Some Chinese Ghosts

by Lafcadio Hearn

  Also the statues in porcelain of divinities: the Genius of the Hearth; the Long-pinn who are the Twelve Deities of Ink; the blessed Lao-tseu, born with silver hair; Kong-fu-tse, grasping the scroll of written wisdom; Kouan-in, sweetest Goddess of Mercy, standing snowy-footed upon the heart of her golden lily; Chi-nong, the god who taught men how to cook; Fo, with long eyes closed in meditation, and lips smiling the mysterious smile of Supreme Beatitude; Cheou-lao, god of Longevity, bestriding his aerial steed, the white-winged stork; Pou-t’ai, Lord of Contentment and of Wealth, obese and dreamy; and that fairest Goddess of Talent, from whose beneficent hands eternally streams the iridescent rain of pearls.

  And though many a secret of that matchless art that Pu bequeathed unto men may indeed have been forgotten and lost forever, the story of the Porcelain-God is remembered; and I doubt not that any of the aged Jeou-yen-liao-kong, any one of the old blind men of the great potteries, who sit all day grinding ­­colors in the sun, could tell you Pu was once a humble Chinese workman, who grew to be a great artist by dint of tireless study and patience and by the inspiration of Heaven. So famed he became that some deemed him an alchemist, who possessed the secret called White-and-Yellow, by which stones might be turned into gold; and ­­others thought him a magician, ­having the ghastly power of murdering men with horror of nightmare, by hiding charmed effigies of them ­under the tiles of their own roofs; and ­­others, again, averred that he was an astrologer who had discovered the mystery of those Five Hing which influence all things,—those Powers that move even in the currents of the star-drift, in the milky Tien-ho, or River of the Sky. Thus, at least, the ignorant spoke of him; but even those who stood about the Son of Heaven, those whose hearts had been strengthened by the acquisition of wisdom, wildly praised the marvels of his handicraft, and asked each ­other if there might be any imaginable form of beauty which Pu could not evoke from that beauteous substance so docile to the touch of his cunning hand.

  And one day it came to pass that Pu sent a priceless gift to the Celestial and August: a vase imitating the substance of ore-rock, all aflame with pyritic scintillation,—a shape of glittering splendor with chameleons sprawling over it; chameleons of porcelain that shifted ­color as ­often as the beholder changed his position. And the Emperor, wondering exceedingly at the splendor of the work, questioned the princes and the mandarins concerning him that made it. And the princes and the mandarins answered that he was a workman named Pu, and that he was without equal among potters, knowing secrets that seemed to have been inspired ­either by gods or by demons. Whereupon the Son of Heaven sent his ­officers to Pu with a noble gift, and summoned him unto his presence.

  So the humble artisan entered ­before the Emperor, and ­having performed the supreme prostration,—thrice kneeling, and thrice nine times touching the ground with his forehead,—awaited the command of the August.

  And the Emperor spake to him, saying: “Son, thy gracious gift hath found high favor in our sight; and for the charm of that ­offering we have bestowed upon thee a reward of five thousand silver liang. But thrice that sum shall be awarded thee so soon as thou shalt have fulfilled our behest. Hearken, therefore, O matchless artificer! it is now our will that thou make for us a vase ­having the tint and the aspect of living flesh, but—mark well our desire!—of flesh made to creep by the utterance of such words as ­­poets utter,—flesh moved by an Idea, flesh horripilated by a Thought! Obey, and answer not! We have spoken.”

  Now Pu was the most cunning of all the P’ei-se-kong,—the men who marry ­­colors together; of all the Hoa-yang-kong, who draw the shapes of vase-decoration; of all the Hoei-sse-kong, who paint in enamel; of all the T’ien-thsai-kong, who brighten ­color; of all the Chao-lou-kong, who watch the furnace-fires and the porcelain-ovens. But he went away sorrowing from the Palace of the Son of Heaven, notwithstanding the gift of five thousand silver liang which had been given to him. For he thought to himself: “Surely the mystery of the comeliness of flesh, and the mystery of that by which it is moved, are the secrets of the Supreme Tao. How shall man lend the aspect of sentient life to dead clay? Who save the Infinite can give soul?”

