Chapter 80

The Fair Maiden Nurses the Yang and Seeks a Mate; the Mind-Monkey Guards His Master and Knows the Fiend

The story tells how the king, ministers, and common folk of the Kingdom of Piqiu saw the four of the Tang out of the city, twenty li, and still would not part. Tripitaka got down from the carriage with an effort, mounted, bade them farewell, and went; those who watched them off turned back only when the travelers were lost to sight. The four went a long while, past the death of winter and the end of spring, unable to see the last of the wildflowers and mountain trees, the fragrant scenery. Ahead rose another high mountain and steep ridge. Tripitaka's heart jumped and he asked: “Disciples, has the high mountain ahead a road, or no? Be careful, all of you.” The Pilgrim laughed: “Master, that is no talk for a long-road traveler—that is young princeling talk, frog-at-the-bottom-of-the-well talk. The old saying goes: ‘The mountain does not bar the road; the road makes its own way through the mountain.’ What talk of road or no road?” Tripitaka said: “Though the mountain does not bar the road, I fear that amid the crags some monster may breed, and from the deep thickets a demon may come out.” Bajie said: “Set your mind at rest, set it at rest. Bliss is not far now; I warrant it is all peace and quiet.”

While master and disciples talked they found themselves at the foot of the mountain. The Pilgrim drew the gold-banded staff, walked up the crag, and called: “Master, here is the road that winds around the mountain—it goes as easy as can be. Come, come.” The elder could only take heart and urge his horse. Sha Monk said: “Second brother, take the load a turn.” And truly Bajie took the load and shouldered it; Sha Monk gathered the reins; the old master sat steady in his carved saddle; and they all hurried with the Pilgrim up the great road on the crag. Behold the mountain:

Cloud and fog hooded the peak tops; a running stream gushed in the ravine. The fragrance of a hundred flowers filled the road; ten thousand trees stood thicket on thicket.Plums green, pears white; willows green, peaches red.Where the cuckoo cries, spring is near its end; the purple swallows' murmur—village festivals are done.Jagged crags; pine canopies of kingfisher green. A rough and winding ridge road, abrupt and delicate at once.Sheer walls and hanging crags; fig-vines and mosses thick upon them.A thousand crags vie in beauty like ranks of halberds; ten thousand ravines race their waters, waves rolling far and broad.

The old master, viewing the mountain slowly, heard suddenly the cry of birds, and the thought of home rose in him. He reined in and called: “Disciples!

From Heaven's Tile I carried the decree; beneath the brocade screen I received the rescripts.On Lantern Night, the fifteenth, I left the eastern lands, and just then parted from the Tang king as heaven parts from earth.Hardly had dragon and tiger met in wind and cloud, when master and disciples fell out with the horsemen.I have walked past the twelve peaks of Wu Mountain—when shall my pair come up and I see the sovereign of today?”

The Pilgrim said: “Master, you are always brooding on home—you are nothing like a man who has left the world. Set your mind at rest and let us go; fret no more. The ancients said: ‘If you would have wealth and honor in life, you must put your back into the work.’” Tripitaka said: “Disciple, your words are reasonable; but where is the road to the Western Heaven still?” Bajie said: “Master, the Tathagata grudges those scriptures of the Three Stores; knowing we meant to fetch them, I suppose he has moved them—or how is it we never arrive?” Sha Monk said: “None of that talk. Just follow big brother. Keep putting one foot before the other, and the day of arriving will come at last.”

As master and disciples idled in talk, they came upon a great forest of black pines. The Tang monk was afraid and called again: “Wukong, we have hardly crossed that rugged mountain road and we meet this deep black pine wood? Be careful.” The Pilgrim said: “What is there to fear?” Tripitaka said: “What kind of talk is that? ‘If you will not believe the honest can be honest, guard against the kind being unkind.’ I have walked through several pine woods with you, but never one so deep and far. Look:

East to west they stood close-ranked; north to south they marched in lines.East to west, close-ranked, they pierced the clouds; north to south, in lines, they pressed the blue River of Heaven.Dense and thorny, brambles knotted all around; knotweed wound the branches, coiling up and down.Vine came twining kudzu; kudzu went twining vine.Vine twining kudzu: the traveler from east or west could hardly pass; kudzu twining vine: how should the merchant of south or north press in?Lodge half a year in this wood and you lose the sun and moon; walk a few li and you see never a star.Look: in the shade a thousand scenes; in the sun ten thousand clusters of flowers.There too: thousand-year scholar-trees and ten-thousand-year junipers, cold-enduring pines, mountain peach in fruit, wild peonies, dryland lotus—heaped cluster upon cluster, dense and piled; such a tangle no immortal could paint.And hear the hundred birds: parrots whistling, cuckoos crying; magpies threading the branches, crows feeding their dams in return; orioles dancing, mockingbirds tuning their notes; partridges calling, purple swallows chattering; mynahs mimicking men's speech—and the thrush, too, could read scripture.And see: the great cat swishing his tail, the tiger gnashing his teeth; foxes and wild cats of many a year dressed up as girls, and gray wolves grown old in the wood roaring till the forest rang.Had Heavenly King Li, the Pagoda Bearer, come here himself, demon-queller though he is, his soul would fail.”

The Great Sage Sun, fearing nothing, drove the iron staff ahead to split the great road, and led the Tang monk straight into the deep forest. Free and easy, they went half a day and saw no way out of the wood. The Tang monk called: “Disciples, westward all this while, past numberless mountains and woods and rugged passes, happily this spot is quiet and refined, the whole road peaceable. The strange flowers and rare plants in this wood are truly to one's liking. I would sit here a while: first, to rest the horse; second, my belly is empty—go somewhere and beg a little food for me.” The Pilgrim said: “Master, get down; Old Sun goes to beg the meal.” The elder truly got down; Bajie tied the horse to a tree; Sha Monk set down the baggage, took the alms bowl, and handed it to the Pilgrim. The Pilgrim said: “Master, sit steady and be not alarmed; I go and come.” Tripitaka sat upright beneath the shade of the pines, and Bajie and Sha Monk went off to hunt flowers and fruit for their pleasure.

Now the Great Sage sprang his somersault into mid-air, steadied his cloud-light, turned to look back, and saw in the pine wood an auspicious cloud shimmering, blessed haze wreathing. He cried out suddenly: “Good! Good!” Why did he cry good, do you think? He was praising the Tang monk: a reincarnation of Elder Golden Cicada, a good man refined through ten lifetimes, and so this blessed radiance hooded his head. “If it were I, Old Sun—five hundred years ago, when I wrecked the Heavenly Palace, roaming the sea corners and ranging the sky's ends—I gathered the sprites and called myself the Great Sage Equal to Heaven; I subdued dragons and tamed tigers, and struck my name from the ledger of death. On my head a gold crown of three points; on my body armor of beaten gold; in my hand the gold-banded staff; on my feet the cloud-treading shoes. Under me were forty-seven thousand monsters, all calling me the Old Master Great Sage—I cut a figure in those days. Now I have escaped heaven's calamity, and play the small and humble, and am your disciple. I think: over my master's head the blessed cloud and radiance hang hooded—take him straight back to the eastern lands, and good must come of it; and Old Sun too will surely win his true fruit.”

