a hermitage in it came into sight. Tripitaka rolled from the saddle, dismounted, and stood at the side of the highroad.
“Master,” asked Pilgrim, “this road is level and holds nothing untoward. Why do you not go on?”
“Elder brother,” said Eight Rules, “how little you understand of feelings. The master has sat on that horse till he is worn through. Let him get down and take a little air, why not.”
“It is not for the air,” said Tripitaka. “I see a household over there, and I have a mind to go myself and beg a little plain fare.”
Pilgrim laughed. “Listen to the master — where does talk like that come from? If you want food, I will go and beg it. The common saying has it: one day a teacher, a lifetime a father. Where is the sense in the disciple sitting up high while the master is packed off to beg?”
“That is not how it stands,” said Tripitaka. “On ordinary days one looks out and sees neither edge nor end, and off you go to beg with no thought for far or near. Today the house is right at hand, near enough to call and be heard. Let me go and beg one this time.”
“The master has no judgement in him,” said Eight Rules. “As the common word goes: three men go out, and the youngest one suffers. You are of the father's generation besides, and we are all of us disciples. The old books say: when there is work, the young bear the labour. Let old Pig go.”
“Disciples,” said Tripitaka, “the weather today is clear and bright, quite unlike those times of wind and rain. On days of that sort, you must of course go far afield. This household is close at hand. Let me go. Food or no food, I can turn straight round and we take the road again.”
Sha Monk, standing by, laughed. “Elder brother, no need for more talk. The master's temper is set this way; there is nothing to gain by crossing him. Vex him, and even if you do beg the food and fetch it back, he will not eat it.”
Eight Rules did as he was told, brought out the alms bowl at once, and changed his master's robe and cap for him. Off he strode, straight up before the farmstead to look it over; and a handsome spot to live it was, too. Behold:
A stone bridge rearing high;
ancient trees ranged in ranks.
A stone bridge rearing high, and murmuring waters running out to meet a long stream;
ancient trees ranged in ranks, and chattering hidden birds calling to the far peaks.
Beyond the bridge, a few beams of thatched cottage, so clean and so elegant it might be an immortal's hermitage;
and there besides a window of woven reeds, so white and so bright it shames a Daoist cloister.
And before the window, all at once, four lovely women — every one of them there embroidering phoenixes and tracing simurghs at their needlework.
The Elder, seeing that the household held not one man but only four women, did not dare go in. He held himself still and slipped in under the tall trees. He saw only that those women, every one of them —
Chamber hearts as firm as stone,
orchid natures glad as spring.
Tender faces set off by red cloud,
vermilion lips evenly touched with crimson.
Moth eyebrows, a small moon laid crosswise;
cicada tresses, fresh cloud piled high.
Let them stand among the flowers,
and the roving bees would take them for the real thing.
He waited the better part of an hour, and the place grew quieter still — not a chicken, not a dog. “If I have not the skill to beg one meal,” he thought, “those disciples of mine will laugh at me. They will say: if the master cannot beg up a dinner, how are the disciples to go and worship Buddha?”
The Elder, at his wits' end, and carrying some sense of being in the wrong himself, quickened his step up onto the bridge. A few steps more, and he saw that inside the thatched place stood a climbing-rose pavilion, and beneath the pavilion were three more women, kicking a leather ball about. Look at those three women: set beside the other four, they were of quite another make. Behold them:
Kingfisher sleeves flying;
pale-yellow skirts trailing.
Kingfisher sleeves flying, and low beneath them the slender jade bamboo-shoots;
pale-yellow skirts trailing, and half out from under them the narrow golden lotuses.
Form and bearing complete at every point;
in motion and at rest, a thousand turns of heel and slipper.
Head-catches beyond all counting, running high and low;
the wide float comes over true and exact.
A turn of the body kicks a Flower-Over-the-Wall;
a step back flips it into a Great-Crossing-of-the-Sea.
Lightly she takes a Lump-of-Clay;
single-spear, and quick into a Facing-Crook.
A Bright-Pearl up onto the Buddha's Head;
a solid pinch brings up the Pointed-Boot.
At Narrow-Brick she is especially deft;
at Lying-Fish the foot spreads wide.
Level-Waist, a bend of the knee and down into a crouch;
Twist-Crown, the heel lifted in the slipper.
At Pull-the-Stool she can put on a fine show;
at Over-the-Shoulder she is wonderfully free.
