Sha Huizi was a master of the powerful form of kungfu known as Steel Shirt. He could hack through the neck of an ox with the flat of his hand. He could thrust his hand directly into the animal's belly.

Once he was at Qiu Pengsan's house. A large block of wood was suspended in midair, and he ordered two strapping great fellows to hoist it up and let it fall. He took the full impact, but the block merely smacked loudly against his naked belly and bounced away across the room. Then he took out his penis, laid it on a stone and began hammering away at it with a wooden mallet, without causing himself the least injury. But he refused to try using a knife.

Caption

He took the full impact on his naked belly.

87.

FOX TROUBLE.

Zhang Taihua, a wealthy clerk of Tai'an, was experiencing fox trouble. All his attempts to contain the fox-spirits or exorcize them had proved fruitless. He even reported the matter to the local Magistrate, who proved powerless to do anything.

At the same time as this, in a village to the east of Tai'an, a fox had taken up residence in a certain peasant's home, and was witnessed by the villagers in the form of a white-haired old man who took part in all the village ceremonies, just like other folk. He claimed to be the second in his generation, and they all called him Old Mr Fox the Second.

It so happened that a young scholar called on the Magistrate of Tai'an and in the course of conversation mentioned the existence of this Old Mr Fox the Second. The Magistrate thought he saw in this a way of helping Clerk Zhang out of his predicament, and he advised Zhang to go and call upon the old fox-gentleman. One of the Magistrate's yamen-runners, who happened to be from the village in question, confirmed the story and invited Zhang to return with him to the village, where he arranged a banquet and invited Old Mr Fox along.

At the banquet Old Mr Fox was most civil, behaving just like a regular gentleman.

'I know all about this trouble of yours,' he said to Zhang, when he explained his problem. 'I regret to say I am unable to deal with it for you myself. But I have a friend by the name of Zhou the Third, who has lodgings at the foot of Mount Tai, in the Temple of the Eastern Sacred Mountain. He should certainly be able to control these foxes for you, and I will ask him to do so.'

Zhang was delighted to hear this, and expressed his gratitude. As he was leaving, Old Mr Fox said he would prepare a banquet for the very next day and that they should all meet to the east of the temple. Zhang agreed to this.

The following day, Old Mr Fox brought along his friend Zhou the Third, who turned out to be another foxy-looking fellow with bristly moustaches and a complexion dark as steel, dressed in cavalryman's breeches. The three of them drank several rounds together.

'My good friend Old Mr Fox here,' said moustachioed Zhou to Zhang, 'has already spoken to me of your problem, and I know of it in every detail. These particular trouble-making creatures are numerous and a difficult bunch, unlikely to listen to mere words of persuasion. I'm afraid it may have to come to a fight, and for this purpose I shall be obliged to lodge at your house. I am certainly willing to undertake this little commission for you, if you so wish.'

Zhang pondered this proposal for a while. He would in effect be ridding himself of one set of fox problems and gaining another, exchanging an old evil for a new one. Zhou understood his hesitation.

'Do not fear. I am not at all like the other foxes. And besides, you and I have a predestined affinity. Please have no misgivings on my account.'

Zhang finally consented, and Zhou gave him his instructions: 'Tomorrow I want your entire household to shut themselves up in a single room and not to make the slightest noise. Just leave the rest to me.'

Zhang returned home, and the following morning he did exactly as he had been instructed. Presently the sound of violent fighting broke out in the courtyard and continued for some time, before it was replaced by complete silence. Then the members of Zhang's household opened the door and, peeping out, saw blood all over the steps and several little fox heads, no bigger than rice bowls, strewn on the terrace. In the middle of the room beyond, which had been swept clean specially for the occasion, sat the moustachioed Zhou the Third, bolt upright. He greeted Zhang with clasped hands and a smile on his face.

Caption

'Your commission is performed, sir.'

'Your commission is performed, sir. The foxes are all dealt with and exterminated.'

He stayed on in Zhang's home, and the two lived on the most polite terms, like landlord and tenant.

88.

LUST PUNISHED BY FOXES.