In the middle of these proud thoughts he saw suddenly south of the wood a column of black vapor, gouting up in gouts. The Pilgrim was greatly alarmed: “In that black vapor there is surely evil. My Bajie and Sha Monk do not send up black vapor.” The Great Sage hung in mid-air, uncertain what to make of it.

Now Tripitaka, sitting in the wood, had cleared his mind to see his nature, chanting the Heart Sutra of Prajna Paramita, when he heard a faint voice crying “Save me!” Tripitaka started: “Blessed, blessed! Who calls in a wood so deep? Some poor soul frightened by wolves and tigers, I suppose. Let me look.” The elder rose and stepped out, threading the thousand-year cypresses and parting the ten-thousand-year pines, gripping vines and clambering creepers, and came up close to look: bound to a great tree was a woman, her upper half lashed to the tree with kudzu vine, her lower half buried in the earth. The elder planted his feet and asked her: “Bodhisattva of the female kind—what business binds you here?” Ah! Plainly the creature was a demon; but the elder had mortal eyes and mortal flesh, and could not know it. At his question the demon's tears gushed like a spring. Look at her: peach cheeks dropping tears, a beauty to sink fish and bring down geese; starry eyes brimming sorrow, a face to hide the moon and shame the flowers. The elder dared not come near, and asked again: “Bodhisattva of the female kind, what sin have you truly done? Tell this poor monk, that he may save you.” With cunning words and honeyed speech, false feeling and feigned care, the demon answered hurriedly: “Master, my home is in the Kingdom of Pinpo, two hundred li and more from here. My father and mother are living, very devout, kind to kin and friends all their lives. It chanced to be the Qingming festival; they invited the kin and the whole family to sweep the ancestral graves. A line of sedan chairs and horses, all come to the open wilds. Before the graves we spread the offerings; the paper horses were scarcely burnt when gongs rang and drums beat, and out rushed a band of brigands, brandishing blades and staves, shrieking as they charged. We were frightened out of our wits. My parents and the kin, with horses and chairs, each fled for life; I, young and unable to run, fell to the ground with fright, and the brigands carried me off into the mountains. The eldest king wanted me for his lady, the second for his wife; the third and fourth too lusted after my beauty, and seventy or eighty households quarreled together, none yielding to another; so they bound me here in the wood and the robbers scattered to their haunts. Five days and five nights have passed; my life is failing; before long I shall be dead. By what ancestors' virtue in some former life, I know not, I have met you today, reverend master. I beg a thousand times your great mercy: save my life, and in the nine springs I will never forget the debt.” With that her tears fell like rain.

Tripitaka, truly tender of heart, could not keep his own tears back; his voice caught, and he called: “Disciples.” Bajie and Sha Monk were hunting flowers and fruit in the wood when they suddenly heard the master call so piteously. The Idiot said: “Sha Monk—the master has found kin of his own in here.” Sha Monk laughed: “Second brother, talk sense. We have walked all this while without meeting a living soul—where would kin come from?” Bajie said: “If not kin, why is the master weeping with someone? Come and see.” Sha Monk truly went back by the old path, led the horse, shouldered the load, and coming up called: “Master, what is this?” The Tang monk pointed at the tree: “Bajie, untie that Bodhisattva of the female kind and save her life.” The Idiot, no weighing of good or bad, went to work at once.

Now the Great Sage in mid-air saw the black vapor thickening, covering the auspicious light altogether, and said: “Bad, bad! The black vapor hoods the blessed light—can it be but a demon harming my master? Begging food is a small matter; let me go see my master first.” He turned his cloud-head, pressed down into the wood, and saw Bajie unwinding the cords in a flurry. The Pilgrim stepped up, seized his ear, and floored him with a thump. The Idiot looked up, scrambled up, and said: “The master told me to save her; why must you throw your strength about and floor me?” The Pilgrim laughed: “Brother, do not untie her. She is a demon, playing tricks to gull us.” Tripitaka shouted: “You brazen monkey, more of your nonsense! How can you know a woman like this for a demon?” The Pilgrim said: “Master, you do not know: this is Old Sun's old trade—the art of wanting men's flesh. How would you know it?” Bajie, lips poked out: “Master, do not believe this Keeper of Heavenly Horses. This woman is of the households here. We come from the far eastern lands and have no quarrel with them; she is no kin of ours—how can he call her a demon? He would have us leave her and go on, then turn his somersault, work his art, come back and do his sly tricks—marrying into the house backward, that is what it is!” The Pilgrim shouted: “Clod, none of your jabber. Old Sun has come west all this way—where would you find shamelessness like yours? A foul-souled wretch like you, who prizes beauty over life and forgets honor for gain, who cannot tell good from bad—you would play the go-between and be bound to a tree yourself for it.” Tripitaka said: “Enough, enough. Bajie, your senior brother is not often wrong. Since he says so, let us have nothing to do with her; we go.” The Pilgrim rejoiced: “Good—the master's life is safe. Mount, and out of the pine wood; there are households beyond, and I will beg you a meal.” The four went on together and left the demon.

Now the demon, bound to the tree, ground her teeth in hate: “For years I have heard men say the Pilgrim Sun's powers are vast, and today I see him—the words were no lie. The Tang monk cultivated as a virgin, the primal yang never spent one drop; I meant to take him and pair with him, and become an immortal of the first rank. Who knew this monkey would see through my art and spirit him away. If they had untied the rope and set me down, I could have seized him as I pleased—would he not have been my man then? And now he is carried off on a scatter of idle words, and my labor goes for nothing. Let me call after him once or twice and see how it falls.” The demon stirred no rope, but took a few words of pitiful, gentle speech and blew them, on a following wind, whining soft, into the Tang monk's ear. And what do you suppose she called? She called: “Master! You who will not save a living soul's life—with a darkened heart, what scriptures would you fetch by worshipping Buddha?”