Crossed-Crotch, back and forth as she pleases;
Locked-Neck, swaying along with it.
What she kicks is a Yellow-River-Runs-Backward;
a Buy-It-On-Goldfish-Sands.
That one mistakes it for a Header;
this one spins and goes straight into a Crook-Strike.
Square and upright she takes it on the shin;
straight on, the toe comes in to strike.
Heel lifted, she flicks it off the straw sandal;
a backward stab, and a Turn-and-Gather.
A step back into a Shoulder-Dress;
the Hook, and only one Bad-Foot.
The Pedlar's-Basket comes down long;
then she takes the Gate-Snatch in hand.
And when the kicking reaches the heart's content,
the lovely women all cry out together.
Every one of them with sweat running and powder gone slick, soaking through the silk;
spirits flagging, appetite gone, and only then do they call it enough.
There is no end to the telling of it; and there is a poem in proof:
Kickball on the field in the third month of spring;
an immortal wind blows down these plain-robed beauties.
Sweat wets the powdered face, a flower holding dew;
dust stains the moth eyebrows, a willow trailing mist.
Kingfisher sleeves hang low, sheltering the jade shoots;
pale-yellow skirts drag aside, showing the golden lotus.
Kicked out at last and tender with exhaustion,
cloud-tresses loosened, the jewelled coil gone askew.
Tripitaka watched a good long while, then had no choice but to walk up onto the bridgehead. He raised his voice and called, “Lady bodhisattvas, this poor monk is here to beg a little food, as chance provides.”
Hearing him, the women were delighted, every one of them. They threw down their needlework, dropped the ball, and came out to meet him all smiles and chatter. “Elder, forgive us for not coming to greet you. Now that you have come to our poor farmstead, we would certainly not stop a monk on the road and turn him away. Please come inside and sit.”
“Excellent, excellent!” said Tripitaka within himself. “The West is the very land of the Buddha. If even women here are mindful of feeding monks, how could the men not turn devout hearts to the Buddha?”
The Elder made his bow of greeting and went into the thatched house with the women following about him. Past the climbing-rose pavilion he looked about him — and oh! It turned out there were no rooms in there at all, no halls, nothing. This is what he saw:
Ridge-tops rearing high;
earth-veins running far.
Ridge-tops rearing high, reaching up to touch the cloud and mist;
earth-veins running far, running through to the sea and the sacred peaks.
The gate close by a stone bridge, nine bends and nine turns of running water looking back on it;
the garden planted with peach and plum, a thousand stems and a thousand heads vying in lush bloom.
Vines and creeper hung over three trees and five;
iris and orchid scattering their scent through ten thousand flowers and a thousand more.
Seen from far off, the grotto-mansion puts the Isle of Penglai to shame;
seen close to, the hills and woods press down on Mount Tai Hua itself.
This is exactly the place a demon-immortal picks to hide in:
no neighbours anywhere, a household standing on its own.
One of the women stepped forward, pushed the two leaves of the stone door open, and invited the Tang monk to sit inside. The Elder had no choice but to go in. Raising his head to look, he saw the place was set out with stone tables and stone benches, and the air in it was cold and dim. The Elder took fright. “This place has little of good in it and much of ill,” he said to himself. “It is certainly not wholesome.”
The women smiled and laughed, and all of them said, “Elder, please be seated.” The Elder, having no way out of it, could only sit down. After a little while, he gave a shiver.
“Elder, which blessed mountain are you from?” the women asked. “And what are you collecting for? Is it for mending bridges and repairing roads, for raising temples and paying reverence at pagodas — or is it for casting Buddha images and printing scriptures? Bring out your subscription book and let us have a look.”
“I am not a monk out collecting alms,” said the Elder.
“If you are not collecting,” said the woman, “then what have you come here for?”
“I am one sent from the Great Tang in the Eastern Land to the Great Thunderclap in the Western Heaven, to seek scriptures,” said the Elder. “Passing through your excellent country, my belly grew empty, so I have come to your gracious house to beg a single meal. Then this poor monk will be on his way.”
“Good, good, good,” said the women. “As the common word has it: a monk from far away is the one who reads the sutras well. Sisters — do not be slack about it. Get the meal on, quickly.”
Three of the women stayed to keep him company, talking this way and that, discussing points of doctrine. The other four went into the kitchen, hitched up their clothes and pulled back their sleeves, lit the fire and scoured the pan.
