Now that he had tied up Friar Sand, the monster did not kill him, hit him, or even swear at him. Instead he raised his sword and thought, “Coming from so great a country the Tang priest must have a sense of propriety—he can't have sent his disciples to capture me after I spared his life. Hmm. That wife of mine must have sent some kind of letter to her country and let the secret out. Just wait till I question her.” The monster became so furious that he was ready to kill her.

The unwitting princess, who had just finished making herself up, came out to see the ogre knitting his brows and gnashing his teeth in anger.

“What is bothering you, my lord?” she asked with a smile. The monster snorted and started to insult her.

“You low bitch,” he said, “you haven't a shred of human decency. You never made the slightest complaint when I first brought you here. You wear clothes of brocade and a crown of gold, and I go out to find anything you need. You live in luxury all four seasons of the year, and we've always been very close to each other. So why do you think only of your mother and father? Why do you have no wifely feelings?”

This so frightened the princess that she fell to her knees and said, “What makes you start talking as if you are going to get rid of me?”

“I'm not sure whether I'm getting rid of you or you're getting rid of me,” the monster replied. “I captured that Tang Priest and brought him here to eat, but you released him without asking me first. You must have secretly written a letter and asked him to deliver it for you. There's no other explanation for why these two monks should have made an attack on this place and be demanding your return. It's all your fault, isn't it?”

“Don't blame me for this, my lord,” she replied. “I never wrote such a letter.”

“Liar,” he said. “I've captured one of my enemies to prove it.”

“Who?” she asked.

“Friar Sand, the Tang Priest's second disciple.” Nobody likes to accept their death, even at their last gasp, so she could only try to keep up the pretence.

“Please don't lose your temper, my lord,” she said. “Let's go and ask him about it. If there really was a letter I'll gladly let you kill me; but if there wasn't, you'd be killing your slave unjustly.” With no further argument the monster grabbed her by her bejeweled hair with his fist the size of a basket and threw her to the floor in front of him. Then he seized his sword to question Friar Sand.

“Friar Sand,” he roared, “When you two had the impertinence to make your attack was it because the king of her country sent you here after getting a letter from her?”

When the bound Friar Sand saw the evil spirit throw the princess to the ground in his fury then take hold of his sword to kill her, he thought, “It's obvious she must have sent a letter. But she did us a very great favour by sparing our master. If I tell him about it, he'll kill her. No, that would be a terrible thing to do after what she did for us. Besides, I haven't done any good deeds all the time I have been with our master, so as a prisoner here I can pay back my master's goodness to me with my life.”

His mind made up, he shouted, “Behave yourself, evil monster. She sent no letter, so don't you mistreat her or murder her. I'll tell you why we came to demand the princess. When my master was your prisoner in this cave he saw what the princess looked like. Later on when he presented his credentials to the King of Elephantia, the king showed him her picture and asked him if he'd seen her on his journey. The king had this picture of her painted long ago, and made enquiries about her all over the place. My master told the king about her, and when he heard this news of his daughter the king gave us some of his imperial wine and sent us to bring her back to the palace. This is the truth. There was no letter. If you want to kill anybody, kill me, and don't be so wicked as to slaughter an innocent woman.”

Impressed by Friar Sand's noble words, the monster put aside his sword and took the princess in his arms, saying, “Please forgive me for being so boorishly rude.” Then he put her hair up again for her, and turning tender again, urged her to go inside with him. He asked her to take the seat of honour and apologized to her. In her female fickleness the princess was prompted by his excess of courtesy to think of an idea.

“My lord,” she said, “could you have Friar Sand's bonds loosened a little for the sake of our love?” The old fiend ordered his underlings to untie Friar Sand and lock him up there instead.

On being untied and locked up, Friar Sand got up and thought, “The ancients said that a good turn to someone else is a good turn to yourself. If I hadn't helped her out, she wouldn't have had me untied.”

The old fiend then had a banquet laid on to calm his wife and make it up to her. When he had drunk himself fairly tipsy he put on a new robe and girded a sword to his waist. Then he fondled the princess and said, “You stay at home and drink, wife. Look after our two sons and don't let Friar Sang get away. While the Tang Priest is in Elephantia I'm going to get to know my relations.”