The Tang monk, on horseback, heard the call again, and reined in at once: “Wukong, go and take the woman down.” The Pilgrim said: “Master, we are on the road—why think of her now?” The Tang monk said: “She is calling again.” The Pilgrim asked: “Bajie, do you hear it?” Bajie said: “My ears hang over them; I hear nothing.” He asked again: “Sha Monk, do you hear it?” Sha Monk said: “I go ahead with the load; I was not minding, and heard nothing.” The Pilgrim said: “Old Sun does not hear it either. Master—what does she call, that only you hear?” The Tang monk said: “She calls with reason: ‘A living soul's life you will not save—with a darkened heart, what scriptures would you fetch by worshipping Buddha?’ ‘To save one life is worth more than building a pagoda of seven stories.’ Go quickly and take her down; that is better than fetching scriptures and worshipping Buddha.” The Pilgrim laughed: “Master, once you take up being kind, there is no medicine for you. Consider: since you left the eastern lands and came west, how many mountain folds have you crossed, how many demons met, that were always carrying you off into caves? It was Old Sun who saved you, staff in hand, beating thousands upon thousands to death. And now one demon's life you cannot spare, and must go save her?” The Tang monk said: “Disciple, the ancients said: ‘Do not fail to do good because it is small; do not do evil because it is small.’ Go save her after all.” The Pilgrim said: “Master, if it must be so—this burden Old Sun cannot carry. If you will save her, I dare not press you hard: press you a while, and you are vexed. Save her as you please.” The Tang monk said: “Monkey head, no more talk. You stay here; Bajie and I go save her.”

The Tang monk went back into the wood and had Bajie untie the upper cords, and dig the lower half of her out with the rake. The demon tapped her shoes, straightened her skirt, and followed the Tang monk out of the pine wood, glad and tripping, and came before the Pilgrim, who only went on laughing coldly. The Tang monk cursed: “Brazen monkey head—what are you laughing at?” The Pilgrim said: “I laugh that in your season you meet good friends, and out of it you meet fair ladies.” Tripitaka cursed again: “Brazen ape, what nonsense. From my mother's womb I have been a monk; now by decree I come west, reverent in worshipping Buddha and seeking scriptures; I am none of your fortune-hunters—when was my luck out?” The Pilgrim laughed: “Master, a monk from childhood you may be, but you know only scripture and the Buddha's name; you have never seen the king's law and its clauses. This woman is young and pretty; we are men out of the world, and if we walk the road with her, and we fall in with some villain who drags us to the magistrate—never mind scriptures and worshipping Buddha, we should all be had up as an adultery case; and lacking that, they would question us for carrying off a person: the master would forfeit his monk's certificate and take a small beating; Bajie would be sentenced to the frontier; Sha Monk to the post-road stations; and I, Old Sun, would not come off clean—wit as I have, plead as I might, I should be had up for contempt.” Tripitaka shouted: “None of that talk. How could saving her life drag us into trouble? Take her along, and for whatever happens, it falls on me.” The Pilgrim said: “Master, you say it falls on you—but do you not know: you would not be saving her, you would be her ruin.” Tripitaka said: “I save her out of the wood and she gets her life; how is that her ruin?” The Pilgrim said: “Bound there in the wood, in three or five days, or ten or fifteen, with nothing to eat, she dies of hunger and her body goes whole to the shades. Take her out now: you ride a swift horse and travel like the wind; we must follow you, but the woman's feet are small and her steps hard—how should she keep up? Drop her once by the way, and if she meets wolves or tigers, one gulp—would that not be the death of her instead?”

Tripitaka said: “True enough—that is a thought owing to you. How shall we manage it?” The Pilgrim laughed: “Take her up before you, and ride her on your horse.” Tripitaka pondered: “How could I share my horse with her?”—“Then how is she to go?” Tripitaka said: “Let Bajie carry her.” The Pilgrim laughed: “The Idiot's fortune is made.” Bajie said: “‘On a long road no load is light.’ To carry a man—what fortune is in that?” The Pilgrim said: “Your mouth is long. Carry her, turn that mouth of yours round, and plot a little love-talk by the way—would that not be handy?” Bajie heard, beat his breast and pranced: “No, no! Let the master beat me a few strokes—I could bear the pain. Carry her on my back and I should never be cleared; senior brother has a lifetime's art of blackening men. I will not carry her—done.” Tripitaka said: “Enough, enough. I can walk a few steps yet; let me get down and go slowly along with her, and let Bajie lead the empty horse.” The Pilgrim laughed aloud: “The Idiot has found himself a trade—the master patronizes you to lead the horse.” Tripitaka said: “Monkey head, more nonsense. The ancients said: ‘A horse may travel a thousand li, but without a man it cannot go alone.’ Suppose I walk slowly on the road—would you leave me and go? If I am slow, you are slow. Let us all go together down the mountain with this Bodhisattva of the female kind, and at some nunnery or cloister, some household, leave her there—so we shall have saved her all the same.” The Pilgrim said: “Master, well said. Forward, quickly.”

Tripitaka walked ahead; Sha Monk shouldered the load; Bajie led the empty horse and conducted the woman; the Pilgrim took the iron staff and held her in check; and so they went. In less than twenty or thirty li the sky darkened toward evening, and they saw a group of towers and halls. Tripitaka said: “Disciples, that must be a nunnery or cloister, a monastery; let us lodge there tonight and go on early.” The Pilgrim said: “Master, well said; every man bestir himself.” In a moment they were at the gate. The Pilgrim gave his orders: “Stand a little way off, all of you; let me go first to beg the lodging. If there is room, I will send some one to call you.” They all stood under the willow shade; only the Pilgrim, iron staff in hand, kept guard over the woman.

The elder strode up close and saw the gate leaning east and west, everything fallen and scattered. Pushing it open and looking, he could not keep the misery from his heart: the long corridors silent, the old monastery desolate; moss filling the courts, weeds choking the paths; only fireflies for lamps, only frogs' voices for the water-clock. Tears fell from the elder suddenly. Truly it was:

The halls withered and fallen; the cloister rooms forlorn and tumbled down.Ten-odd heaps of broken brick and shattered tile, all crooked beams and snapped posts.Green grass grown thick before and behind; the fragrant kitchen rotted and buried in dust.The bell tower caved in, the drum without a skin; the glazed lamp of incense broken.The Buddha's golden body lost its color; the arhats lying tumbled east and west.Guanyin, rain-soaked, all crumbled to clay; the willow and pure vase fallen to the ground.By day, never a monk; by night, nothing but foxes lodged there.You heard only the wind roaring like thunder—it was all a lurking place of tigers and leopards.The walls on every side were down, and not a door leaf to shut.

There is a poem to prove it. The poem says:

For years the old monastery has known no repair: wretched and withered, fallen past mending.Fierce winds have split the guardian's face; great rains have wasted the Buddha's head.The vajras, tumbled and spoiled, take whatever the rain pours; the earth god has no house and is not sheltered at night.And two things more there are to sigh over: the bronze bell lies on the ground, its bell tower gone.

Tripitaka, steeling his heart, walked in through the second gate. The bell and drum towers were both down; only one bronze bell stood planted in the ground, its upper half white as snow, its lower half blue-black as indigo—long years had washed the rain-white into the top, and the earth's breath had drawn bronze-green up from below. Tripitaka laid his hand on the bell and called aloud: “O bell! You too hung in the high tower and roared; your voice rang far from painted beams. At the cock's crow you told the dawn; at day's end you ushered the dusk. Where has the Taoist who cast the bronze gone home? Where does the smith who molded it abide? I suppose their two lives have gone down to the dark world: they are without trace, and you are without sound.”