And what do you suppose they were preparing? It was human fat rendered down and human flesh boiled: cooked to a black paste and passed off as wheat gluten, and human brains gouged out and fried into squares of beancurd.
Two dishes were carried over and set down on the stone table. “Please,” they said to the Elder. “At such short notice we have not managed to prepare anything good. Make do with a little of this to fill you up. There is more coming to follow it.”
The Elder gave it a sniff, caught the rank and gamey smell of it, did not dare open his mouth, and rose slightly with his palms together. “Lady bodhisattva, this poor monk has been vegetarian since the womb.”
“Elder, this food is vegetarian,” said the women, smiling.
“Amitabha Buddha!” said the Elder. “If that is what vegetarian food looks like, then this monk who eats it may give up all thought of ever setting eyes on the World-Honoured One or laying hands on the scriptures.”
“Elder, you are one who has left the household life,” said the women. “You must not pick and choose among those who give alms.”
“I would not dare, I would not dare,” said the Elder. “This monk travels west by the decree of the Great Tang, and along the whole road I have not harmed the smallest living thing, and have helped whatever suffering I met; where I have come upon a grain of corn I have picked it up with my hand and eaten it, and where I have come upon a thread of silk I have stitched it together to cover myself. How should I dare pick and choose among those who give?”
The women laughed. “Elder, you may not pick and choose among people, but you have a fair bit of coming-to-the-door-and-finding-fault about you. Do not turn your nose up at plain fare. Eat a little of it, do.”
“Truly I dare not eat it,” said the Elder. “I am afraid of breaking my vows. I beg you, bodhisattvas: keeping a thing alive is not so good as setting it free. Let this monk go out of here.”
The Elder struggled to get away, but the women barred the door — as if they would let him out. “Business that walks in at your own door is not to be turned down,” they all said. “You have let the fart out; no use clapping your hand over it now. Where do you think you are going?”
Every one of them had some skill at arms, and they were quick with hand and foot. They seized hold of the Elder, walked off with him as easily as leading away a sheep, and knocked him flat on the ground. The others held him down, bound him up with rope, and hung him high from the roof beam.
This particular way of hanging somebody has a name. They call it the Immortal Points the Way. It went like this: one arm out in front, drawn up on a thread; one arm bound round the waist, hauled up with a rope. Both legs back, hoisted on a third rope: three ropes holding the Elder up against the beam, his back turned upward and his belly turned down.
The Elder bore the pain and held back his tears, hating it silently in his heart. “What a bitter fate this monk has. I only said I would beg a meal at a good house — how was I to know I had dropped into a fire-pit? Disciples! Come quickly and save me, and we may still see one another; but be two double hours late, and my life is over.”
Wretched as the Elder was, he still kept an eye on those women. Once they had him hanging properly, they went off and began stripping their clothes. The Elder took fright. “If they are taking their clothes off like this,” he said inwardly, “they mean to give me a beating. Or else they mean to eat me raw, that could be it too.”
In fact the women only loosened the gauze shifts on their upper bodies, baring their bellies, and each showed her power: from the hollow of every waist there came pouring out a silken cord, thick as a duck's egg, gurgling forth, spitting jade and flying silver, and in no time at all the farmstead was curtained over and hidden from view.
Now Pilgrim, Eight Rules and Sha Monk were all waiting beside the highroad. The other two were minding the horse and watching the luggage, but Pilgrim, being a restless creature, was up in the trees, swinging from the branches, picking leaves and hunting for fruit. He turned round all at once and saw a sheet of light. In alarm he sprang down out of the tree and hollered, “This is bad, this is bad — the master's luck has run low!” He pointed with his hand. “Look at that farmstead — what do you make of it?”
Eight Rules and Sha Monk turned their eyes on it together: that sheet was like snow and brighter than snow, like silver and more lustrous than silver.
“That's done it, that's done it,” said Eight Rules. “The master has run into a monster. Let's go quickly and save him!”
“Brother, don't shout,” said Pilgrim. “You cannot see what is going on. Wait for old Sun to go.”
“Elder brother, be careful,” said Sha Monk.
“I have my own way of managing it,” said Pilgrim.