“What relations?” she asked.

“Your father,” he replied. “I'm his son-in-law and he's my father-in-law, so why shouldn't we get acquainted?”

“You mustn't go,” was her reply.

“Why not?” he asked.

“My father,” she answered, “didn't win his country by force of arms; it was handed down to him by his ancestors. He came to the throne as a child and has never been far from the palace gates, so he's never seen a tough guy like you. You are a bit on the hideous side with that face of yours, and it would be very bad if a visit from you terrified him. You'd do better not to go and meet him.”

“Then I'll make myself handsome,” he said.

“Try it and show me,” said the princess.

The splendid fiend shook himself, and in the middle of the banquet he changed himself into a handsome man.

 

Elegant he was, and tall.

He spoke like a high official,

His movements were those of a youth.

He was as brilliant as the poet Cao Zhi,

Handsome as Pan An to whom the women threw fruit.

On his head was a hat with magpie feathers,

To which the black clouds submitted;

He wore a robe of jade-coloured silk

With wide and billowing sleeves.

On his feet were black boots with patterned tops,

And at his waist hung a gleaming sword.

He was a most imposing man,

Tall, elegant and handsome.

 

The princess was thoroughly delighted at the sight of him. “Isn't this a good transformation?” he asked her with a smile.

“Wonderful,” she replied, “wonderful. When you go to court like that the king will be bound to accept you as his son-in-law and make his civil and military officials give you a banquet, so if you have anything to drink you must be very careful not to show your real face—it wouldn't do to let the secret out.”

“You don't need to tell me that,” he said, “I understand perfectly well myself.”

He sprang away on his cloud and was soon in Elephantia, where he landed and walked to the palace gates. “Please report,” he said to the High Custodian of the gate, “that His Majesty's third son-in-law has come for an audience.”

A eunuch messenger went to the steps of the throne and reported, “Your Majesty's third son-in-law has come for an audience and is waiting for your summons outside the palace gates.” When the king, who was talking with Sanzang, heard the words “third son-in-law” he said to the assembled officials, “I only have two sons-in-law—there can't be a third.”

“It must be that the monster has come,” the officials replied.

“Then should I send for him?” the king asked.

“Your Majesty,” said Sanzang in alarm, “he is an evil spirit, so we mortals can do nothing about him. He knows about the past and the future and rides on the clouds. He will come whether you send for him or not, so it would be better to send for him and avoid arguments.”

The king accepted the proposal and sent for him. The fiend came to the bottom of the steps and performed the usual ritual of dancing and chanting. His handsome looks prevented any of the officials from realizing that he was a demon; instead they took him in their mortal blindness for a good man. At the sight of his imposing figure the king thought that he would be a pillar and the savior of the state. “Son-in-law,” he asked him, “where do you live? Where are you from? When did you marry the princess? Why haven't you come to see me before?”

“I come,” the monster replied, knocking his head on the ground, “from the Moon Waters Cave in Bowl Mountain.”

“How far is that from here?” asked the king.

“Not far,” he replied, “only a hundred miles.”

“If it's a hundred miles away,” said the king, “how did the princess get there to marry you?”

The monster gave a cunning and deceptive answer. “My lord,” he said, “I have been riding and shooting since childhood, and I support myself by hunting. Thirteen years ago as I was out hunting one day with falcons, hounds, and a few score retainers when I saw a ferocious striped tiger carrying a girl on its back down the mountainside. I fitted an arrow to my bow and shot the tiger, then took the girl home and revived her with hot water, which saved her life. When I asked her where she was from she never mentioned the word 'princess'—had she said that she was Your Majesty's daughter, I would never have had the effrontery to marry her without your permission. I would have come to your golden palace and asked for some appointment in which I might have distinguished myself. As she said she was the daughter of ordinary folk I kept her in my home. With her beauty and my ability we fell in love, and we have been married all these years. When we were married I wanted to kill the tiger and serve him up at a banquet for all my relations, but she asked me not to. There was a verse that explained why I should not:

 

“'Thanks to Heaven and Earth we are becoming man and wife;

We will marry without matchmaker or witnesses.