  Now Pu had discovered those witchcrafts of ­color, those surprises of grace, that make the art of the ceramist. He had found the secret of the feng-hong, the wizard flush of the Rose; of the hoa-hong, the delicious incarnadine; of the mountain-green called chan-lou; of the pale soft yellow termed hiao-hoang-yeou; and of the hoang-kin, which is the blazing beauty of gold. He had found those eel-tints, those serpent-greens, those pansy-violets, those furnace-crimsons, those carminates and lilacs, subtle as spirit-flame, which our enamellists of the Occident long sought without success to reproduce. But he trembled at the task assigned him, as he returned to the toil of his studio, saying: “How shall any miserable man render in clay the quivering of flesh to an Idea,—the inexplicable horripilation of a Thought? Shall a man venture to mock the magic of that Eternal Moulder by whose infinite power a million suns are shapen more readily than one small jar might be rounded upon my wheel?”

  Yet the command of the Celestial and August might never be disobeyed; and the patient workman strove with all his power to fulfil the Son of Heaven’s desire. But vainly for days, for weeks, for months, for season ­after season, did he strive; vainly also he prayed unto the gods to aid him; vainly he besought the Spirit of the Furnace, crying: “O thou Spirit of Fire, hear me, heed me, help me! how shall I,—a miserable man, unable to breathe into clay a living soul,—how shall I render in this inanimate substance the aspect of flesh made to creep by the utterance of a Word, sentient to the horripilation of a Thought?”

  For the Spirit of the Furnace made strange answer to him with whispering of fire: “Vast thy faith, weird thy prayer! Has Thought feet, that man may perceive the trace of its passing? Canst thou mea­sure me the blast of the Wind?”

  Nevertheless, with purpose unmoved, nine-and-forty times did Pu seek to fulfil the Emperor’s command; nine-and-forty times he strove to obey the behest of the Son of Heaven. Vainly, alas! did he consume his substance; vainly did he expend his strength; vainly did he exhaust his knowl­edge: success smiled not upon him; and Evil visited his home, and Poverty sat in his dwelling, and Misery shivered at his hearth.

  Sometimes, when the hour of trial came, it was found that the ­­colors had ­become strangely transmuted in the firing, or had faded into ashen pallor, or had darkened into the fuliginous hue of forest-mould. And Pu, beholding these misfortunes, made wail to the Spirit of the Furnace, praying: “O thou Spirit of Fire, how shall I render the likeness of lustrous flesh, the warm glow of living ­color, unless thou aid me?”

  And the Spirit of the Furnace mysteriously answered him with murmuring of fire: “Canst thou learn the art of that Infinite Enameller who hath made beautiful the Arch of Heaven,—whose brush is Light; whose paints are the ­­colors of the Evening?”

  Sometimes, again, even when the tints had not changed, ­after the pricked and labored surface had seemed about to quicken in the heat, to assume the vibratility of living skin,—even at the last hour all the labor of the workers proved to have been wasted; for the fickle substance rebelled against their efforts, producing only crinklings gro­tesque as those upon the rind of a withered fruit, or granulations like those upon the skin of a dead bird from which the feathers have been rudely plucked. And Pu wept, and cried out unto the Spirit of the Furnace: “O thou Spirit of Flame, how shall I be able to imitate the thrill of flesh touched by a Thought, unless thou wilt vouchsafe to lend me thine aid?”

  And the Spirit of the Furnace mysteriously answered him with muttering of fire: “Canst thou give ghost unto a stone? Canst thou thrill with a Thought the en­­trails of the granite hills?”

  Sometimes it was found that all the work indeed had not failed; for the ­color seemed good, and all faultless the ­matter of the vase appeared to be, ­having n­either crack nor wrinkling nor crankling; but the pliant softness of warm skin d
id not meet the eye; the flesh-tinted surface ­offered only the harsh aspect and hard glimmer of metal. All their exquisite toil to mock the pulpiness of sentient substance had left no trace; had been brought to nought by the breath of the furnace. And Pu, in his despair, shrieked to the Spirit of the Furnace: “O thou merciless divinity! O thou most pitiless god!—thou whom I have worshipped with ten thousand sacrifices!—for what fault hast thou abandoned me? for what error hast thou forsaken me? How may I, most wretched of men! ever render the aspect of flesh made to creep with the utterance of a Word, sentient to the titillation of a Thought, if thou wilt not aid me?”

  And the Spirit of the Furnace made answer unto him with roaring of fire: “Canst thou divide a Soul? Nay! . . . Thy life for the life of thy work!—thy soul for the soul of thy Vase!”

