The Golden Days

by Cao Xueqin

  Shi-yin realized that he was listening to the words of a madman and took no notice. But the monk persisted:

  ‘Give her to me! Give her to me!’

  Shi-yin was beginning to lose patience and, clasping his little girl more tightly to him, turned on his heel and was about to re-enter the house when the monk pointed his finger at him, roared with laughter, and then proceeded to intone the following verses:

  ‘Fond man, your pampered child to cherish so-

  That caltrop-glass which shines on melting snow !

  Beware the high feast of the fifteenth day,

  When all in smoke and fire shall pass away!’1

  Shi-yin heard all this quite plainly and was a little worried by it. He was thinking of asking the monk what lay behind these puzzling words when he heard the Taoist say, ‘We don’t need to stay together. Why don’t we part company here and each go about his own business ? Three kalpas from now I shall wait for you on Bei-mang Hill. Having joined forces again there, we can go together to the Land of Illusion to sign off.’

  ‘Excellent!’ said the other. And the two of them went off and soon were both lost to sight.

  ‘There must have been something behind all this,’ thought Shi-yin to himself. ‘I really ought to have asked him what he meant, but now it is too late.’

  He was still standing outside his door brooding when Jia Yu-cun, the poor student who lodged at the Bottle-gourd Temple next door, came up to him. Yu-cun was a native of Hu-zhou and came from a family of scholars and bureaucrats which had, however, fallen on bad times when Yu-cun was born. The family fortunes on both his father’s and mother’s side had all been spent, and the members of the family had themselves gradually died off until only Yu-cun was left. There were no prospects for him in his home town, so he had set off for the capital, in search of fame and fortune. Unfortunately he had got no further than Soochow when his funds ran out, and he had now been living there in poverty for a year, lodging in this temple and keeping himself alive by working as a copyist. For this reason Shi-yin saw a great deal of his company.

  As soon as he caught sight of Shi-yin, Yu-cun clasped his hands in greeting and smiled ingratiatingly. ‘I could see you standing there gazing, sir. Has anything been happening in the street?’

  ‘No, no,’ said Shi-yin. ‘It just happened’that my little girl was crying, so I brought her out here to amuse her. Your coming is most opportune, dear boy. I was beginning to feel most dreadfully bored. Won’t you come into my little den, and we can help each other to while away this tedious hot day ?’

  So saying, he called for a servant to take the child indoors, while he himself took Yu-cun by the hand and led him into his study, where his boy served them both with tea. But they had not exchanged half-a-dozen words before one of the servants rushed in to say that ‘Mr Yan had come to pay a call.’ Shi-yin hurriedly rose up and excused himself: ‘I seem to have brought you here under false pretences. I do hope you will forgive me. If you don’t mind sitting on your own here for a moment, I shall be with you directly.’

  Yu-cun rose to his feet too. ‘Please do not distress yourself on my account, sir. I am a regular visitor here and can easily wait a bit.’ But by the time he had finished saying this, Shi-yin was already out of the study and on his way to the guestroom.

  Left to himself, Yu-cun was flicking through some of Shi-yin’s books of poetry in order to pass the time, when he heard a woman’s cough outside the window. Immediately he jumped up and peered out to see who it was. The cough appeared to have come from a maid who was picking flowers in the garden. She was an unusually good-looking girl with a rather refined face: not a great beauty, by any means, but with something striking about her. Yu-cun gazed at her spellbound.

  Having now finished picking her flowers, this anonymous member of the Zhen household was about to go in again when, on some sudden impulse, she raised her head and caught sight of a man standing in the window. His hat was frayed and his clothing threadbare; yet, though obviously poor, he had a fine, manly physique and handsome, well-proportioned features.

  The maid hastened to remove herself from this male presence; but as she went she thought to herself, ‘What a fine-looking man! But so shabby! The family hasn’t got any friends or relations as poor as that. It must be that Jia Yu-cun the master is always on about. No wonder he says that he won’t stay poor long. I remember hearing him say that he’s often wanted to help him but hasn’t yet found an opportunity.’ And thinking these thoughts she could not forbear to turn back for another peep or two.