A red thread must have united us in a former life,

So let us make the tiger our matchmaker.'

 

“When she said that I untied the tiger and spared its life. The wounded beast swished its tail and was off. Little did I realize that after escaping with its life it would have spent the past years making itself into a spirit whose sole intention is to deceive and kill people. I believe that there was once a group of pilgrims going to fetch scriptures who said that they were priests from the Great Tang. The tiger must have killed their leader, taken his credentials, and made himself look like the pilgrim. He is now in this palace trying to deceive Your Majesty. That man sitting on an embroidered cushion is in fact the very tiger who carried the princess off thirteen years ago. He is no pilgrim.”

The feeble-minded king, who in his mortal blindness could not recognize the evil spirit, believed that his tissue of lies were the truth and said, “Noble son-in-law, how can you tell that this monk is the tiger who carried the princess off?”

“Living in the mountains,” he replied, “I eat tiger, dress in tiger, sleep amid tigers, and move among tigers. Of course I can tell.”

“Even if you can tell,” said the king, “turn him back into his real form to show me.”

“If I may borrow half a saucer of water,” answered the fiend, “I will turn him back into his real form.” The king sent an officer to fetch some water for his son-in-law. The monster put the water in his hand, leapt forward, and did an Eye-deceiving Body-fixing Spell. He recited the words of the spell, spurted a mouthful of water over the Tang Priest, and shouted “Change!” Sanzang's real body was hidden away on top of the hall, and he was turned into a striped tiger. To the king's mortal eyes the tiger had:

 

A white brow and a rounded head,

A patterned body and eyes of lightning.

Four legs,

Straight and tall;

Twenty claws,

Hooked and sharp.

Jagged fangs ringed his mouth,

Pointed ears grew from his brow.

Fierce and powerful, formed like a giant cat,

Wild and virile as a brown bull-calf.

His bristling whiskers shone like silver,

Acrid breath came from his spike tongue.

He was indeed a savage tiger

Whose majesty dominated the palace hall.

 

One look at him sent the king's souls flying from his body, and all the officials fled in terror except for a handful of gallant generals. They charged the tiger at the head of a group of officers, hacking wildly with every kind of weapon. If the Tang Priest had not been fated to survive, even twenty of him would have been chopped to mince. Luckily for him the Six Dings, the Six Jias, the Revealers of the Truth, the Duty Gods, and the Protectors of the Faith were all protecting him in mid-air and preventing him from being wounded by any of the weapons. After a turmoil that continued until evening they finally caught the tiger, chained it, and put it in an iron cage in the room where officials waited for audience.

The king then ordered his household department to lay on a large banquet to thank his son-in-law for saving his daughter from being killed by the monk. That evening, when the court had been dismissed, the monster went to the Hall of Silvery Peace. Eighteen Palace Beauties and Junior Concubines had been selected, and they made music, sang and danced, urging the fiend to drink and be merry. The ogre sat alone in the seat of honour, and to left and right of him were all these voluptuous women. When he had been drinking until the second watch of the night he became too intoxicated to restrain his savagery and longer. He jumped up, bellowed with laughter, and turned back into his real self. A murderous impulse came upon him, and stretching out his hand as big as a basket he seized a girl who was playing a lute, dragged her towards him, and took a bite from her head. The seventeen other palace women fled in panic and hid themselves.

 

The Palace Beauties were terrified,

The Junior Concubines were panic-stricken.

The terrified Palace Beauties

Were like lotuses beaten by the rain at night;

The panic-stricken Concubines

Were like peonies swaying in the spring breezes.

Smashing their lutes, they fled for their lives,

Trampling on zithers as they ran away.

As they went out through the doors they knew not where they went;

In their flight from the hall they rushed everywhere,

Damaging their faces of jade

And bumping their pretty heads.

Every one of them fled for her life;

All of them ran away to safety.

 

The women who had fled did not dare to shout as they did not want to disturb the king in the middle of the night, so they all hid trembling under the eaves of walls, where we shall leave them.