  And hearing these words Pu arose with a terrible resolve swelling at his heart, and made ready for the last and fiftieth time to fashion his work for the oven.

  One hundred times did he sift the clay and the quartz, the kao-ling and the tun; one hundred times did he purify them in clearest ­water; one hundred times with tireless hands did he knead the creamy paste, mingling it at last with ­­colors known only to himself. Then was the vase shapen and reshapen, and touched and retouched by the hands of Pu, ­until its blandness seemed to live, ­until it appeared to quiver and to palpitate, as with vitality from within, as with the quiver of rounded muscle undulating beneath the integument. For the hues of life were upon it and infiltrated throughout its innermost substance, imitating the carnation of blood-bright tissue, and the reticulated purple of the veins; and over all was laid the envelope of sun-­colored Pe-kia-ho, the lucid and glossy enamel, half diaphanous, even like the substance that it counterfeited,—the polished skin of a woman. Never since the making of the world had any work comparable to this been wrought by the skill of man.

  Then Pu bade those who aided him that they should feed the furnace well with wood of tcha; but he told his resolve unto none. Yet ­after the oven ­began to glow, and he saw the work of his hands blossoming and blushing in the heat, he bowed himself ­before the Spirit of Flame, and murmured: “O thou Spirit and ­Master of Fire, I know the truth of thy words! I know that a Soul may never be divided! Therefore my life for the life of my work!—my soul for the soul of my Vase!”

  And for nine days and for eight nights the furnaces were fed unceasingly with wood of tcha; for nine days and for eight nights men watched the wondrous vase crystallizing into ­being, rose-lighted by the breath of the flame. Now upon the coming of the ninth night, Pu bade all his weary comrades retire to rest, for that the work was wellnigh done, and the success assured. “If you find me not here at sunrise,” he said, “fear not to take forth the vase; for I know that the task will have been accomplished ac­cording to the command of the August.” So they departed.

  But in that same ninth night Pu entered the flame, and yielded up his ghost in the embrace of the Spirit of the Furnace, giving his life for the life of his work,—his soul for the soul of his Vase.

  And when the workmen came upon the tenth ­morning to take forth the porcelain marvel, even the bones of Pu had ceased to be; but lo! the Vase lived as they looked upon it: seeming to be flesh moved by the utterance of a Word, creeping to the titillation of a Thought. And whenever tapped by the finger it uttered a voice and a name,—the voice of its maker, the name of its creator: PU.

  And the Son of Heaven, hearing of these things, and viewing the miracle of the vase, said unto those about him: “Verily, the Impossible hath been wrought by the strength of faith, by the force of obedience! Yet never was it our desire that so cruel a sacrifice should have been; we sought only to know whether the skill of the matchless artificer came from the Divinities or from the Demons,—from heaven or from hell. Now, indeed, we discern that Pu hath taken his place among the gods.” And the Emperor mourned exceedingly for his faithful servant. But he ordained that godlike honors should be paid unto the spirit of the marvellous artist, and that his memory should be revered forevermore, and that fair statues of him should be set up in all the cities of the Celestial Empire, and above all the toiling of the potteries, that the multitude of workers might unceasingly call upon his name and invoke his benediction upon their labors.

  APPENDIX

  NOTES

  “The Soul of the Great Bell.”—The story of Ko-Ngai is one of the collection en­titled Te-Hiao-Tou-Choué, or “A Hundred Examples of Filial Piety.” It is very simply told by the Chinese narrator. The scholarly French consul, P. Dabry de Thiersant, translated and published in 1877 a portion of the book, including the legend of the Bell. His translation is enriched with a number of Chinese drawings; and there is a quaint ­little picture of Ko-Ngai leaping into the molten metal.

  “The Story of Ming-Y.”—The singular phantom-tale upon which my work is based forms the thirty-fourth story of the famous collection Kin-Kou-Ki-Koan, and was first translated ­under the ­title, “La Bachelière du Pays de Chu,” by the learned Gustave Schlegel, as an introduction to his publication (accompanied by a French version) of the curious and obscene Mai-yu-lang-toú-tchen-hoa-koueï (Leyden, 1877), which itself forms the seventh recital of the same work. Schlegel, Julien, Gardner, Birch, D’Entrecolles, Rémusat, Pavie, Olyphant, Grisebach, Hervey-Saint-Denys, and ­­others, have given the Occidental world translations of eighteen stories from the Kin-Kou-Ki-Koan; namely, Nos. 2, 3, 5, 6, 7, 8, 10, 14, 19, 20, 26, 27, 29, 30, 31, 34, 35, and 39. The Chinese work itself dates back to the thirteenth century; but as it forms only a collection of the most popular tales of that epoch, many of the stories selected by the Chinese editor may have had a much more ancient origin. There are forty tales in the Kin-Kou-Ki-Koan.