A certain man bought a new house, only to discover that it was haunted by fox-spirits, who constantly spoiled his clothes and other belongings and dropped dirt into his noodles.

One day, one of this gentleman's friends dropped by to visit him. Unfortunately he was not at home, and that evening, since her husband had still not returned, his wife prepared dinner for the guest, before eating separately with her maid.

Now, her husband was a somewhat dissolute character who made a hobby of collecting aphrodisiacs of one sort or another. At some time or other that day the resident fox-spirits had secretly slipped one of the drugs from his collection into the congee. While the wife was eating her dinner she noticed a strange taste that resembled camphor and musk and asked her maid what it might be, but the maid said she knew of nothing. After dinner, the wife began to experience an overwhelming feeling of sexual arousal, and the more she tried to suppress it, the stronger and the more urgent it became. There was no available man in the house other than the guest, her husband's friend, and so she made her way to the guest-room and knocked at the door.

The guest asked who it was, and the woman gave her name. He asked her what she wanted, and when she remained silent, he guessed her intentions.

'Your husband and I are friends and treat one another decently. I could never behave in such a bestial manner with my friend's wife.'

The wife remained there standing at the door and refused to leave.

Caption

She made her way to the guest-room and knocked at the door.

'Your husband,' he protested angrily, 'is a man with a reputation in the community! Are you determined to destroy it?'

With these words he spat at her through the window-lattice, and finally in great embarrassment she left. As she went she began asking herself how she could have done such a thing. Then she recalled the strange taste in her congee bowl at dinner. It entered her mind that it might have been caused by one of the aphrodisiacs from her husband's collection, and when she went to look, she found that one of the packages had indeed been tampered with, and the contents scattered all over the cups and bowls on the kitchen table. She remembered having once heard that cold water acted as an antidote in such cases, so she drank some water immediately and soon came round. She awoke from her state of drugged confusion to a feeling of intense remorse and shame. All that night she lay there brooding restlessly, and as dawn was almost breaking, unable to face the world, she threw her sash over a beam and hanged herself. Her maid found her and untied her in the nick of time. Although by this time she was all but dead, she gradually recovered consciousness.

The guest meanwhile had left during the night. The following day at dawn, the master of the house returned to find his wife in bed and plainly unwell. No matter how many times he asked her what the matter was, she lay there in complete silence and would do nothing but weep. When the maid informed her master that her mistress had tried to hang herself in the early hours, he pressed his wife with more and more questions, and finally she sent her maid away and told him the whole story.

The husband heaved a sigh. 'It is my lust that is being punished! This is no fault of yours. Fortunately, this friend of mine is a good man, or I would never be able to hold my head up in the world again.'

After this experience, he became a reformed character, and the foxes disappeared completely.

89.

MOUNTAIN CITY.

The Mountain City of Mount Huan is acknowledged to be one of the wonders of my home district, even though many a year goes by when it is not seen at all. Sun Yu'nian was drinking with his friends on a terrace when suddenly they beheld a lone pagoda on the mountainside opposite, rising up far into the deep blue sky. They looked at one another in sheer disbelief, since they knew of no Zen monastery in that vicinity. Then a host of palaces and halls sprang into view, with roofs and flying eaves of bright green-glazed tiles, and it dawned on them that this was the Mountain City of Mount Huan.

Presently two or three miles of high walls and crenellated battlements, the city's mighty fortifications, became visible, and within the walls they could distinguish countless storeyed buildings and residential districts. Then suddenly a great wind arose, the air grew thick with dust, and the city could scarcely be seen any longer. By and by the wind subsided, the air cleared, and the city had vanished, save for one tall tower, reaching up high into the sky. Each storey of this tower was pierced by a row of five shuttered windows, all of which had been thrown open and let through the light from the sky on the other side. One could count the storeys of the tower by the rows of bright dots. The higher they were, the smaller they became, until by the eighth storey they resembled tiny stars, and above that they became an indistinguishable blur of twinkling lights disappearing into the heavens. It was just possible to make out figures on the tower, some hurrying about, coming and going, others leaning and standing in a variety of postures.