  Yu-cun saw her turn back and, at once assuming that she had taken a fancy to him, was beside himself with delight. What a perceptive young woman she must be, he thought, to have seen the genius underneath the rags! A real friend in trouble!

  After a while the boy came in again and Yu-cun elicited from him that the visitor in the front room was now staying to dinner. It was obviously out of the question to wait much longer, so he slipped down the passage-way at the side of the house and let himself out by the back gate. Nor did Shi-yin invite him round again when, having at last seen off his visitor, he learned that Yu-cun had already left.

  But then the Mid Autumn festival arrived and, after the family convivialities were over, Shi-yin had a little dinner for two laid out in his study and went in person to invite Yu-cun, walking to his temple lodgings in the moonlight.

  Ever since the day the Zhens’ maid had, by looking back twice over her shoulder, convinced him that she was a friend, Yu-cun had had the girl very much on his mind, and now that it was festival time, the full moon of Mid Autumn lent an inspiration to his romantic impulses which finally resulted in the following octet:

  ‘ Ere on ambition’s path my feet are set,

  Sorrow comes often this poor heart to fret.

  Yet, as my brow contracted with new care,

  Was there not one who, parting, turned to stare ?

  Dare I, that grasp at shadows in the wind,

  Hope, underneath the moon, a friend to find?

  Bright orb, if with my plight you sympathize,

  Shine first upon the chamber where she lies.’

  Having delivered himself of this masterpiece, Yu-cun’s thoughts began to run on his unrealized ambitions and, after much head-scratching and many heavenward glances accompanied by heavy sighs, he produced the following couplet, reciting it in a loud, ringing voice which caught the ear of Shi-yin, who chanced at that moment to be arriving:

  ‘The jewel in the casket bides till one shall come to buy.

  The jade pin in the drawer hides, waiting its time to fly.’2

  Shi-yin smiled. ‘You are a man of no mean ambition, Yu-cun.’

  ‘Oh no!’ Yu-cun smiled back deprecatingly. ‘You are too flattering. I was merely reciting at random from the lines of some old poet. But what brings you here, sir ?’

  ‘Tonight is Mid Autumn night,’ said Shi-yin. ‘People call it the Festival of Reunion. It occurred to me that you might be feeling rather lonely here in your monkery, so I have arranged for the two of us to take a little wine together in my study. I hope you will not refuse to join me.’

  Yu-cun made no polite pretence of declining. ‘Your kindness is nrore than I deserve,’ he said. ‘I accept gratefully.’ And he accompanied Shi-yin back to the study next door.

  Soon they had finished their tea. Wine and various choice dishes were brought in and placed on the table, already laid out with cups, plates, and so forth, and the two men took their places and began to drink. At first they were rather slow and ceremonious; but gradually, as the conversation grew more animated, their potations too became more reckless and uninhibited. The sounds of music and singing which could now be heard from every house in the neighbourhood and the full moon which shone with cold brilliance overhead seemed to increase their elation, so that the cups were emptied almost as soon as they touched their lips, and Yu-cun, who was already a sheet or so in the wind, was seized with an irrepressible excitement to which he presently gave e
xpression in the form of a quatrain, ostensibly on the subject of the moon, but really about the ambition he had hitherto been at some pains to conceal:

  ‘In thrice five nights her perfect O is made,

  Whose cold light bathes each marble balustrade.

  As her bright wheel starts on its starry ways,

  On earth ten thousand heads look up and gaze.’

  ‘Bravo!’ said Shi-yin loudly. ‘I have always insisted that you were a young fellow who would go up in the world, and now, in these verses you have just recited, I see an augury of your ascent. In no time at all we shall see you up among the clouds! This calls for a drink!’ And, saying this, he poured Yu-cun a large cup of wine.

