'This region of yours,' replied the old man, 'is a peaceful and harmonious one. My own province is not a good place to settle at present. Great disturbances will break out there.'

They were living in a time of great general calm and tranquillity, but Li did not inquire any further into the old man's meaning.

The very next day, the old man sent his card, inviting his landlord to a return banquet. Li was greatly astonished by the excellent food and lavish entertainment and wondered aloud if his lodger was perhaps some important official living incognito. The old man replied that, since they were now friends, he could tell him the truth: he was a fox-spirit in human form. Li was flabbergasted by this revelation.

He mentioned it to an acquaintance of his, and the local gentry soon came to know about his extraordinary lodger, which resulted in a constant flow of visitors at the old man's door, all of whom he received with the utmost civility. Soon even the local Prefect became a regular visitor. The one person who was not granted admission, however, was the local County Magistrate. The old man always fobbed him off with some excuse or other. The Magistrate even tried asking Li to plead on his behalf, but to no avail. When Li eventually asked the old man what his reasons were, the old man drew closer to him and whispered, 'You do not know this, but that Magistrate of yours was a mule in a previous life. He may seem a very distinguished gentleman, but really he is a person of shameless greed. I may not be human myself, but I consider it beneath my dignity to associate with the likes of him.'

Li made up some story to placate the Magistrate that the old man was too much in awe of him to receive him and the Magistrate believed him and ceased his entreaties.

Caption

The old man drew closer to him and whispered.

This all happened in the eleventh year of the reign of the Kangxi Emperor. The disastrous uprising of Wang Fuchen broke out shortly after this date in Shaanxi. The prophetic powers of foxes are to be believed.

60.

THIS TRANSFORMATION.

A certain monk (no one ever knew where he was originally from) lived in Ji'nan, and went every day to Hibiscus Street and Bright Lake, the entertainment quarter in the north-west part of the city. There, barefoot and wearing a tattered, patched cassock, he would frequent the various restaurants and teahouses, chanting sutras and begging for alms wherever he went. He refused offerings of any kind, however wine, food, money or grain and when asked what it was he had need of, would give no reply. He was never seen to eat or drink anything.

'Reverend Master,' he was once politely advised, 'since you eat no meat and drink no wine, would it not be better to beg for alms in some lonely lane in a mountain village, rather than come here every day and endure the stench and clamour of the city?'

The monk continued his chanting unperturbed, his hands clasped, his long eyelashes motionless, as though he had heard nothing. A little later, the same advice was proffered again. This time the monk glared at his interlocutor.

'This,' he boomed, 'is the transformation I am seeking.'

He continued chanting and eventually went on his way. The man followed him, intent on knowing what 'this transformation' could be, and why the monk was so set upon it. To his questioning the monk made no reply, but continued walking. When the man persisted, he bellowed again, 'You can know nothing! This is my transformation; this is what I am seeking.'

Several days later, the monk was seen outside the southern walls of the city, lying curled up beside the road, stiff as a corpse. He remained there motionless for three days. The local people, afraid that he would starve to death and that they would be held responsible, urged him to move on, promising him whatever food or money he needed. The monk said nothing and refused even to open his eyes, whereupon they began to shake him and berate him. The monk became angrier and angrier, until finally, producing a little knife from within his cassock, he slit open his stomach. He then reached in with one hand, pulled out his own innards and proceeded to lay them out on the roadside. Then he expired.

The locals were aghast. They informed the Prefect, and gave the corpse a hasty burial. Some time later, a dog dug up the shallow grave and exposed the prayer mat in which the monk had been wrapped when they buried him. It sounded hollow underfoot, and when they examined it more closely they found it still as tightly sealed as it had been at the burial. Inside, it was now as empty as a cocoon.

Caption

The monk slit open his stomach.

61.

FOX CONTROL.

A certain Academician was possessed by a fox-spirit, fell ill and began to waste away. All imaginable charms and prayers were resorted to, but to no avail. He begged for leave to return home, in the hope that he might thereby somehow escape the evil influence that was afflicting him. But the fox followed him on his journey. He now lived in mortal fear and knew not what to do.