That fine Great Sage tightened his tiger-skin kilt, drew out his gold-banded cudgel, stretched his stride and in two or three paces was up at the front of the place. He saw that the silk cords were wound a thousand layers thick and more, threaded through and crossed over, for all the world like warp and weft on a loom. He pressed it with his hand and gave it a push: it was sticky and soft and clung to the skin. Pilgrim had no idea at all what the stuff was.
He raised the cudgel at once. “This one blow — never mind a few thousand layers, if there were tens of thousands I would smash straight through.” He was about to strike when he checked his hand. “If it were hard I could break it, but this soft stuff — all I would do is flatten it. Suppose I startle them and they wrap up old Sun instead — that would be no good at all. Let me put a question or two first, and hit it afterwards.”
And whom do you suppose he asked? He made a magic sign with his fingers and recited a spell, and had the old local god hauled up — spinning round and round inside his own shrine like a man pushing a millstone.
“Old man, what are you turning about for?” said the local god's wife. “Looks to me as if you have come down with the goat-staggers.”
“You don't know, you don't know,” said the local god. “There is a Great Sage Equal to Heaven arrived, and I did not go out to receive him — so he is over there hauling me in.”
“Then go and see him and have done,” said his wife. “What are you doing turning circles in here?”
“If I go and see him — that cudgel of his is a fearful weight, and he will hit you whether you have done anything or not.”
“He can see how old you are. Would he really hit you?”
“All his life he has liked drinking on other people's money, and he hits old people for preference.”
The pair of them talked it over for a while, and then there was nothing for it: he had to go out. Trembling, he knelt at the side of the road and called, “Great Sage, the local god of this district makes his kowtow.”
“Get up, get up,” said Pilgrim. “No need for all this fussing. I will not beat you for now. I shall put it on account. Now tell me: what place is this?”
“Great Sage, from which quarter have you come?” said the local god.
“I have come from the Eastern Land, travelling west.”
“Great Sage, coming from the east — have you by any chance been up on that ridge?”
“On that very ridge,” said Pilgrim. “Our luggage and the horse are resting up on that ridge still, are they not!”
“That is called Spiderweb Ridge,” said the local god. “Below the ridge there is a cave, and it is called Spiderweb Cave. And in the cave there are seven monsters.”
“Male monsters or female?”
“Female monsters.”
“And how much power do they have?”
“Your humble god is weak in strength and short in authority,” said the local god. “I do not know how much they can do. All I know is that away to the due south, some three lǐ distant from here, there is a spring called Filth-Cleansing, natural hot water, and it was originally the bathing pool of the seven immortal maidens of the upper realm. Since the monsters came here to live, they have taken over his Filth-Cleansing Spring, and the immortal maidens never once contended with them for it — they simply let them have it, for nothing. When I see heaven's own immortals decline to provoke a demon, I am sure the creature has great power in it.”
“And what do they want with the spring?” said Pilgrim.
“Having taken over the bathing pool, the creatures come out to wash three times a day. The hour of the Snake is past now, and the hour of the Horse is nearly on us.”
Pilgrim listened. “Local god, off you go back. Let old Sun deal with them himself.”
The old local god knocked his head on the ground once, and went trembling back to his own shrine.
This Great Sage worked his own power: with a shake of the body he changed into a speckled fly, and settled on a grass stem at the roadside to wait. In a moment he heard a sound of drawing in and blowing out, for all the world like silkworms eating leaves, or a tide coming up out of the sea. In about the time it takes to drink half a cup of tea, the silk cords were all drawn in, and the farmstead stood out plainly again, looking just as it had at first.
Then he heard a creak as the brushwood gate swung, and out of the laughing and chattering inside came seven women. Pilgrim, watching closely from cover, saw them come over the bridge hand in hand, shoulder against shoulder and sleeve caught in sleeve, talking and laughing — and handsome they certainly were. Behold:
Sweeter of scent than jade;
truer of speech than any flower.
Willow brows sweeping like distant peaks;
sandalwood lips parting on cherry.
Kingfisher feathers standing up at the hairpin head;
golden lotuses flashing under crimson skirts.
Like the moon goddess herself come down to the world below;
like immortal maids fallen into the dust of earth.
Pilgrim laughed. “No wonder my master wanted to come and beg for food here. So this is the sort of good thing on offer. These seven pretty ones — if they had kept my master, he would not have made them a single meal to eat, nor two days' use to use. And if they went at him by turns, one working-over and he would be dead. Let me go and hear what they say, and see what they are planning.”