The monster, still in his seat of honour, thought for a moment then drank another bowl of wine, dragged the woman towards him, and took two more gory mouthfuls of her. While he was enjoying himself inside the palace the news was being spread outside that the Tang Priest was really a tiger spirit. The rumour spread like wildfire, and it soon reached the government hostel. Nobody else was there but the white horse, who was eating fodder from a trough. This horse had once been a young dragon prince from the Western Sea who as a punishment for offending against the Heavenly Code had lost his horns and scales and been turned into a white horse to carry Sanzang to the West to fetch the scriptures.

When he heard it being said that the Tang Priest was a tiger spirit he thought, “My master is clearly a good man. That evil spirit must have changed him into a tiger to harm him, whatever shall I do? Monkey's been gone for ages, and there's no news of the other two.” By the middle of the night he could wait no longer.

He jumped up and said, “If I don't rescue the Tang Priest I'll win no merit at all.” He could restrain himself no longer, so he snapped his halter, shook his bridle and girths loose, and changed himself back into a dragon. Then he went straight up on a black cloud to the Ninth Heaven. There is a poem to prove it that goes:

 

On his journey West to worship the Buddha

Sanzang met an evil demon.

Now that he had been changed into a tiger

The white horse came to his rescue, trailing its halter.

 

From up in the air the dragon saw the bright lights in the Hall of Silvery Peace, where eight wax candles were burning on eight great candlesticks. Bringing his cloud down for a closer look he saw the monster sitting by himself in the seat of honour and drinking as he ate human flesh. “Hopeless beast,” thought the dragon with a grin, “giving his game away like that. He's broken the counterpoise of his steelyard—he has exposed himself! A man-eater can't be a good fellow. Now I know what has happened to our master: he's met this foul ogre. I'll try to fool him. If it comes off there's still time to rescue our master.”

With a shake the splendid dragon king turned himself into a slim and seductive Palace Beauty. Hurrying inside he greeted the ogre and said, “If you spare my life, Your Highness, I'll hold your cup for you.”

“Pour me out more wine,” he said. The young dragon took the pot and used a Water-controlling Spell to fill his cup so full that the wine stood several inches higher than the rim without spilling.

The monster, who did not know this piece of magic, was delighted with the trick; and when the dragon asked, “Shall I fill it higher still?” he replied, “Yes, yes.” The dragon lifted the pot and poured and poured. The wine rose till it towered as tall as a thirteen-storied pagoda, and still hardly any spilled over. The ogre opened his mouth wide and swallowed the lot, then pulled the dead girl towards him and took another bite.

“Can you sing?” he asked, and the dragon replied, “Yes, in a way.” He sang a short song and handed the ogre another cup of wine.

“Can you dance?” the ogre asked. “Yes, in a way,” he replied, “but I can't dance well empty-handed.” The ogre pushed his robe aside, brought out the sword he wore at his waist, unsheathed it, and handed it to the dragon, who took it and did a sword dance in front of the banqueting table.

As the monster gazed pop-eyed the dragon stopped dancing and hacked at his face. The ogre side-stepped and immediately seized a cast-iron lantern, that must have weighed a good hundredweight with its stand, with which to parry the sword. As the pair of them came out of the Hall of Silvery Peace, the dragon reverted to his true form and went up into mid-air on a cloud to continue the fight. It was a really vicious combat:

 

One was a monster born and bred on Bowl Mountain;

The other was an exiled dragon from the Western Sea.

One shone as if he were breathing out lightning;

The other's vigor seemed to burst through the clouds.

One was like a white-tusked elephant in a crowd;

The other was a golden-clawed wildcat leaping down to earth.

One was a pillar of jade, towering to heaven,

The other was one of the ocean's golden beams.

The silver dragon danced,

The yellow monster soared,

As the blade cut tirelessly to left and right,

And the lantern flashed to and fro without a pause.

 

The old monster was as strong as ever, after eight or nine rounds of their battle in the clouds the young dragon was tiring and unable to keep up the fight, so he hurled his sword at the monster. The ogre used a magic trick to catch it, went for the helpless dragon, throwing the lantern at him and hitting him on the hind leg. The dragon brought his cloud straight down to earth, where the canal in the palace saved his life: once he had dived in, the ogre could not find him. Instead he went back to the Hall of Silvery Peace, clutching the sword and the candlestick. There he drank himself to sleep.