  “The Legend of Tchi-Niu.”—My authority for this tale is the following legend from the thirty-fourth chapter of the Kan-ing-p’ien, or “Book of Rewards and Punishments,”—a work attributed to Lao-tseu, which contains some four hundred anecdotes and traditions of the most curious kind:—

  Tong-yong, who lived ­under the Han dynasty, was reduced to a state of extreme poverty. Having lost his ­father, he sold himself in ­order to obtain . . . the wherewithal to bury him and to build him a tomb. The ­Master of Heaven took pity on him, and sent the Goddess Tchi-Niu to him to ­become his wife. She wove a piece of silk for him every day ­until she was able to buy his freedom, ­after which she gave him a son, and went back to heaven.—Julien’s French Translation, p. 119.

  Lest the reader should suppose, however, that I have drawn wholly upon my own imagination for the details of the apparition, the cure, the marriage ceremony, etc., I refer him to No. XCVI. of Giles’s “Strange Stories from a Chinese Studio,” en­titled, “A Supernatural Wife,” in which he will find that my narrative is at least conformable to Chinese ideas. (This story first appeared in “Harper’s Bazar,” and is republished here by permission.)

  “The Return of Yen-Tchin-King.”—There may be an involuntary anachronism in my version of this legend, which is very pithily narrated in the Kan-ing-p’ien. No emperor’s name is cited by the homilist; and the date of the revolt seems to have been left wholly to conjecture.—Baber, in his “Memoirs,” mentions one of his Mongol archers as able to bend a two-hundred-pound bow ­until the ears met.

  “The Tradition of the Tea-Plant.”—My authority for this bit of folklore is the brief statement published by Bretschneider in the “Chinese Rec­order” for 1871:—

  “A Japanese legend says that about A.D. 519, a Buddhist priest came to China, and, in ­order to dedicate his soul entirely to God, he made a vow to pass the day and night in an uninterrupted and unbroken meditation. ­After many years of this continual watching, he was at length so tired that he fell asleep. On awaking the following ­morning, he was so sorry he had broken his vow that he cut off both his eyelids and threw them upon the ground. Returning to the same place the following day he observed that each eyelid had ­become a shrub. This was the tea-shrub,
unknown ­until that time.”

  Bretschneider adds that the legend in question seems not to be known to the Chinese; yet in view of the fact that Buddhism itself, with all its marvellous legends, was received by the Japanese from China, it is certainly probable this legend had a Chinese origin,—subsequently disguised by Japanese chronology. My Buddhist texts were drawn from Fernand Hû’s translation of the Dhammapada, and from Leon Feer’s translation from the Thibetan of the “Sutra in Forty-two Articles.” An Orientalist who should condescend in a rare leisure-moment to glance at my work might also discover that I had borrowed an idea or two from the Sanscrit ­poet, Bhâminî-Vilâsa.

  “The Tale of the Porcelain-God.”—The good Père d’Entrecolles, who first gave to Europe the secrets of Chinese porcelain-manufacture, wrote one hundred and sixty years ago:—

  “The Emperors of China are, during their lifetime, the most redoubted of divinities; and they ­believe that ­nothing should ever stand in the way of their desires. . . .

  “It is related that once upon a time a certain Emperor insisted that some porcelains should be made for him ac­cording to a model which he gave. It was answered that the thing was simply impossible; but all such remonstrances only served to excite his desire more and more. . . . The ­officers charged by the demigod to supervise and hasten the work treated the workmen with great harshness. The poor wretches spent all their money, took exceeding pains, and received only blows in return. One of them, in a fit of despair, leaped into the blazing furnace, and was instantly burnt to ashes. But the porcelain that was ­being baked there at the time came out, they say, perfectly beautiful and to the satisfaction of the Emperor. . . . From that time, the unfortunate workman was regarded as a hero; and his image was made the idol which presides over the manufacture of porcelain.”