One day he halted at Zhuo County, and there in the street he encountered a travelling quack who claimed to be able to subdue foxes. The Academician engaged his services, and the quack gave him a remedy, which was in point of fact a potent aphrodisiac. He urged him to swallow the medicine and then to have intercourse with the fox-spirit. He would be an invincible lover.

He followed the doctor's instructions. The fox-spirit sought to withdraw from his embrace, pleading with him to stop, but he ignored her entreaties and continued making love to her more fiercely than ever. She writhed and wriggled and struggled to escape, but he would not let her go. And then finally she fell silent. When he looked, he saw the body of a dead fox lying in his bed.

There was once a young gentleman of my home district who fancied himself greatly as a lover. He thought himself the equal of the legendary Lao Ai, whose enormous penis had given such satisfaction to the Empress Dowager of Qin. This gentleman claimed that he himself had never once been satisfied by any woman.

Caption

The quack gave him a remedy.

One night he was alone at an inn. It was an isolated building, and there were no neighbours. Suddenly a girl came hurrying into his room, through the closed door. He knew she must be a fox-spirit, and at once set about seducing her, stripping her naked and without further ado plunging his member straight in her up to the hilt. She felt a searing pain and screamed out loud, fleeing from the room and shooting into the night like a hawk loosed from the hand of a falconer.

He called out through the window, appealing to her with many words of lascivious endearment, in the hope of luring her back. But she had vanished without trace.

This man was a veritable Exterminator of Foxes! He could indeed have hung a sign up outside his door inscribed with the words 'Fox Control', and made a living that way.

62.

DRAGON DORMANT.

Commissioner Qu, of Wuling County, was reading in an upper room when a heavy rain began to fall. In the deepening gloom he caught sight of a little creature, bright as a glow-worm, wriggling its way on to his desk. It meandered across his scroll, scorching the paper as it went and leaving a trail behind it, like a slug. Somehow he formed the notion that it must be a dragon and, lifting up the scroll in both his hands, carried it outside. There he stood in the doorway for some time holding it solemnly aloft, but the creature simply coiled in on itself like a caterpillar and refused to budge.

'Have I caused you some offence?' pondered Qu aloud. He returned with the scroll and replaced it on the table. Donning full mandarin hat and girdle this time, he made a deep bow and carried it once more to the door. He stood beneath the eaves waiting, and finally the creature reared its head, stretched and took off into the air above the scroll, whirring and emitting a great stream of light. It flew a few yards, then wheeled round towards the Commissioner, its head now the size of a large earthenware jar, its huge trunk twenty or thirty hands in circumference. Round again it spun, and this time, with a rumbling roar, soared up into the heavens.

Qu returned to his desk and retraced its winding trail to one of the bamboo boxes in which he stored his books.

Caption

It soared up into the heavens.

63.

CUT SLEEVE.

He Shican had a studio out in the countryside east of Tiaoxi. One evening, he happened to go out doors, and saw a woman riding past on a mule, followed by a young man. The woman was in her fifties and seemed a person of some refinement, while the young man following her looked fifteen or sixteen, and possessed, so Shican observed, a quite extraordinary personal beauty. He was prettier than a girl. Shican was himself of the Cut Sleeve persuasion and had always had rather a predilection for boys. He gazed at the youth in breathless wonder, standing there on tiptoe and watching him disappear into the distance, before returning indoors.

The next day, he looked out for him from early morning till evening. It was sunset and growing dark by the time the boy finally came past again, and when Shican, in his most charming manner, asked him where he had been, he replied that he was visiting his grandfather. Shican invited him indoors, but he declined, saying he was pressed for time. Shican insisted, positively dragging him into the house, and the boy agreed to stay for a little while, after which he took his leave, saying that he could on no account be detained any further. Shican took him by the hand and saw him on his way, entreating him to drop by again if he was ever passing, to which the boy nodded and left.

From that day forth, Shican was unable to take his mind off the beautiful young stranger, and was forever pacing up and down, looking out for him. Then one day when the sun had almost set, the boy suddenly appeared, to the great joy of Shican, who invited him in at once, telling his servant to bring wine. He asked him his name.