The elder's praise rang loud, and unknowingly startled someone within the monastery. Within was a Taoist who tended the incense; hearing voices, he scrambled up, took a piece of broken brick, and struck the bell with it, and the bell rang out with a clang. The elder was startled into a fall; scrambling up to go, he caught his foot on a tree root and pitched again. The elder lay on the ground, lifted his head, and called again: “O bell! This poor monk was sighing over you when you rang out of turn. I suppose no traveler has come this western way so long that you have turned into a sprite.”

The Taoist hurried up, took hold of him, and said: “My lord, get up. It is no business of the bell's turning sprite—it was I who struck it.” Tripitaka lifted his head and saw his face ugly and black: “Are you not some goblin or demon? I am no common man: I come from the Great Tang, and I have disciples who subdue dragons and tame tigers. Cross them, and your life will not hold.” The Taoist knelt: “My lord, do not fear. I am no demon; I am the incense-tender of this monastery. Just now I heard my lord praising so kindly, and was coming out to welcome you; but fearing some evil spirit knocked, I took up a piece of brick and rang the bell once to press down the fright before I dared come out. My lord, get up.” The Tang monk gathered himself: “Abbot, you all but frightened the life out of me. Lead me in.”

The Taoist led the Tang monk straight in through the third gate to look: how different from outside! Behold:

Green brick built up the walls of painted cloud; green tiles roofed the halls of glazed light.Gold covers the sacred images; white jade makes the steps and terraces.In the Mahavira hall a blue light dances; beneath the Vairocana tower a keen air rises.The Manjushri hall knots its colors in flying cloud; the scripture-wheel hall flowers painted, kingfisher green in drifts.On the three-eaved roofs the treasure vases spike the sky; in the five-blessing tower the embroidered canopy spreads level.A thousand kingfisher bamboos sway by the chan couches; ten thousand green pines mirror the Buddha's gate.From the Azure Cloud palace a golden light streams; out of the purple mist drifts blessed haze.At morning, fragrant winds from the four wilds, far off; at evening, painted drums sound from the high hills.There should be morning sun to patch a worn cassock; how should there be no moon to finish a half-read sutra?And see: along half a wall lamp-light shines on the back court; a single line of incense mist drifts across the middle yard.

Tripitaka saw and dared not enter: “Taoist, the front of your house is so wretched, and the back so trim—why?” The Taoist laughed: “My lord, in these mountains are many demons and strong robbers: in clear weather they ply the mountain robbing; in foul weather they come and hide in the monastery, pushing down the Buddha images to sit on, hauling off the timber to burn. The monks of this house are weak and dare not dispute with them; so we abandoned all these broken rooms in front to the robbers to lodge in, begged alms of new donors, and built this other monastery. The clear and the muddy, each in its place—that is how things are on this western road.” Tripitaka said: “So that is how it is.”

As he went he saw five great characters over the mountain gate: “The Sea-Subduing Chan Grove Monastery.” He had hardly stepped and pushed into the gate when a monk came toward him. Look at his appearance:

On his head a velvet-brocade cap pinned left of the crown; a pair of copper rings hung from his ear roots.His body wrapped in a woolen garment of foreign weave; a pair of pale eyes bright as silver.In his hand a rattle-drum swinging; on his lips a foreign scripture, not to be made out.Tripitaka did not know him: this was a lama monk of the western road.

The lama monk came out the gate, saw that the Tang monk's brows were clear and his eyes bright, his forehead broad and crown even, his ears reaching his shoulders, his arms passing his knees—like an arhat come into the world, altogether fine and gentle. He came up, seized his hand, all smiles, kneading his fingers and squeezing his feet, feeling his nose and pulling his ears, to show his closeness. He led him to the abbot's room, and courtesies done, asked: “From where does the reverend master come?” Tripitaka said: “Your disciple is sent under imperial commission of the Great Tang of the eastern lands to the Great Thunderclap Monastery in India in the west, to worship the Buddha and fetch scriptures. Reaching your precious country at dusk, I came specially to your lofty monastery to beg a night's lodging and go on early. I beg you grant me this small convenience.” The monk laughed: “Shame on such talk, shame on such talk! We did not leave the world out of fondness: our parents gave us birth, our fates cross the Flower Canopy star, our families could not keep us, and so we cut off and went out. Being once disciples of the Buddha's gate, never speak words with holes in them.” Tripitaka said: “I speak the honest truth.” The monk said: “From the eastern lands to the Western Heaven—how many li? On the road are mountains; in the mountains caves; in the caves sprites. A single man like you, and delicate withal—how are you like a scripture-seeker?” Tripitaka said: “Abbot, you see truly. Could this poor monk alone have come so far? I have three disciples who open roads through mountains and bridge rivers, guarding their master; so I reached your lofty house.” The monk said: “Where are your three worthy disciples?” Tripitaka said: “Waiting outside the mountain gate.” The monk panicked: “Master, you do not know: here are tigers and wolves, demon thieves, and ghosts that hurt men. By day we dare not go far out, and we shut our gates before dark. This hour, and you leave men outside?” He called: “Disciples, quick—invite them in.”

Two little lamas ran out and, seeing the Pilgrim, fell down in a fright; seeing Bajie, fell again. They scrambled up and tore back, crying: “Sovereign, our luck is out: your disciples are nowhere—only three or four demons standing at the gate!” Tripitaka asked: “What do they look like?” The little monk said: “One has a Thunder God's beak, one a pestle mouth, one a blue face and tusked jaws. Beside them is a woman, powdered and perfumed.” Tripitaka laughed: “You do not know them. The three ugly ones are my disciples; that woman I saved out of the pine wood.” The lama said: “Heavens! So fine a master as you—how could you take such ugly disciples?” Tripitaka said: “Ugly they may be, but they are all of use. Invite them in quickly; linger a little and that Thunder-God-beaked one will make trouble—he is not of human parentage; he will beat his way in.”

The little monk hurried out, knelt trembling: “Honored sirs, Lord Tang invites you.” Bajie laughed: “Brother, the invitation is well enough—why so all of a tremble?” The Pilgrim said: “He saw how ugly we are and is afraid.” Bajie said: “Talk! We were made this way—who would choose ugliness?” The Pilgrim said: “Let us tidy the ugliness a little.” The Idiot truly tucked his mouth into his breast, hung his head, and led the horse; Sha Monk shouldered the load; the Pilgrim followed behind, staff in hand, guarding the woman: and so they went in. Through the fallen corridors, in at the third gate, they tied the horse and set down the load, came into the abbot's room, greeted the lama monks, and took their seats. The monk went within and brought out seventy or eighty little lamas, and courtesies done, they made ready a meal to entertain them. And it is well said:

Merit must be heaped in merciful thought; when the Buddha's law flourishes, monk gives praise to monk.

But how they were to leave the monastery—listen to the next chapter to find out.