  Yu-cun drained the cup, then, surprisingly, sighed:

  ‘Don’t imagine the drink is making me boastful, but I really do believe that if it were just a question of having the sort of qualifications now in demand, I should stand as good a chance as any of getting myself on to the list of candidates. The trouble is that I simply have no means of laying my hands on the money that would be needed for lodgings and travel expenses. The journey to the capital is a long one, and the sort of money I can earn from my copying is not enough—’

  ‘Why ever didn’t you say this before?’ said Shi-yin interrupting him. ‘I have long wanted to do something about this, but on all the occasions I have met you previously, the conversation has never got round to this subject, and I haven’t liked to broach it for fear of offending you. Well, now we know where we are. I am not a very clever man, but at least I know the right thing to do when I see it. Luckily, the next Triennial is only a few months ahead. You must go to the capital without delay. A spring examination triumph will make you feel that all your studying has been worth while. I shall take care of all your expenses. It is the least return I can make for your friendship.’ And there and then he instructed his boy to go with all speed and make up a parcel of fifty taels of the best refined silver and two suits of winter clothes.

  ‘The almanac gives the nineteenth as a good day for travelling,’ he went on, addressing Yu-cun again. ‘You can set about hiring a boat for the journey straight away. How delightful it will be to meet again next winter when you have distinguished yourself by soaring to the top over all the other candidates!’

  Yu-cun accepted the silver and the clothes with only the most perfunctory word of thanks and without, apparently, giving them a further moment’s thought, for he continued to drink and laugh and talk as if nothing had happened. It was well after midnight before they broke up.

  After seeing Yu-cun off, Shi-yin went to bed and slept without a break until the sun was high in the sky next morning. When he awoke, his mind was still running on the conversation of the previous night. He thought he would write a couple of introductory letters for Yu-cun to take with him to the capital, and arrange for him to call on the family of an official he was acquainted with who might be able to put him up; but when he sent a servant to invite him over, the servant brought back word from the temple as follows:

  ‘The monk says that Mr Jia set out for the capital at five o’clock this morning, sir. He says he left a message to pass on to you. He said to tell you, “A scholar should not concern himself with almanacs, but should act as the situation demands,” and he said there wasn’t time to say good-bye.’

  So Shi-yin was obliged to let the matter drop.

  It is a true saying that ‘time in idleness is quickly spent’. In no time at all it was Fifteenth Night, and Shi-yin sent little Ying-lian out, in the charge of one of the servants called Calamity, to see the mummers and the coloured lanterns. It was near midnight when Calamity, feeling an urgent need to relieve his bladder, put Ying-lian down on someone’s doorstep while he went about his business, only to find, on his return, that the child was nowhere to be seen. Frantically he searched for her throughout the rest of the night; but when day dawned and he had still not found her, he took to his heels, not daring to face his master and mistress, and made off for another part of the country.

  Shi-yin and his wife knew that something must be wrong when their little girl failed to return home all night. Then a search was made; but all those sent out were obliged in the end to report that no trace of her could be found.

  The shock of so sudden a loss to a middle-aged couple who had only ever had the one daughter can be imagined. In tears every day and most of the night, they almost lost the will to go on living, and after about a month like this first Shi-yin and then his wife fell ill, so that doctors and diviners were in daily attendance on them.

  Then, on the fifteenth of the third month, while frying cakes for an offering, the monk of Bottle-gourd Temple carelessly allowed the oil to catch alight, which set fire to the paper window. And, since the houses in this area all had wooden walls and bamboo fences – though also, doubtless, because they were doomed to destruction anyway – the fire leaped from house to house until the whole street was blazing away like a regular Fiery Mountain; and though the firemen came to put it out, by the time they arrived the fire was well under way and long past controlling, and roared away all night long until it had burnt itself out, rendering heaven knows how many families homeless in the process.

  Poor Zhens 1 Though they and their handful of domestics escaped unhurt, their house, which was only next door to the temple, was soon reduced to a heap of rubble, while Shi-yin stood by helpless, groaning and stamping in despair.