A little while longer, and the tower began to diminish in size, Caption

It dawned on them that this was the Mountain City.

until its roof came into sight. It continued shrinking still further to the height of an ordinary building, then to the size of a fist, then a bean, until finally it could not be seen at all.

There is also a story about an early morning walker who once saw the whole layout of the city with its inhabitants, its markets, its shops. It was in no respect different from a city in our world. This is why it has also been called the City of Ghosts.

90.

A CURE FOR MARITAL STRIFE.

A certain young gentleman named Sun married a young lady of good family named Xin. From the day she became his wife, she wore a pair of chastity-trousers fastened with several sashes and presented to her husband an impregnable fortress, repulsing his every advance and absolutely refusing to make love to him. On their marital bed, she kept a supply of sharpened awls and hairpins ready for use in self-defence.

Having sustained several painful injuries, in the end Sun resigned himself to sleeping in a separate bed, and a month later abandoned all attempts at intimacy with her. As the saying goes, he did not 'venture near the tripod'. Even when they met during the day, she did not grace him with a word or a smile.

One of Sun's friends came to know of this and said to him in private, 'Does your wife ever drink?'

'A little,' was Sun's reply.

The friend went on, jokingly, 'Why then, I know how to bring the two of you together. It is an excellent method, guaranteed to succeed.'

Sun inquired what he had in mind.

'First you must give her a cup of drugged wine. That will knock her out, and then she will let you have your way.'

Sun laughed at the crudity of the idea, but secretly thought to himself that it might just work. He consulted a doctor and carefully mixed up a concoction of wine and the potent herbal root known as monkshood (a well-known narcotic and anaesthetic), which he left on the table in their room. That night, he warmed himself a separate, untainted wine and drank several cups of it before retiring to bed. Three nights he followed this same procedure, but his wife showed no signs whatsoever of taking the bait. Then, one night, when he had been lying in his bed for some time, he noticed that his wife was still sitting up in bed on her own. He deliberately began to snore, whereupon she climbed down from her bed, took the drugged wine from the table and went to warm it on the stove. Sun watched with secret delight as she drank a whole cup, then poured herself a second, drank about half, tipped the rest back into the wine kettle, straightened out her bedding and lay down to sleep. A long silence ensued. Her lamp was still burning, and Sun suspected that she was still awake.

'The lamp will catch fire!' he called out.

There was no reply. Again he called, and again there was no reply. He got down naked from his bed and went over to look at her. He could see that her senses had indeed been completely numbed by the drug. He lifted the coverlet, lay down beside her and began untying her numerous protective wrappings one by one. She was perfectly aware of what he was doing, but could neither move nor utter a word. She could only let him have his way with her, whereupon he returned to his own bed.

When eventually she recovered the full use of her faculties, she was overwhelmed with such feelings of disgust and self-loathing that she tied a sash to a beam and hanged herself without further ado. In the midst of his dreams, Sun heard a strange gasping and groaning, and when he rose from his bed and went hurrying over, he found his wife hanging there, her tongue already protruding two inches from her mouth. Aghast, he cut her down and carried her to her bed, where in time she regained consciousness.

Sun himself now began to feel an intense physical repugnance towards his wife. They avoided each other as much as was humanly possible, and if they were obliged to be in each other's company would hang their heads and ignore one another. Four or five years passed in this gloomy fashion, during which time they barely exchanged a single word. She might be in a room talking and laughing with someone else; but the moment she saw her husband come in, her face would harden and she would grow cold as ice. Sun moved into his study and slept there the whole year round. On the rare occasion when he yielded to parental pressure and allowed himself to be dragged back to the conjugal bedroom, he would sit there sullenly facing the wall, then climb into bed and go to sleep without a word. His parents were most disconsolate about the turn things had taken.

One day, an elderly nun came to visit the household. She met the wife and spoke highly of her to Sun's mother, who said nothing but heaved a deep sigh. Later the nun asked her in private what was troubling her, and was told the whole story.

'This is an easy matter,' she said.