The Maiden, Nursing Yang, Seeks a Mate; the Mind-Monkey Guards His Master and Knows the Demon

The story tells how the king, ministers, and common folk of the kingdom of Bhikshu saw the Tang monk's four out of the city, twenty li and more, and still would not part. The Tripitaka got down from the carriage with an effort, mounted his horse, and took his leave; those who watched followed with their eyes till no shadow could be seen, and then turned back. The four traveled a long while; winter ran out and spring ended, and there was no end of wild flowers and mountain trees, sweet and fragrant. Ahead they saw a high mountain again, steep ridges and peaks. The Tripitaka's heart jumped, and he asked: "Disciples, is there a road over that high mountain ahead, or none? Be careful, all of you." Pilgrim laughed: "That is not the talk of a long-road traveler, Master; it is the talk of some young lord, a prince's son, sitting in a well and looking at the sky. From of old the saying goes: 'The mountain does not block the road; the road of itself goes through the mountain.' Why ask whether there is a road?" The Tripitaka said: "The mountain may not block the road; but I fear that among crags and steeps monsters breed, and in the deep thickets demons come out." Bajie said: "Set your mind at rest, set it at rest. Here we are not far from the land of bliss; we shall have peace and no trouble, I warrant."

As master and disciples talked, they came without knowing it to the foot of the mountain. Pilgrim took out the gold-banded staff, went up the rock cliff, and called: "Master, here is the road that turns the mountain, and a fine easy road it is. Come on, come on." The elder had to take heart and whip his horse on. Sha Monk said: "Second brother, take the load on your shoulder a while." And truly Bajie took the load and shouldered it; Sha Monk gathered up the reins; the old master sat steady in the carved saddle; and they all hurried up the great road on the cliff after Pilgrim. See the mountain:

Cloud and mist hood the peak tops; babbling water wells in the ravines. The scent of a hundred flowers fills the road; ten thousand trees stand thick on thick. Plum trees gray-green, pear trees white; willows green, peaches red. Where the cuckoo cries, spring is near its end; the swallows' soft chatter says the feast days are done. Rugged rocks; pines like green canopies. The mountain track winds and climbs, jutting, delicate. Sheer walls and hanging cliffs, terribly steep; vines and creepers, dense growth and thick. A thousand crags vie in beauty like ranged halberds; ten thousand ravines race their waters, far waves swelling like a flood.

The old master, gazing slowly at the mountain scene, heard the crying of birds, and the thought of home rose in him; he reined in his horse and called: "Disciples!

From the heaven-tiled hall the edict came; beneath the brocade screen I received my papers.With the lamps of the fifteenth I left the Eastern Land, and only then was parted from my lord the Tang.Scarce had dragon and tiger met in wind and cloud, when master and disciples were sundered, horsemen scattered.I have walked the twelve peaks of the Wu mountains all through — when shall I hold the dice again before the present king?"

Pilgrim said: "Master, you are always pining for home — nothing like a man who has left home. Go on with an easy mind, and fret no more. The ancients said: 'To seek riches and honor in life, you must put in deadly work.'" The Tripitaka said: "Wise as your words are, disciple, I do not know where the road to the Western Heaven still lies." Bajie said: "Master, our Buddha the Tathagata could not bear to part with those Tripitaka scriptures, and knowing we were coming to fetch them, I suppose he moved house. Otherwise, why do we never get there?" Sha Monk said: "No nonsense; just keep following big brother. Keep plodding at the work, and the day must come when we arrive."

As master and disciples talked at ease, they saw a great forest of black pines. The Tang monk was afraid, and called again: "Wukong, we have barely passed those rugged mountain roads — and now this deep, black pine forest? Be careful." Pilgrim said: "What is there to fear?" The Tripitaka said: "What talk is that? 'If you will not believe that the straight may not be straight, you must guard against kindness that is not kind.' I have walked through many pine woods with you, but never one so deep and far as this. Look:

East and west they stand in close array; north and south they rank in lines. East and west, arrayed close to the very clouds; north and south, ranked lines that press upon the Milky Way. Thick-trunked and thorned, they hedge the world around; the knotweed twines its branches, coiling up and down. Vine winds about wisteria, wisteria winds about vine. Vine winding wisteria — the traveler east and west can hardly pass; wisteria winding vine — how shall the merchant north and south get through? Live half a year within this wood, and you lose the sun and moon; walk a few li in it, and you do not see the Dipper's stars. See the thousand scenes where the shade lies, the ten thousand clusters of flowers where the sun strikes. There too are thousand-year huai trees, ten-thousand-year junipers, hardy pines, mountain peaches, wild peonies, dry-land lotus — heaped in thickets, piled on piles, a wild tangle no immortal's brush could draw. And hear the hundred birds: parrots whistle and cuckoos cry; magpies thread the branches, crows feed their parents in return; yellow orioles dance, the hundred-tongues tune their notes; partridges call and swallows chatter; the myna learns to talk like men, and even the thrush can read the sutras. And see the great cat swishing his tail, the tiger grinding his teeth; foxes of many a year dressed up as village girls, gray wolves grown old roaring through the wood. Were the Heavenly King of the Pagoda himself to come here, demon-tamer though he is, his soul would leave him."

The Great Sage Sun, quite without fear, split the great road open with his iron staff and led the Tang monk straight into the deep forest. At ease and leisurely they traveled half a day, and no way out of the wood appeared. The Tang monk called: "Disciples, all this way west there have been countless rugged mountains and woods; happily it is clean and quiet here, and the road has been peaceful. The rare flowers and strange plants of this wood are truly a delight. Let me sit here a while: first, to rest the horse; second, I am hungry in my belly. Go somewhere and beg a meal for me to eat." Pilgrim said: "Master, get down from the horse; old Sun will go and beg the meal." The elder truly got down, Bajie tied the horse to a tree, and Sha Monk set down the load and handed the alms bowl to Pilgrim. Pilgrim said: "Sit steady, Master, and be not afraid; I go and come." The Tripitaka sat straight in the shade of the pines, and Bajie and Sha Monk went off hunting flowers and fruit in play.

Now the Great Sage turned a somersault into mid-air, checked his cloud light, and looked back: in the pine wood he saw auspicious clouds floating and blessed vapor wreathing. He suddenly cried out: "Good! Good!" And why did he cry good? He was praising the Tang monk: he was the elder Golden Cicada reborn, a good man refined through ten lifetimes, and so such auspicious light hooded his head. "As for old Sun: only five hundred years ago, when I wrecked the Heavenly Palace, I wandered sea corners and roamed the sky's rim; I gathered a crowd of sprites and styled myself the Great Sage Equal to Heaven; I tamed dragons and subdued tigers, and struck my name from the book of death. On my head a gold crown of three peaks; on my body armor of yellow gold; in my hand the gold-banded staff; on my feet cloud-treading shoes. Under me were forty-seven thousand monsters, and every one called me Grandpa Great Sage — I was somebody indeed. Now I have escaped Heaven's punishment, made myself small and humble, and become your disciple. Master's head has auspicious cloud and blessed light settled over it; straight back to the Eastern Land, he is sure of some good thing — and old Sun is sure to win his true fruit too."