That fine Great Sage gave a buzz and flew up to settle on the cloud-coiled hair of the woman walking in front. As they came over the bridge, one from behind walked up and called, “Sister, when we have had our bath, let us go and steam that fat monk and eat him.”
Pilgrim laughed to himself. “These monsters have no head for planning. Boiling would save firewood — why on earth would you want him steamed?”
The women picked flowers and played the grass game as they went south, and before long they had come to the bathing pool. And there stood a gate and wall, most handsomely made, with wild flowers scenting the whole ground and orchids crowding thick along every side. One of the women at the back walked forward, gave a whistle, pushed the two leaves of the door open, and there in the middle of it was indeed a pool of hot water.
As for this water. Since the world was split open there had been ten suns by rights. Later Yi, who was a fine hand with a bow, shot down nine of the crows so that they fell to earth, and only the one golden crow was left — which is the true fire of the sun. There are nine hot springs in heaven and earth, and all of them are what those crows turned into. Those nine Yang Springs are: Fragrant Cold Spring, Companion Hill Spring, Warm Spring, Eastern Union Spring, Golden Hill Spring, Filial Peace Spring, Broad Fen Spring, Hot Spring — and this spring, which is Filth-Cleansing Spring.
There is a poem in proof:
One breath through it, knowing neither winter nor summer;
three autumns long, and it pours out spring for ever.
Burning waves like a cauldron on the boil;
snow-white breakers fresh as new-run broth.
Divided channels feed the standing grain;
still pools wash off the dust of the world.
Trickling, it brims like pearl-drop tears;
rolling, it breeds jade in the spittle of the earth.
Smooth to the touch, and never brewed;
clear and level, and warm of its own accord.
Its good fortune is the excellence of the ground itself;
its making is the work of heaven's own truth.
Where lovely women wash, the ice-clear flesh grows smooth;
rinse off the dust and vexation, and the jade body is made new.
That bathing pool was about five zhàng and more across and better than ten zhàng long, with four chǐ or so of depth inside it, and the water so clear you could see straight to the bottom. Down at the bottom the water was like rolling pearls and spilling jade, welling up thick and heavy, and round the sides were six or seven vents for it to run through. It ran off two or three lǐ and flowed down into the fields, and it was still warm water there.
Above the pool there were three bays of pavilion. In the middle bay, up against the back wall, stood a bench with eight legs. And at the two ends stood two clothes racks in coloured lacquer. Pilgrim, hidden and pleased with himself, went buzzing over on a wing and settled on the head of one of the clothes racks.
The women, seeing the water so clear and so warm, wanted at once to bathe. They stripped off their clothes together, hung them on the rack, and went down into it all together. And Pilgrim saw:
Buttons slipped loose,
silk sashes untied.
Soft breasts white as silver;
jade bodies all over like snow.
Elbows and upper arms outdoing spread ice;
fragrant shoulders you would think were moulded out of powder.
Bellies soft and yielding;
backs smooth and clean.
Knees and wrists half a span round;
golden lotuses three cùn narrow.
And at the middle, one stretch of feeling;
showing the hollow where romance lives.
The women all jumped down into the water, leaping through the waves and turning in them, ducking and playing about.
“If I were to hit them,” said Pilgrim, “I need only take this cudgel and give the pool one stir — it would be what they call scalding rats with boiling broth: a whole nestful dead at once. A pity, a pity! Strike and I would strike them dead — only it would bring old Sun's name down. As the common word goes: a man does not fight with a woman. A great fellow like me, killing off a few girls — it would be a poor showing indeed. I will not hit them. I shall just make them a present of a plan to end their line — fix it so they cannot move a step. How would that be?”
That fine Great Sage made the sign with his fingers, said a spell, shook himself and changed into a starving old eagle. Behold:
Feathers like frost and snow;
eyes like the bright stars.
Where the demon fox sees him, its souls all flee;
when the cunning hare meets him, its gall is emptied out with fright.
Steel talons keen at the edge;
a bold shape and a fierce air across him.
He can put an old fist to work to fill his belly;
he never grudges chasing a thing down with his own hands through the air.
Ten thousand lǐ of cold sky he follows up and down;
through the clouds he picks out his object and goes where he pleases.