'My name is Huang,' he replied, 'and I am the ninth in my family.'

'What brings you past here so often?'

'I am going to visit my mother. She is living at her father's and is often unwell.'

After a few cups of wine he stood to take his leave, but Shican held him by the arm, loth to let him go, and even resorted to locking the door. In the end Huang had no choice but to sit down again, his face flushed with embarrassment. Shican lit the lamps, and as they conversed he found Huang to be softly spoken and tender as a young girl. But the moment he spoke to him in an amorous fashion, the boy turned away coyly towards the wall. A little while later, he drew him up on to the bed, and at first Huang refused, pleading (rather feebly) that he was a poor sleeper. But Shican persisted, and in the end persuaded Huang to remove his shirt and gown and lie down on the bed in nothing but his silken trousers. Shican extinguished the lamp and was soon lying beside him, wrapping his arms and legs around him, hugging him and beseeching him to make love. Huang protested indignantly.

'I thought you a gallant gentleman, sir, and was happy to be your friend. But what you are suggesting is the way beasts in the wild behave!'

Presently the morning star began to shine, and Huang took his leave. Shican was now afraid that he would never see him again, and he was constantly on the lookout for him, pacing up and down in anxious expectation and gazing endlessly into the furthest distance.

And then, a few days later, the beautiful youth appeared. Shican welcomed him joyfully and craved his forgiveness, drawing him eagerly into his studio again, pressing him to be seated and engaging him in smiling conversation. He was hugely relieved to discover that Huang bore him no ill will from their last encounter, and in a little while he removed Huang's sandals and climbed on to the bed with him, fondling him and pleading with him once more.

'My affection for you is now deeply engraved on my heart,' said Huang. 'But surely this is not the only way in which we can show our feelings?'

Shican plied him with honeyed words, begging to be allowed just a single kiss of his jade-like body, to which Huang finally consented. And then Shican waited until he had fallen asleep to begin touching him in earnest. Huang awoke, reached for his clothes, rose from the bed and left at once, though it was still the middle of the night. From that day, Shican pined for him more and more. He ceased eating and sleeping, and began to waste away, and every day sent his pageboy out to scout for news of young Huang.

One day, Huang came past Shican's house and would have continued on his way, but the pageboy saw him and dragged him in. Huang was shocked to see how pale and thin his friend had become, and when he inquired with concern after his health, Shican told him the truth, sobbing and weeping as he spoke.

'I only meant it for the best,' said Huang gently. 'I thought that to love in that way would do me no good, and would bring you nothing but harm. That is why I refused you. But since you insist it will bring you happiness, perhaps I should not hold back any longer.'

Shican was overwhelmed with emotion when he heard this. That same day, when Huang left, he experienced a sudden recovery, and a few days later, when Huang returned to see him, he was quite restored to health. They were soon wrapped in each other's arms.

'Today I will let you have your way,' said Huang. 'But please do not expect this every time.'

Afterwards he said to Shican, 'Now I have a favour to ask of you.'

'Tell me what it is.'

'My mother has a heart ailment, and the only medicine that can cure it is the Primordial Bolus, a patent remedy prepared by the Imperial Physician Qi Yewang. I know you are on friendly terms with Dr Qi. Would you please ask him for one on my behalf?'

Shican agreed to do this, and before he left that morning, Huang reminded him of his promise. Shican went into town to procure some of the medicine, and he was able to give it to Huang when he returned that very evening. Huang was overjoyed and clasped his hands together in a gesture of appreciation. Shican was eager to make love once more.

'Let us not become too deeply involved,' said Huang. 'I will find you another lover, someone a thousand times better than me.'

Shican asked who this person was.

'A cousin of mine,' replied Huang, 'an extraordinarily beautiful young woman. If you agree, I will act as your go-between.'

Shican smiled, but said nothing in reply. Huang went away with the medicine in his pocket, and returned after an interval of three days, asking for more. Shican had missed him dreadfully in the meantime, and berated him for his long absence.