In the very middle of his praise a column of black vapor came welling up from the south side of the wood, gout upon gout. Pilgrim was greatly startled: "In that black vapor there must be some evil. My Bajie and Sha Monk cannot put out any black vapor." The Great Sage hung in mid-air, unable to make it out.

Now the Tripitaka, sitting in the wood, had cleared his heart and seen his nature, and was chanting the Heart Sutra of Great Wisdom Gone to the Farther Shore, when he suddenly heard a soft crying of "Save me!" The Tripitaka was greatly startled: "How good, how good! In so deep a wood, who is crying? Some soul frightened by wolves and tigers, I suppose. Let me look." The elder rose and moved forward, past the thousand-year cypress and through the ten-thousand-year pines, catching at vines and clambering along creepers, and came near to look: bound to a great tree was a woman, the upper half tied with wisteria to the tree, the lower half buried in the earth. The elder planted his feet and asked her: "Bodhisattva, what matter is it that you are tied up here?" Ah! Plainly this creature was a demon; but the elder had the eyes of flesh and the body of a common man, and could not know it. The demon, seeing him question her, wept like a gushing spring. See her: peach cheeks dropping tears, with beauty to sink fish and bring down wild geese; starry eyes full of sorrow, with loveliness to hide the moon and shame the flowers. The elder truly dared not come near, and asked again: "Bodhisattva, what wrong have you truly done? Tell your poor monk, so that I may best save you." The demon, with pretty words and painted phrases, in seeming and not in truth, answered hurriedly: "Master, my home is in the Kingdom of Bupo, two hundred li and more from here. My father and mother are living, very good and pious, kind to kin and friends all their lives. It was Qingming time, and they invited all our kin, old and young, to sweep the ancestral graves; a line of sedan chairs and horses went out to the wild open country. Before the graves, the offerings were laid and the paper horses just burned, when we heard gongs and drums, and out ran a band of robbers, brandishing knives and staves, shouting and killing as they came. We were frightened out of our wits. My parents and kins who had horses and sedans each fled for his life; I, young and unable to run, fell frightened to the ground, and the robbers carried me off to the mountain. The eldest king meant to make me his lady, the second his wife; the third and fourth loved my beauty too; seventy or eighty households quarreled over me all together, and none would yield, and so they bound me here in the wood and went off about their business. It is now five days and five nights; my life is near spent, and soon I shall die. I know not in which life my ancestors stored up virtue, that I should meet you, old master, today. I beg you a thousand times to let your great mercy move, and save my life; beneath the nine springs I shall never forget the debt." And as she finished, the rain of tears fell.

The Tripitaka's heart was truly merciful; he could not keep back his own tears either, and, his voice choking, called: "Disciples." Bajie and Sha Monk were hunting flowers and fruit in the wood when they suddenly heard their master cry so piteously. The Idiot said: "Sha Monk, Master has found a kinswoman here." Sha Monk laughed: "Second brother, what nonsense! We have walked all this while and never met a living soul — where would kin come from?" Bajie said: "Kin or no, why else would Master be weeping with someone? Let us go and see." Sha Monk truly went back the way they had come, led the horse, shouldered the load, came up, and called: "Master, what is this?" The Tang monk pointed at the tree: "Bajie, untie that Bodhisattva and save her life." The Idiot, with never a judgment, went to work.

Now the Great Sage, in mid-air, saw the black vapor thicken till it had smothered all the auspicious light, and said: "Bad, bad! Black vapor hooding the blessed light — can it be but a demon harming my master? Begging meals is a small matter; let me go look to my master." He turned his cloud, let down into the wood, and saw Bajie fumbling at the cords. Pilgrim came up, seized him by the ear, and floored him with a throw. The Idiot looked up, saw him, crawled up, and said: "Master told me to save her — why must you throw your strength about and lay me flat?" Pilgrim laughed: "Brother, do not untie her. She is a demon, playing her tricks to fool us." The Tripitaka barked: "That brazen ape, there goes your nonsense again! How can you tell, just to look, that such a woman is a demon?" Pilgrim said: "Master, you never knew: this was old Sun's old trade. When it comes to ways of wanting men's flesh to eat — how would you know them?" Bajie said, lips thrust out: "Master, do not believe this Bimawen's fooling. This woman is of the people of this place. We come from the far Eastern Land, we have no quarrel with her, and we are no kin of hers — how can he say she is a demon? He sends us on ahead and drops us, then turns a somersault, works his magic art, and comes back to do his sly business with her — marrying into the house by the back door, that's all." Pilgrim roared: "Clod, none of your jabber! All the way west, where has old Sun ever done a base thing? A lustful, life-cheapening, gain-grubbing, faith-forgetting slops-bucket like you, who cannot tell good from bad, would go and let someone gull you into being a live-in son-in-law, bound to a tree!" The Tripitaka said: "Very well, very well. Bajie, your brother's eye is often not wrong. Since he says so, let us not meddle with her; we go on." Pilgrim rejoiced: "Good — Master's life is safe. Mount up, and out of the pine wood; at some house I will beg you a meal." The four went on down the road and left the demon behind.

Now the demon, bound to the tree, ground her teeth in hate: "For years I have heard men say Sun Wukong's magic is broad — and now I have seen him, and the word was no lie. That Tang monk is a virgin body, refined in the Way, not one drop of his first yang yet spent, and I meant just to take him and match with him and become an immortal of the highest order. Who knew this monkey would see through my art and save him away? If they had untied the cords and let me down, I could have seized him on the spot — and would he not have been my man? And now he is led off by a string of scattered, chattering words — was all my labor for nothing? Let me call after him once or twice more, and see how it goes." The demon never moved a cord; she took a few kind words and kind phrases and blew them on a following wind, whining, into the Tang monk's ear. And what do you think she called? She called: "Master, Master — you who will not save a living person's life, with what face do you worship Buddha and seek the scriptures?"

The Tang monk, on his horse, heard her call again, and reined in at once: "Wukong, go and take that woman down." Pilgrim said: "Master, you are on the road — how do you come to think of her again?" The Tang monk said: "She is calling again." Pilgrim asked: "Bajie, do you hear?" Bajie said: "My ears are in the way; I hear nothing." He asked again: "Sha Monk, do you hear?" Sha Monk said: "I carry the load and walk ahead; I paid no heed, and heard nothing." Pilgrim said: "Nor did old Sun hear. Master — what is she calling, that only you hear?" The Tang monk said: "She calls with reason. She says: 'If you will not save a living life, with what face do you worship Buddha and seek the scriptures?' 'To save one life is better than to build a pagoda of seven stories.' Go quickly and take her down; that is better than seeking scriptures and worshiping Buddha." Pilgrim laughed: "Once Master takes to being kind, there is no medicine for him. Think: since you left the Eastern Land and came all the way west, how many mountain tracts have you crossed, how many demons have you met, that were forever carrying you off into caves? Old Sun came to save you, and with this iron staff has beaten thousands upon thousands to death. And today you cannot bear the death of one demon, and must go save her?" The Tang monk said: "Disciple, the ancients said: 'Do not fail to do good because it is small; do not do evil because it is small.' Go and save her, do." Pilgrim said: "Since Master is set on it, this burden is more than old Sun can bear. You will save her; I dare not press you hard. If I press, you will only take offense. Save her as you please." The Tang monk said: "Monkey head, no more talk. You sit here, and let Bajie and me go and save her."