  After some discussion with his wife, Shi-yin decided that they should move to their farm in the country; but a series of crop failures due to flooding and drought had led to widespread brigandage in those parts, and government troops were out everywhere hunting down the mutinous peasants and making arrests. In such conditions it was impossible to settle on the farm, so Shi-yin sold the land and, taking only two of the maids with them, went with his wife to seek refuge with his father-in-law, Feng Su.

  This Feng Su was a Ru-zhou man who, though only a farmer by calling, had a very comfortable sufficiency. He was somewhat displeased to see his son-in-law arriving like a refugee on his doorstep; but fortunately Shi-yin had on him the money he had realized from the sale of the farm, and this he now entrusted to his father-in-law to buy for him, as and when he could, a house and land on which he could depend for his future livelihood. Feng Su embezzled about half of this sum and used the other half to provide him with a ruinous cottage and some fields of poor, thin soil.

  A scholar, with no experience of business or agricultural matters, Shi-yin now found himself poorer after a year or two of struggle than when he had started. Feng Su would treat him to a few pearls of rustic wisdom whenever they met, but behind his back would grumble to all and sundry about ‘incompetents’ and ‘people who liked their food but were too lazy to work for it’, which caused Shi-yin great bitterness when it came to his ears. The anxieties and injustices which now beset him, coming on top of the shocks he had suffered a year or two previously, left a man of his years with little resistance to the joint onslaught of poverty and ill-health, and gradually he began to betray the unmistakable symptoms of a decline.

  One day, wishing to take his mind off his troubles for a bit, he had dragged himself, stick in hand, to the main road, when it chanced that he suddenly caught sight of a Taoist with a limp – a crazy, erratic figure in hempen sandals and tattered clothes, who chanted the following words to himself as he advanced towards him:

  ‘Men all know that salvation should be won,

  But with ambition won’t have done, have done.

  Where are the famous ones of days gone by ?

  In grassy graves they lie now, every one.

  Men all know that salvation should be won,

  But with their riches won’t have done, have done.

  Each day they grumble they’ve not made enough.

  When they’ve enough, it’s goodnight everyone!

  Men all know that salvation should be won,

  But with their loving wives they won’t have done.

  Th
e darlings every day protest their love:

  But once you’re dead, they’re off with another one.

  Men all know that salvation should be won,

  But with their children won’t have done, have done.

  Yet though of parents fond there is no lack,

  Of grateful children saw I ne’er a one.’

  Shi-yin approached the Taoist and questioned him. ‘What is all this you are saying ? All I can make out is a lot of “won” and “done” .’

  ‘If you can make out “won” and “done” ,’ replied the Taoist with a smile, ‘you may be said to have understood; for in all the affairs of this world what is won is done, and what is done is won; for whoever has not yet done has not yet won, and in order to have won, one must first have done. I shall call my song the “Won-Done Song”.’

  Shi-yin had always been quick-witted, and on hearing these words a flash of understanding had illuminated his mind. He therefore smiled back at the Taoist: ‘Wait a minute! How would you like me to provide your “Won-Done Song” with a commentary ?’

  ‘Please do!’ said the Taoist; and Shi-yin proceeded as follows:

  ‘Mean hovels and abandoned halls

  Where courtiers once paid daily calls:

  Bleak haunts where weeds and willows scarcely thrive

  Were once with mirth and revelry alive.

  Whilst cobwebs shroud the mansion’s gilded beams,

  The cottage casement with choice muslin gleams.

  Would you of perfumed elegance recite ?

  Even as you speak, the raven locks turn white.

  Who yesterday her lord’s bones laid in clay,

  On silken bridal-bed shall lie today.

  Coffers with gold and silver filled:

  Now, in a trice, a tramp by all reviled.

  One at some other’s short life gives a sigh,

  Not knowing that he, too, goes home – to die!

  The sheltered and well-educated lad,

  In spite of all your care, may turn out bad;

  And the delicate, fastidious maid