With a rush of wings he flew forward, spread his sharp talons, and took the seven suits of clothes hanging on that rack — carried off the lot of them, turned straight back to the ridge top, resumed his own shape, and came to Eight Rules and Sha Monk.
Look at that blockhead — he came up grinning. “So the master has been and got these out of the pawnshop!”
“How do you make that out?” said Sha Monk.
“Can't you see our elder brother has come back with a pile of clothes he's snatched off them?”
Pilgrim put them down. “These are clothes the monsters were wearing.”
“How is it there are so many?”
“Seven suits.”
“How did you get them stripped off so easily, and so cleanly?”
“There was no stripping about it,” said Pilgrim.
“It turns out this place is called Spiderweb Ridge, and that farmstead is called Spiderweb Cave. In the cave there are seven female monsters. They have taken my master prisoner and hung him up inside, and they have all gone off to the Filth-Cleansing Spring to bathe. That spring is a thing heaven and earth produced of themselves, a pool of hot water. Their plan is to have their bath and then steam my master and eat him.
“I followed them there, and when I saw them take their clothes off and go into the water I wanted to hit them — but I was afraid of fouling my cudgel, and afraid too of bringing my name down. So I never used the cudgel at all: I just turned into a starving old eagle and made off with their clothes. They are all swallowing their shame and hiding their faces, not daring to come up, squatting there in the water. Let us go quickly and cut the master down, and get on the road.”
Eight Rules laughed. “Elder brother, whenever you do a thing you leave a root behind. You saw the monsters — why did you not beat them to death, instead of going straight off to untie the master? Even if they hide their shame now and stay in, they are certain to come out by nightfall. They will have old clothes at home. They will put a set on and come after us.
“And even if they do not come after us — they live here for good, and when we have fetched the scriptures we come back along this same road. As the common word goes: better to be short of road-money than short of road-fists. Come that time, they block the way and make a scene — will they not be enemies then?”
“Then what do you propose?” said Pilgrim.
“If it were up to me: kill the monsters first, then go and release the master. That is what they call cutting the weeds and pulling out the roots.”
“I am not going to hit them,” said Pilgrim. “If you want to hit them, you go and hit them.”
Eight Rules shook himself up, delighted with the whole business, hoisted his muck-rake, stretched his stride and went straight off there at a run. He shoved the door open to look, and there were the seven women squatting in the water, cursing that eagle for all they were worth. “That flat-feathered brute! That cat-chewed corpse! Carried off every stitch we had — how are we supposed to do anything now?”
Eight Rules could not hold it in. He laughed. “Lady bodhisattvas — having a bath in here, are we? Take a monk along with you and let me have a wash too — how about it?”
The monsters saw him and said in a fury, “You monk — this is grossly improper. We are women who keep to the house; you are a man who has left the household life. The old books say: from seven years old, boys and girls do not share a mat. How can you possibly bathe in the same pool as us?”
“The weather is hot, there is nothing for it, just let me have a bit of a wash,” said Eight Rules. “What are you trotting out the book-bag for — same mat, not the same mat!”
The blockhead would hear no more of it. He threw down the muck-rake, pulled off his black brocade habit, and jumped into the water with a splash. The monsters were furious and came at him together to strike. What they did not know was that Eight Rules is thoroughly at home in water. Once in, he shook himself and turned into a catfish spirit.
The monsters set to groping for the fish and could not lay hands on him: grope to the east, and off he slipped westward; grope to the west, and off he slipped eastward. Slithery as anything, he went darting about between their legs. Now that water was chest-deep. They swam about on the surface for a while and then round about the bottom, until every one of them was worn out with turning, gasping for breath, all their strength gone out of them.
Eight Rules only then jumped up out of the water, resumed his own shape, put on his habit, took up the muck-rake and shouted, “And who am I, then? You took me for a catfish spirit!”
The monsters saw him and were struck to the heart with terror. “You came first as a monk,” they said to him, “then in the water you turned into a catfish, and when we could not catch you, here you are got up like this again. What in truth are you, and where have you come from? You must give us your name.”
“You pack of filthy monsters really do not know me,” said Eight Rules. “I am the disciple of the Tang Elder who goes from the Great Tang in the Eastern Land to fetch the scriptures — Marshal of the Heavenly Reeds, Wuneng, Eight Rules, that is who. You have hung my master up in your cave and you are reckoning to steam him for your own enjoyment. My master — and you thought he would steam up nicely? Put your heads out here, quickly, and take a rake apiece — I will finish your line for you.”
