Читать книгу Tales of a Chinese Grandmother - Frances Carpenter - Страница 13

II

HOW PAN KU MADE THE WORLD

YOU MAY OFFER my guests ginger, Ah Shung, and you may offer sugared lotus seed, Yu Lang," Grandmother Ling said to the children when the family gathered in her room after the evening meal. Huang Ying, the old woman's favorite maid servant, went to a tall mahogany cabinet that stood against the wall, and from its carved wooden shelf she lifted down a small blue-and-white bowl which she put into the boy's hands. She gave to Yu Lang a china jar with a scene on its sides done in all the five colors: red, yellow, blue, black, and white.

The children held these out politely in both their hands. They bowed as they offered them to the Old Old One, who sat very straight in her great chair of carved polished wood. Then they bowed before the other grownups, who selected bits of orange-colored ginger and some sugary seeds with their thin yellow fingers.

The men in their long gowns of dark silk were seated near their wives, with little tables beside them, the eldest having places of honor nearest Lao Lao. With their shining black hair coiled so neatly upon their necks, with their smooth faces so carefully tinted with red and white powder, and with their gowns of fine silk and embroidery, the younger women looked like the delicate figures on Lao Lao's best summer fan.

Across the back of this room, framed in carved wood, was Grandmother Ling's brick bed under which a fire burned. Her soft silken comforters were piled upon it out of the way in the corner, and the green curtains that hung from under its canopy were pushed aside. Upon the warm floor of the bed sat some of the other children with their feet tucked beneath them. They greeted the ginger and the lotus seeds with the broadest of smiles, but they took care not to seem to be in a hurry to take them lest they should be thought impolite.

"It is the hour for our Little Dragon to go to sleep," said Grandmother Ling. She looked toward the small boy whose name, Lung-Er, had been given him in the hope that he would grow up to be as strong and as good as a mighty dragon. Also, when they heard this name the bad spirits might think he was not a child at all but a young dragon whom they would not dare to carry away.

Lung-Er was only three years old. He was the youngest of all the Ling children and the pet of everyone, big and little, inside the red gate. Around his neck he wore a silver chain fastened with a silver lock, bought with coins given by one hundred friends of the family. The Lings firmly believed this would chain him to earth. A red string was twined in his tiny black braid to bring him good luck.

The little boy was bundled up in thick padded clothing. In his outer suit of gay red he looked just like the fat top that Ah Shung often spun on the hard floor of his room. Everyone laughed as Lung-Er stood before his grandmother and made such a low bow that he almost toppled over.

"He grows," said Grandmother Ling, smiling, as his nurse took the child away. "He grows almost as fast as Pan Ku, who made the world."

Ah Shung and Yu Lang hurried to bring their stools close to their grandmother's chair. They looked up into her face with such eager expressions that the old woman laughed.

"Ho, these two want a story about the mighty Pan Ku! Well, it will do no harm for us to hear that tale once again," she said as she wiped the sugar from her wrinkled fingers on a damp towel which Huang Ying held for her.

"Once long, long ago," she began, "there was no world. But from somewhere or other there came this man called Pan Ku. With his hammer and a cutting tool, called a "chisel," he began to make the earth. Each day Pan Ku grew six feet in height. The earth grew just as fast. With his head Pan Ku pushed the sky farther and farther away. He made the earth larger and larger.

"From out of the sky four beasts came to help him. There was the good unicorn with his single great horn growing out of his forehead and his hairy hide with all the five colors upon it. His body was shaped like a deer's, but his hoofs were those of a horse. His tail was like that of an ox, and his horn was tipped with a tuft of soft flesh.

"And there was the phoenix, the king of the birds, who came from the sun. On his body, too, there were all the five colors, and his tail had twelve feathers, one for each moon of the year. Such long feathers they were that they trailed far behind him as he flew through the air.

"The great tortoise that lived for thousands of years also aided Pan Ku. But best of all there was a dragon so huge that he could reach all the way across the broad sky. Pan Ku's dragon may have looked like those that are carved upon my bed."

