Skip to main content

The Picture Horse.

A CERTAIN Mr. Ts‘ui, of Linch‘ing, was too poor to keep his garden walls in repair, and used often to find a strange horse lying down on the grass inside. It was a black horse marked with white, and having a scrubby tail, which looked as if the end had been burnt off; and, though always driven away, would still return to the same spot. Now Mr. Ts‘ui had a friend, who was holding an appointment in Shansi; and though he had frequently felt desirous of paying him a visit, he had no means of travelling so far. Accordingly, he one day caught the strange horse and, putting a saddle on its back, rode away, telling his servant that if the owner of the horse should appear, he was to inform him where the animal was to be found. The horse started off at a very rapid pace, and, in a short time, they were thirty or forty miles from home; but at night it did not seem to care for its food, so the next day Mr. Ts‘ui, who thought perhaps illness might be the cause, held the horse in, and would not let it gallop so fast. However, the animal did not seem to approve of this, and kicked and foamed until at length Mr. Ts‘ui let it go at the same old pace; and by midday he had reached his destination. As he rode into the town, the people were astonished to hear of the marvellous journey just accomplished, and the Prince sent to say he should like to buy the horse. Mr. Ts‘ui, fearing that the real owner might come forward, was compelled to refuse this offer; but when, after six months had elapsed, no inquiries had been made, he agreed to accept eight hundred ounces of silver, and handed over the horse to the Prince. He then bought himself a good mule, and returned home. Subsequently, the Prince had occasion to use the horse for some important business at Linch‘ing; and when there it took the opportunity to run away. The officer in charge pursued it right up to the house of a Mr. Tsêng, who lived next door to Mr. Ts‘ui, and saw it run in and disappear. Thereupon he called upon Mr. Tsêng to restore it to him; and, on the latter declaring he had never even seen the animal, the officer walked into his private apartments, where he found, hanging on the wall, a picture of a horse, by Tzŭang, exactly like the one he was in search of, and with part of the tail burnt away by a jossstick. It was now clear that the Prince’s horse was a supernatural creature; but the officer, being afraid to go back without it, would have prosecuted Mr. Tsêng, had not Ts‘ui, whose eight hundred ounces of silver had since increased to something like ten thousand, stepped in and paid back the original purchase money. Mr. Tsêng was exceedingly grateful to him for this act of kindness, ignorant, as he was, of the previous sale of the horse by Ts‘ui to the Prince.

畫馬

臨清崔生,家窶貧。圍垣不修。每晨起,輒見一馬臥露草間,黑質白章;惟尾毛不整,似火燎斷者。逐去,夜又復來,不知所自。崔有好友,官於晉,欲往就之,苦無健步,遂捉馬施勒乘去。囑屬家人曰:「倘有尋馬者,當如晉以告。」既就途,馬騖駛,瞬息百里。夜不甚餤芻豆,意其病。次日緊啣不令馳;而馬蹄嘶噴沫,健怒如昨。復縱之,午已達晉。時騎入市廛,觀者無不稱歎。晉王聞之,以重直購之。崔恐為失者所尋,不敢售。居半年,無耗,遂以八百金貨於晉邸,乃自市健騾以歸。後王以急務,遣校尉騎赴臨清。馬逸,追至崔之東鄰,入門,不見。索諸主人。主曾姓,實莫之睹。及入室,見壁間挂子昂畫馬一幀,內一匹毛色渾似,尾處為香炷所燒,始知馬,畫妖也。校尉難復王命,因訟曾。時崔得馬貲,居積盈萬,自願以直貸曾,付校尉去。曾甚德之,不知崔即當年之售主也。

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

The wonderful pear-tree

Once upon a time a countryman came into the town on market-day, and brought a load of very special pears with him to sell. He set up his barrow in a good corner, and soon had a great crowd round him ; for everyone knew he always sold extra fine pears, though he did also ask an extra high price. Now, while he was crying up his fruit, a poor, old, ragged, hungry-looking priest stopped just in front of the barrow, and very humbly begged him to give him one of the pears. But the countryman, who was very mean and very nasty-tempered, wouldn't hear of giving him any, and as the priest didn't seem inclined to move on, he began calling him all the bad names he could think of. " Good sir," said the priest, " you have got hundreds of pears on your barrow. I only ask you for one. You would never even know you had lost one. Really, you needn't get angry." "Give him a pear that is going bad ; that will make him happy," said one of the crowd. "The o...

The Legend of The Three-Life Stone

The Buddhist believe metempsychosis, or the migration of the souls of animated beings, people's relationships are predestined through three states of life: the past, present, and future life. Legend has it that there's a road called Yellow Spring Road, which leads to Fogotten River. Over the river there's a bridge called Helpless Bridge (Naihe Bridge), at one end of the bridge sits a crimson stone called Three-life Stone. When two people die, they take this route to reincarnation. if they carve their name on the Three-life Stone together while they pass the stone, they are to be predestined to be together in their future life. Although before their rebirth they will be given a MengPo Soup to drink and thereby their memory of past life are obliterated. In reality, San-Sheng Shi (三生石), or Three-Life Stone is located beside Flying Mountain near the West Lake, Hangzhou. On the stone, there is seal with three Chinese characters that say "The Three-life Stone," and a de...

The Fox and The Tiger

ONE day a fox encountered a tiger. The tiger showed his fangs and waved his claws and wanted to eat him up. But the fox said: 'Good sir, you must not think that you alone are the king of beasts. Your courage is no match for mine. Let us go together and you keep behind me. If the humans are not afraid of me when they see me, then you may eat me up.' The tiger agreed and so the fox led him to a big high-way. As soon as the travellers saw the tiger in the distance they were seized with fear and ran away. Then the said: 'You see? I was walking in front; they saw me before they could See you.' Then the tiger put his tail between his legs and ran away. The tiger had seen that the humans were afraid of the fox but he had not realized that the fox had merely borrowed his own terrible appearance. [This story was translated by Ewald Osers from German, published by George Bell & Sons, in the book 'Chinese Folktales'.  Osers noted that this story was ...