The Tang monk went back into the wood and told Bajie to untie the cords of the upper half, and dig out the lower half of her body with the rake. The demon shook out her shoes, straightened her skirt, and followed the Tang monk out of the pine wood, beaming, and met Pilgrim. Pilgrim only went on laughing coldly. The Tang monk cursed: "That brazen ape, what are you laughing at?" Pilgrim said: "I laugh that in your good hours you meet true friends, and in your bad you meet a beauty." The Tripitaka cursed again: "Brazen ape, what nonsense! From my mother's womb I have been a monk; now I come west by the king's command, with a single heart to worship Buddha and seek the scriptures — no seeker after gain and salary, I — where is the turn of my luck?" Pilgrim laughed: "Master, though you have been a monk from childhood, you have only read sutras and murmured Buddha's name; you have never seen the king's law and its articles. This woman is young and pretty; and we, who have left home, walking the road with her — suppose we meet some bad men, and they seize us and hale us to the magistrate. Never mind seeking scriptures or worshiping Buddha — the whole of us would be condemned for lewdness. And if it never came to that, they would still question us of carrying off a person of the people: Master would be stripped of his ordination papers and given a small death; Bajie would be questioned and sent to the frontier army; Sha Monk would be questioned and set to march the stations; and old Sun would not come off clean either — for all my tongue, and howsoever I argued, I would be fined for answering without leave." The Tripitaka shouted: "Nonsense! Surely not — I save her life, and there is some entanglement in that? Take her along: whatever happens, it is on my head." Pilgrim said: "Master, you say it is on your head, but you do not see that you are not saving her — you are killing her." The Tripitaka said: "I save her out of the wood, and she gets her life — how is that killing her?" Pilgrim said: "Bound in the wood as she was, in three days or five, ten days or half a month, without food, she would have starved to death and gone to the dark world with her body whole. Now you bring her out: you ride a swift horse and travel like the wind, and we can only follow you; but the woman's feet are small, and every step is hard — how will she keep up? Once she is left behind, and she meets wolves or tigers, one gulp and she is swallowed — would that not be the death of her indeed?"

The Tripitaka said: "True, true — that is a thought only you would have. What is to be done?" Pilgrim laughed: "Take her up and let her ride with you." The Tripitaka pondered: "How could I share a horse with her?" — "Then how is she to travel?" The Tripitaka said: "Let Bajie carry her." Pilgrim laughed: "The Idiot's luck is in." Bajie said: "'On a long road there is no light load.' To make me carry a person — where is the luck?" Pilgrim said: "That long mouth of yours: carry her, turn your head, and scheme a few sweet words together — would that not be handy?" Bajie heard, and beat his breast and stamped and bounced: "Bad, bad! Let Master beat me a few blows — I would rather bear the pain. Carry her on my back and I shall never be clean of it; my brother is a lifelong hand at blackening people. Carry her I will not." The Tripitaka said: "Very well, very well. I can still walk a few steps myself. Let me get down, and we will go slowly together, and Bajie shall lead the empty horse." Pilgrim laughed aloud: "The Idiot has a trade after all — Master has taken him on to lead the horse." The Tripitaka said: "There goes the monkey head again. The ancients said: 'Though a horse travel a thousand li, without a man it does not go of itself.' Suppose I walk slowly on the road — would you drop me and go on? If I go slow, you go slow too. All together, with this Bodhisattva, we go down the mountain; at some nunnery or monastery, some household, we leave her there. That too is saving her once and well." Pilgrim said: "Master's word is good; forward quickly, please."

The Tripitaka strode ahead; Sha Monk carried the load; Bajie led the empty horse and brought the woman along; Pilgrim held the iron staff — and so they went. In less than twenty or thirty li the sky was darkening, and they saw a building of towers and halls. The Tripitaka said: "Disciples, that must be a nunnery or a monastery; let us beg lodging there and go on at dawn." Pilgrim said: "Master is right. All of you walk a little faster." In a moment they were at the gate, and he told them: "Stand back a little, all of you; let me go first and ask for lodging. If there is room, I will send someone to call you." They all stood under the shade of the willows, and only Pilgrim held the iron staff over the woman to keep her in check.

The elder strode up close: the gate was tumbled this way and that, fallen into bits. He pushed it open and looked, and his heart ached in spite of himself: the long corridors still and silent; the old monastery bare and desolate; moss over the courts, weeds choking the paths; the firefly's flight the only lamp, the frog's voice keeping the hours in place of the water clock. The elder suddenly dropped tears. Truly:

Halls and towers fallen and tumbled; corridors and rooms forlorn and collapsed. Broken bricks and shattered tiles in a dozen heaps; crooked beams and snapped columns all. Before and behind, green grass grows everywhere; dust buries the rotted altar kitchen. The bell tower is tumbled down, the drum stripped of its skin; the glazed lamp of incense is broken. The Buddha's gilded body has lost its color; arhats lie tumbled east and west. Guanyin, soaked with rain, is all turned to mud; the willow and the pure vase have fallen to the ground. By day there is not a monk within; by night foxes sleep their fill. Only hear the wind roaring like thunder — a hiding place for tigers and leopards. The walls all round are tumbled down, and never a door leaf to shut.

There is a poem to prove it. The poem says:

An old monastery of many years, with no one to mend it; forlorn and tumbled, fallen past praying for.The wild wind has split the guardian's face; the driving rain has eaten the Buddha's head.The guardians are tumbled and marred, soaked as they fall; the earth god has no house, and no shelter at night.Two things more there are to sigh over: the bronze bell lies on the ground, its hanging tower gone.

The Tripitaka steeled his gall and went in through the second gate. The bell tower and drum tower were both tumbled down; only one bronze bell remained, planted in the ground, its upper half white as snow, its lower half blue as indigo — for years of time had rained the top to white, and the breath of the soil had raised the bronze green below. The Tripitaka laid his hand on the bell and called aloud: "O bell! You too once hung in a high tower and roared; once rang from painted beams, your voice carrying far. You cried the dawn as the cocks crowed; you saw the dusk in at day's end. Where has the priest who cast your bronze gone home? Where does the bell-founder's hand abide? I think both lives are gone to the dark land: they have left no trace, and you have no voice."