The children examined anew the carved wooden dragons that served as legs for the frame of the Old Old One's bed. Each of the twisting creatures had a head like a cow, the body of a serpent, scales like a fish, feet round as a tiger's paw, and claws like an eagle's. Two short horns were on its head, and its eyes popped from their sockets. Its wide mouth was open, and a slender tongue was thrust out between its long fangs.

"What did Pan Ku look like, Lao Lao?" Ah Shung asked as his grandmother paused for a moment. In reply the old woman sent her maid, Huang Ying, to bring a scroll from the carved cabinet.

"Here is Pan Ku," Grandmother Ling said as she unrolled the strip of silk and paper that was wound about a shiny black stick. "This is an old painting that belonged to your grandfather. How long it has been in the Ling treasure chests nobody knows."

Everyone gathered about as the old picture was spread out on the floor and weights were laid on its corners. Strangely enough, this Pan Ku was not tall, but Lao Lao explained that the artist might have been showing him before he began to grow so quickly. Two little horns were set upon his wrinkled brow, and an apron of green leaves was his only garment. In one hand he carried his hammer and in the other his chisel. And near by, at his feet, were his helpers, the unicorn and the dragon, the phoenix and the tortoise.

"Nothing that is done hastily is well done, my children. So it is not at all strange that it took Pan Ku eighteen thousand years to finish making the world. " Grandmother Ling went on with her story. "But at last the sky was round and the earth was ready. There was no living thing on it, however, until Pan Ku died and his spirit flew away to the Heavenly Kingdom. He gave life to the world. His head became its high mountains. His breath became the winds that blew over it and the clouds that crossed the sky. His voice rolled in the thunder. The blood in his veins turned into rivers, his flesh made the fields, and his skin and his hair made the plants and the trees. His eyes became stars, and his sweat made the rain. Tiny insects that crawled upon his great body were changed into live men and women. And so the world began."

"What about the sun and the moon, Aged and Honorable Mother?" Ah Shung's father inquired. He had heard this story many times, but he enjoyed watching the wondering faces of the younger children who listened so eagerly.

"Oh, the sun and the moon," the old woman said. "Like Pan Ku, I forgot them. Pan Ku neglected to set them in the sky where they belonged. The earth was in darkness. There was no day. There was no night. The emperor who ruled the first people tried to summon the sun and the moon from under the sea where they were hiding. He sent a messenger to them. But no ray of light broke through the darkness.

"There was nothing to do but to call Pan Ku back from the Heavenly Kingdom. Upon the palm of his left hand he drew the sign of the sun, and upon the palm of his right hand he marked the sign of the moon. In turn he stretched his hands out toward the sea. Seven times he called the sun and moon to come forth. He commanded them to take their places up in the sky. Even the sun and the moon could not disobey the mighty Pan Ku. In chariots drawn by strong dragons they rose from the water. Light flooded the heavens, and day and night came to the world.

"I have heard it told that Pan Ku appeared upon the earth once again," said Grandmother Ling. "For many hundreds of years his spirit had no home in the other world. Like all poor homeless spirits, it rode hither and yon upon the strong winds. Then at last it came upon a woman who dwelt on a mountain so high that it was only a step from its top to the Heavenly Kingdom. This woman was a remarkable creature who filled her stomach with clouds and who quenched her thirst with the light from the sun and the moon.

"Well, the spirit of Pan Ku chose to enter the body of this woman's baby. As I heard the tale, her wonderful child could stand up and walk about and speak words of wisdom from the very first moment at which he entered the world. Wherever he went a five-colored cloud floated around him.

"When he grew old again Pan Ku took refuge upon the high Eastern Mountain. As he sat at the door of his cave in the rocks the five-colored clouds still hung over his head. Because of his great age and because of his wisdom, pilgrims came from afar to hear his good words. It was the old god of that Eastern Mountain who found out who he was. He made a special journey to visit the Emperor of Heaven, and from him he learned that the wise hermit of the Eastern Mountain was really Pan Ku, who made the world with his hammer and chisel in the very beginning."