The dragon hid at the bottom of the canal for an hour, by which time all was quiet. Gritting his teeth against the pain from his leg, he leapt out of the water and went back to the hostel on a black cloud, where he turned himself back into a horse and bent over the trough once more. The poor animal was covered with sweat, and his leg was scarred.

 

The Thought-horse and the Mind-ape had scattered,

The Lord of Metal and the Mother of Wood were dispersed.

The Yellow Wife was damaged, her powers divided,

The Way was finished, and how could it be saved?

 

We will leave Sanzang in danger and the dragon in defeat to return to Pig who had been hiding in the undergrowth ever since he abandoned Friar Sand. He had made himself a pigsty there, and slept through to the middle of the night. When he woke up he could not remember where he was. He rubbed his eyes, pulled himself together, and cocked up his ear. In these wild mountains no dogs barked and no cocks crowed. From the position of the stars he worked out that it was around midnight, and thought, “I must go back and rescue Friar Sand. It's all too true that 'You cannot make thread with a single strand, or clap with a single had,' No, no. I'd better go back to the city, see the master, and report on this to the king. He can give me some more brave soldiers to help me rescue Friar Sand.”

The idiot went back to the city on his cloud as fast as he could, and in an instant he was back at the hostel. It was a still, moonlit night, and he could not find his master in either wing of the building. There was only the white horse asleep there, his body covered in sweat, and with a greenish wound the size of a dish on his hind leg.

“This is double trouble,” thought Pig in horror. “Why is this wretch covered with sweat and injured on his leg? He hasn't been anywhere. Some crooks must have carried off the master and wounded the horse.”

Seeing Pig, the horse suddenly called out, “Elder brother.” Pig collapsed from shock, got up again, and was about to flee when the horse took his clothes between his teeth and said, “Brother, don't be afraid of me.”

“Why ever have you started to talk today?” asked Pig, who was shaking all over. “Something terrible must have happened to make you do it.”

“Do you know that our master is in danger?” the horse asked.

“No,” Pig replied.

“You wouldn't,” said the horse. “When you and Friar Sand were showing off in front of the king you thought you'd be able to catch the monster and be rewarded for it. Little did you imagine that his powers would be too much for you. You should be ashamed of the way you've come back by yourself without even having any news to report. That monster turned himself into a handsome scholar, came to the palace, and made the king accept him as his son-in-law. He changed our master into a tiger, who was captured by the officials and put in a cage in the court waiting room. The news made me feel as if my heart were being sliced to pieces. It was already two days since you two went, and for all I knew you might have been killed, so I had to turn back into a dragon and try to rescue our master. When I reached the court I couldn't find him, though I saw the monster outside the Hall of Silvery Peace. I changed into a Palace Beauty to trick him. He made me do a sword dance for him, and when I had him fascinated I took a cut at him. He dodged the blow, picked up a giant lantern in both hands, and soon had me on the run. I flung my sword at him, but he caught it, and wounded me on the hind leg by throwing the lantern at me. I escaped with my life by hiding in the palace canal. The scar is where he hit me with the candlestick.”

“Is this all true?” asked Pig.

“Don't think I'm trying to fool you,” said the dragon.

“What are we to do?” said Pig. “Can you move?”

“What if I can?” said the dragon.

“If you can move,” said Pig, “then make your way back to the sea: I'll take the luggage back to Gao Village and be a married man again.” The dragon's reaction to this was to bite hard on Pig's tunic and not let him go. Tears rolled down his face as he said, “Please don't give up, elder brother.”

“What else can I do but give up?” said Pig. “Friar Sand has been captured by him, and I can't beat him, so what can we do but break up now?”

The dragon thought for a moment before replying, still in tears, “Don't even talk about breaking up, brother. All you need do to rescue the master is to ask someone to come here.”

“Who?” asked Pig.

“Take a cloud back to the Mountain of Flowers and Fruit as fast as you can, and ask our eldest brother Monkey to come here. With his tremendous ability to beat demons he ought to be able to rescue the master and avenge your defeat.”