The elder's loud sighing and praise, without his knowing it, woke someone within the monastery. There was a keeper of the incense fires inside, a lay brother; hearing men's voices, he scrambled up, took a broken brick, and threw it at the bell, and the bell gave one dong. The elder, startled, pitched over; he struggled up to run, caught his foot on a tree root, and fell again. The elder lay on the ground, and looking up, called again: "O bell! Your poor monk was just sounding your praise when you gave a dong and a ding. I suppose no one has come to you on the western road so long that you have turned into a spirit."

The lay brother hurried up, held him by the arm, and said: "My lord, get up, please. It is no business of the bell's turning spirit — it was I who struck it just now." The Tripitaka looked up and saw how ugly and black he was: "Are you not some goblin or demon? I am no common man; I am come from the Great Tang, and I have disciples who tame dragons and subdue tigers. If you run into them, your life will be hard to keep." The lay brother knelt: "My lord, do not be afraid. I am no demon; I am the lay brother who keeps the incense fires in this monastery. Just now I heard your kind words in praise, and wished to come out and receive you; but fearing some evil ghost was knocking, I took a broken brick and gave the bell a stroke to calm my nerves before I dared come out. Get up, my lord, please." Then the Tang monk gathered himself: "Keeper, you frightened the life half out of me. Lead me inside."

The lay brother led the Tang monk straight in through the third gate and showed him: within it was quite another world from outside. See it:

Walls of colored cloud built of blue brick; halls of glaze roofed with green tile. Holy images dressed in gold; steps and terraces wrought of white jade. Over the Great Hero Hall dances a blue sheen; beneath the Vairocana tower rises a keen air. The Manjusri hall is wreathed in cloud-bright color; the wheel-of-law hall figured with flowers, heaped with kingfisher green. On the triple-eaved roof a jeweled vase's point; in the five-blessing tower a level brocaded canopy. A thousand kingfisher bamboos sway over the meditation couches; ten thousand green pines mirror the Buddha's gate. From the Azure Cloud palace streams golden light; amid the purple mist drift blessed haze. At morning, the sweet wind of the four fields carries far; at evening, hear the painted drums sound on the high hills. There should be dawn sun to patch the torn cassock — how should there be no moon to finish the unfinished sutra? And see: the lamp's light half a wall, bright in the back court; a line of incense mist shining through the middle yard.

The Tripitaka saw, and dared not go in: "Keeper, the front of your monastery is in such ruin, and the back so neat — why?" The keeper laughed: "My lord, in these hills there are many demons and strong robbers. When the sky is clear they rob along the mountain; when it is dark they come to shelter in the monastery, push over the Buddha images to sit on, and carry off the timber to burn. The monks of this house are soft and weak, and dare not bandy words with them; so we gave up all these front rooms for the strong men to lodge in, and begged alms again from new donors and built that other monastery. Clean and unclean, one of each — such are the ways of the West." The Tripitaka said: "So that is how it is."

As he went, he saw five great characters over the mountain gate: "The Chan Forest Monastery that Guards the Sea." He had just stepped through the gate when he met a monk coming. See how he looked:

On his head a fur-trimmed brocade cap combed to the left; a pair of brass rings hangs at his ears.His body wrapped in a woolen coat of foreign weave; a pair of white eyes gleaming like silver.In his hand a pellet drum goes round and round; on his lips a barbarian sutra, scarce to be made out.The Tripitaka truly did not know him: this is a Tibetan monk of the western road.

The lama came out the gate, saw the Tripitaka with his clear brows and fine eyes, broad brow and level crown, ears to his shoulders, hands past his knees — like an arhat come among men, very fair and stately. He ran up, seized his hands, beaming all over his face, pinching his fingers and feet, feeling his nose, pulling his ears, to show his friendliness. He led him into the abbot's room; the courtesies were paid, and he asked: "Where do you come from, old master?" The Tripitaka said: "Your disciple is sent under the imperial seal of the Land of the East, the Great Tang, to the Western heaven, the kingdom of India, to the Thunderclap Monastery, to worship Buddha and fetch the scriptures. Coming to your honored land at dusk, I came specially to your great monastery to beg a night's lodging, and go on at dawn. I beg your kindness a little." The monk laughed: "For shame, for shame! We did not leave home from any virtue of ours; it is all because our parents begot us under an unlucky star and could not keep us at home, that we cut the ties and went out. Being now a disciple of the Buddha's gate, never speak empty words." The Tripitaka said: "I speak the plain truth." The monk said: "From the Eastern Land to the Western Heaven, how many li is it? On the road there are mountains; in the mountains there are caves; in the caves there are fiends. A lone man like you, and so tenderly made — how are you one to seek the scriptures?" The Tripitaka said: "Abbot, you see it rightly. Your poor monk alone could never have come here. I have three disciples, who open roads through mountains and bridge the waters, guarding me their master — and so I reached your monastery." The monk said: "Where are your three worthy disciples?" The Tripitaka said: "Waiting outside the mountain gate." The monk panicked: "Master, do you not know that here we have tigers and wolves, demon thieves, and ghosts to hurt people? By day we dare not go far out, and before dark we bar the gates — and at this hour you leave people standing outside?" He called: "Disciples, run and beg them in quickly."

Two little lamas ran out, saw Pilgrim, and fell over in a fright; saw Bajie, and fell over again. They scrambled up and flew back, crying: "Grandfather, our luck is out! Your disciples are nowhere — only three or four monsters standing at the gate." The Tripitaka asked: "What do they look like?" The little monk said: "One has a thunder god's beak, one a pestle mouth, one a green face and tusked jaws. And beside them a woman — powdered face and pomaded hair." The Tripitaka laughed: "You do not know them. The three ugly ones are my disciples; the woman is one I saved out of the pine wood." The lama said: "Grandfather! So fine and handsome a master — why hunt up such ugly disciples?" The Tripitaka said: "Ugly they may be, but every one of them is useful. Beg them in quickly; and if you are any slower, that thunder-beaked one will brew trouble — he was never born of human parents — he will beat his way in."

The little monk ran out at once, knelt trembling: "Your Lordships, Lord Tang bids you in." Bajie laughed: "Brother, he may bid us in — why tremble so?" Pilgrim said: "He saw how ugly we are and is afraid." Bajie said: "What rot! We were born this way — who wants to be ugly?" Pilgrim said: "Tidy the ugliness up a little." And truly the Idiot tucked his mouth into his breast and led the horse, head down; Sha Monk shouldered the load; Pilgrim came behind with his staff, keeping the woman in check: and so they went in. Past the fallen corridors, in through the third gate, they tied the horse and set down the load; they came into the abbot's room and greeted the lama, and seats were taken. The monk went inside and brought out seventy or eighty little lamas; the greetings paid, they made ready a meal to entertain them. Truly:

Merit is heaped up only in thoughts of mercy; when the Buddha's law flourishes, monks praise monks.

How they will leave the monastery, who can say? Listen to the next chapter to find out.