The demons heard this and their souls scattered in terror. There in the water they knelt and bowed. “We beg your lordship to be merciful, be merciful! We have eyes without pupils in them. We took your master by mistake, and though we hung him up in there, we never dared put him to torture or make him suffer. We beg you in mercy to spare our lives. We will gladly put up something toward your travelling costs and see your master on his way to the Western Heaven.”
Eight Rules waved a hand. “Don't give me that. As the common saying has it, and it is a good one: once taken in by a gentleman selling sweets, you never again trust a man with a sweet mouth. So: one rake apiece, and then we all go our separate ways.”
The blockhead is coarse all through and thinks only of showing what he can do. Where would he have any tenderness for the fragrant and the fair in him? He raised his rake, made no distinction between good and bad, and rushed forward hacking at them.
The monsters lost the use of their hands and feet in their fright. What did they care now for shame? Their lives were the urgent thing. They covered their shameful parts with their hands as best they could, sprang out of the water, and all ran into the pavilion and stood there working their art: out of the navel of each one there came pouring a silken cord, gurgling out, and they screened off the sky and rigged up a great silk tent with Eight Rules covered over in the middle of it.
The blockhead looked up all at once and could not see the light of day. He turned to make off outside — and how was he to lift a foot? The fact was they had laid down trip-lines. The ground was silk cord all over, and the moment he moved a foot he went sprawling. Go left, and it was a faceful of ground; go right, and it was an upended leek; turn round in a hurry, and he came down with his mouth in the dirt; scramble up quickly, and down he went in a standing dragonfly. There was no telling how many times he came down. The blockhead was knocked numb in the body and weak in the legs, his head spinning and his eyes swimming; he could not so much as crawl, and only lay on the ground groaning.
Having got him trapped, the creatures did not beat him and did not hurt him. One by one they sprang out of the door, screened off the daylight with the silk tent and went back each to her own cave. Reaching the stone bridge they stopped, spoke the true words of a spell, and in an instant the silk tent was gathered in. Stark naked they ran into the cave, covering that thing with their hands, and went past in front of the Tang monk giggling as they went.
They went into the stone room, took out a few old clothes and put them on, then went straight to the back door and stood there and called: “Where are you, children?”
Now those monsters had a son apiece — not born of them, but adopted sons, sworn to them. By name they were called Bee, Hornet, Cockroach-Wasp, Spanish-Fly, Grasshopper, Wax-Insect and Dragonfly: Bee was the honeybee, Hornet was the horse-hornet, Cockroach-Wasp was the lu-wasp, Spanish-Fly was the blister-beetle, Grasshopper was the ox-grasshopper, Wax-Insect was the wax-moth, and Dragonfly was the dragonfly.
The fact was that these monsters had curtained off the sky with their web and caught these seven sorts of crawling thing, meaning to eat them. As the ancients said: birds have bird speech and beasts have beast speech. At the time these insects pleaded for their lives and asked to be allowed to bow to them as mothers. So from then on they gathered a hundred flowers in spring to supply the creatures, and sought out every plant in summer to serve the spirits dutifully.
Hearing a call, they came all at once to the front and asked, “Mother, what are your orders?”
“Children,” said the monsters, “this morning we crossed a monk who has come from the Tang court, and just now we were headed off in the pool by a disciple of his. We came out of it with a great deal of shame, and were within an inch of losing our lives. Put your backs into it, all of you. Go out to the front at once and drive him off. And when you have won, come and find me at your uncle's house.”
Those monsters, having got away with their lives, went off to their elder brother's place, where their poisonous tongues would breed disaster — but that is not our business here.
Now look at these crawling things: every one of them rubbing his fists and smacking his palms, coming out to meet the enemy.
Now Eight Rules had fallen till his head was thick and his wits were dull. He looked up sharply, saw that silk tent and silk cords were both gone, and only then went a step and a feel, a step and a feel, crawled up onto his feet, bore the pain and found his way back the way he had come. Seeing Pilgrim, he caught hold of him. “Elder brother — is my head swollen? Is my face black and blue?”
“What happened to you?” said Pilgrim.
“That lot dropped a net of silk cord over me and laid down trip-lines. There was no telling how many times I went down. I have fallen till my back is bent double and I cannot move an inch. It was only when the tent and the cords were both gone that I got my life back and came away.”