“Can't we ask someone else?” said Pig. “He hasn't been on the best of terms with me since he killed the White Bone Spirit on White Tiger Ridge. He's angry with me for encouraging the master to say the Band-tightening Spell. I only meant it as a joke—how was I to know the old monk would really say it and drive him away? Goodness knows how furious he is with me. He definitely won't come. I'm no match for him with my tongue, and if he's disrespectful enough to hit me a few times with that murderous great cudgel of his, it'll be the death of me.”

“Of course he won't hit you,” said the dragon. “He's a kind and decent Monkey King. When you see him don't tell him that the master's in trouble. Just say, 'The master's missing you.' Once you've lured him here and he sees the situation he won't possibly be angry. He's bound to want to fight the monster. I guarantee that he'll capture the monster and save our master.”

“Oh well,” said Pig, “oh well. As you're so determined I'll have to go, or else I'll look half-hearted. If Monkey's prepared to come, I'll come back with him; but if he isn't, then don't expect me—I won't be back.”

“Go,” said the dragon. “I promise he'll come.”

The idiot picked up his rake, straightened his tunic, leapt up on a cloud, and headed East. Sanzang was fated to live. Pig had a following wind, so he stuck up his ears for sails and was at the Eastern Ocean in no time. He landed his cloud. Without his noticing it the sun rose as he made his way into the mountains.

As he was going along he suddenly heard voices. He looked carefully and saw Monkey in a mountain hollow with hordes of demons. He was perched on a rock, and in front of him over twelve hundred monkeys were drawn up in ranks and chanting, “Long live His Majesty the Great Sage.”

“He's doing very nicely,” thought Pig, “very nicely indeed. No wonder he wanted to come home instead of staying a monk. He has it really nice here, with a big place like this and all those little monkeys at his beck and call. If I'd had a mountain like this I'd never have become a monk. But what am I to do now I'm here? I must go and see him.” As he was rather overawed, Pig did not dare walk boldly over to see him. Instead he made his way round a grassy cliff, slipped in among the twelve hundred monkeys, and started to kowtow with them.

Little did he expect that the sharp-eyed Monkey would see him from his high throne and say, “There's a foreigner bowing all wrong among the ranks. Where's he from? Bring him here.” The words were hardly out of his mouth before some junior monkeys swarmed round him, shoved him forward, and threw him to the ground. “Where are you from, foreigner?” asked Monkey.

“If I may be permitted to argue,” replied Pig, his head bowed, “I'm no foreigner, I'm an old friend of yours.”

“All my monkey hordes look exactly the same,” replied the Great Sage, “but from the look of your stupid face you must be an evil demon from somewhere else. Never mind though. If, as an outsider, you want to join my ranks you must first hand in a curriculum vitae and tell us your name before we can put you on the books. If I don't take you on, you've no business to be bowing to me like a madman.”

Pig put his arms round his head, which he still kept low, and replied, “I'm sorry. It's an ugly mug. But you and I were brothers for several years; you can't pretend not to recognize me and say that I'm a foreigner.”

“Raise your head,” said Monkey.

The idiot did so and said, “Look, even if you won't recognize the rest of me, you'll remember my face.”

“Pig!” said Monkey with a smile. When Pig heard this he leapt to his feet and said, “Yes, yes. I'm Pig,” thinking that Monkey would be easier to deal with now he had recognized him.

“Why have you come here instead of going to fetch the scriptures with the Tang Priest?” Monkey asked. “Have you offended the master and been sent back too? Show me your letter of dismissal.”

“I haven't offended him,” Pig replied. “He hasn't given me a letter of dismissal, or driven me away.”

“Then why have you come here?” asked Monkey. “The master sent me here to ask you back as he's missing you,” answered Pig. “He hasn't asked me back,” said Monkey, “and he doesn't miss me. He swore an oath by Heaven and wrote a letter of dismissal, so he couldn't possibly miss me or have sent you all this way to ask me back. It certainly wouldn't be right for me to go.”

“He's really missing you,” said Pig, lying desperately, “he really is.”

“Why?” asked Monkey.

“He called out 'disciple' when he was riding along. I didn't hear, and Friar Sand is deaf, so he started missing you and saying that we two were hopeless. He said that you were intelligent and clever, and that you always answered whenever he called. This made him miss you so badly that he sent me over here specially to ask you to come back. Please, please come back with me. You'll save him from disappointment and me from a long, wasted journey.”

Monkey jumped down from his rock, lifted Pig to his feet, and said, “Dear brother, it's been good of you to come so far. Won't you come and take a look round with me?”

“It's been a long journey,” replied Pig, “and I'm afraid that the master would miss me, so I'd better not.”

“Now that you're here,” said Monkey, “you really should have a look at my mountain.” Not wanting to insist too hard, the idiot went off with him.

The two of them walked hand in hand with the monkey horde following behind as they climbed to the summit of the Mountain of Flowers and Fruit. It was a beautiful mountain. In the few days since he had been back, Monkey had made it as neat as it ever had been.

 

It was as green as flakes of malachite,

So high it touched the clouds.

All around it tigers crouched and dragons coiled,

Amid the calls of apes and cranes.

In the morning the peak was covered with cloud,

The evening sun would set between the trees.

The streams splashed like a tinkle of jade,

Waterfalls tumbled with the sound of lutes.

In the front of the mountain were cliffs and rock-faces

At the back were luxuriant plants and trees.

Above it reached to the Jade Girl's washing bowl,

Below it jointed the watershed of the River of Heaven.

In its combination of Earth and Heaven it rivaled the Penglai paradise;

Its blend of pure and solid made it a true cave palace.

It defied a painter's brush and colours;

Even a master could not have drawn it.

Intricate were the strange-shaped boulders,

Adorning the mountain peak.

In the sun's shadow shimmered a purple light;

A magical glow shone red throughout the sea of clouds.

Cave-heavens and paradises do exist on Earth,

Where the whole mountainside is covered with fresh trees and new blossoms.

 

As Pig gazed at it he said with delight, “What a wonderful place, brother. It's the finest mountain in the world.”

“Could you get by here?” asked Monkey.

“What a question,” said Pig with a grin. “This mountain of yours is an earthly paradise, so how could you talk about 'getting by?'”

The two talked and joked for a while then went back down. They saw some young monkeys kneeling beside the path and holding huge, purple grapes, fragrant dates and pears, deep golden loquats, and rich, red tree-strawberries.

“Please take some breakfast, Your Majesty,” they said.

“Brother Pig,” replied Monkey with a smile, “Your big appetite won't be satisfied with fruit. Never mind though—if you don't think it too poor you can eat a little as a snack.”

“Although I do have a big appetite,” said Pig, “I always eat the local food. Bring me a few to taste.”

As the pair of them ate the fruit the sun was rising, which made the idiot worry that he might be too late to save the Tang Priest. “Brother,” he said, trying to hurry Monkey up, “the master is waiting for us. He wants us back as soon as possible.”

“Come and look round the Water Curtain Cave,” was Monkey's reply.

“It's very good of you to offer,” said Pig, “but I mustn't keep the master waiting, so I'm afraid I can't visit the cave.”

“Then I won't waste your time,” said Monkey. “Goodbye.”

“Aren't you coming?” Pig asked.

“Where to?” Monkey replied. “There's nobody to interfere with me here and I'm free to do just as I like. Why should I stop having fun and be a monk? I'm not going. You can go and tell the Tang Priest that as he's driven me away he can just I forget about me.” The idiot did not dare press Monkey harder in case he lost his temper and hit him a couple of blows with his cudgel. All he could do was mumble a farewell and be on his way.

As Monkey watched him go he detailed two stealthy young monkeys to follow him and listen to anything he said. The idiot had gone hardly a mile down the mountainside when he turned round, pointed towards Monkey, and started to abuse him.

“That ape,” he said, “he'd rather be a monster than a monk. The baboon. I asked him in all good faith and he turned me down. Well, if you won't come, that's that.” Every few paces he cursed him some more. The two young monkeys rushed back to report, “Your Majesty, that Pig is a disgrace. He's walking along cursing you.”

“Arrest him,” shouted Monkey in a fury. The monkey hordes went after Pig, caught him, turned him upside-down, grabbed his bristles, pulled his ears, tugged his tail, twisted his hair, and thus brought him back. If you don't know how he was dealt with or whether he survived, listen to the explanation in the next installment.