Sha Monk saw him. “That's done it, that's done it — you have brought trouble down on us. Those monsters will certainly have gone back to the cave to do the master harm. Let us go quickly and save him.”
Pilgrim heard this and set off at once with a long stride; Eight Rules led the horse. They came up to the farmstead in a hurry, and there on the stone bridge were seven little monsters barring the way. “Not so fast, not so fast — we are here for you.”
Pilgrim looked. “How funny. The whole lot of them are tiny little people. The tallest of them is only two chǐ five or six cùn, not a full three chǐ; and the heaviest only eight or nine catties, not a full ten.” He shouted, “Who are you?”
“We are the sons of the seven immortal maidens,” said the monsters. “You have insulted our mother, and you still have the nerve to come and beat on our door. Don't run off. Look out for yourselves.”
Good monsters — they all came swarming forward to fight. Eight Rules, whose temper was up after his fall, saw what dainty little things these crawlers were and set to in a rage with his rake. Those monsters saw how fierce the blockhead was, showed their true forms one and all, flew up into the air and cried, “Change!” In a moment one became ten, ten became a hundred, a hundred became a thousand, a thousand became ten thousand, and every one of them became a number beyond counting. And here is what they saw:
Wax-moths flying all over the sky;
dragonflies dancing over all the ground.
Honeybees and hornets after the forehead;
lu-wasps stabbing at the eyes.
Blister-beetles biting front and back;
ox-grasshoppers stinging above and below.
A blackness spreading over their faces;
a whirring that would frighten gods and ghosts.
Eight Rules panicked. “Brother! They told us the scriptures would be easy to fetch — and on the road west even the bugs push people about.”
“Brother, don't be frightened,” said Pilgrim. “Get forward and hit them, quick.”
“They are all over my head and all over my face, up and down my whole body — stung ten layers thick. How am I supposed to hit anything?”
“It's nothing, it's nothing. I have my own way of dealing with it.”
“Brother — whatever the method is, get it out quickly,” said Sha Monk. “In another moment our bald heads will be stung swollen all over.”
That fine Great Sage pulled out a handful of his own hairs, chewed them to fragments, blew them out, and turned them into a lot of Huang, Ma, Dai, Bai, Diao, Yu and Yao.
“Elder brother — what is all this market patter, Huang this and Ma that?” said Eight Rules.
“You don't know,” said Pilgrim. “Huang is the yellow hawk, Ma is the speckled hawk, Dai is the dai hawk, Bai is the white hawk, Diao is the eagle-hawk, Yu is the fish hawk, and Yao is the sparrowhawk. The monsters' sons are seven kinds of insect; my hairs are seven kinds of hawk.”
Hawks are the best of all things at catching insects — a beakful at a time, striking with the claw and beating with the wing. In a moment they had them beaten to the last one: not a trace left in all the sky, and the ground piled a chǐ deep and more.
The three brothers had only just charged over the bridge and gone straight into the cave when they saw their old master hanging up there and snivelling.
Eight Rules came up. “Master — so you came here to get yourself hung up for fun, and never thought what you were letting me in for. Do you know how many times I went down?”
“Cut the master down first and talk afterwards,” said Sha Monk.
Pilgrim took the ropes and cut them through, and let his master down. “Where have the monsters gone?” he asked.
“All seven of them went off round the back stark naked, calling for their sons,” said the Tang monk.
“Brothers — come with me and we will look for them,” said Pilgrim.
The three of them took up their weapons and searched about the back garden. Not a trace of the monsters. They searched all through the peach and plum trees and did not find them.
“Gone. Gone,” said Eight Rules.
“No need to look for them,” said Sha Monk. “Let me go and help the master.”
The brothers came back round to the front and asked the Tang monk to mount.
“You help the master along,” said Eight Rules. “Let old Pig knock this house of theirs down with a few strokes of the rake, so there is nowhere for them to settle when they come back.”
Pilgrim laughed. “Knocking it down is hard work. Better to fetch some firewood and give them a root-and-branch job.”
That fine blockhead went and found some rotten pine, split bamboo, dry willow and withered vine, put a light to it, and the whole place went up roaring and burnt clean away. Master and disciples only then set out again with easy minds.
Ah! And in the end, going on from here, there is no telling whether those monsters will meet good fortune or ill: listen to the explanation in the next instalment.