Wu Cheng-en - Journey to the West (vol. 2)

We leave them and go back to Monkey, Pig and Friar Sand, who were all still waiting by the main road. While the other two were pasturing the horse and looking after the baggage Monkey was amusing himself by leaping from tree to tree and climbing around the branches as he picked leaves and looked for fruit. Suddenly he turned round and saw a sheet of light.

This so alarmed him that he jumped out of the tree with a shout of, “This is terrible! Terrible! The master's luck is out.” He pointed as he continued, “Look at the farm. What do you think?” When Pig and Friar Sand both looked they saw a sheet of something like snow but brighter and like silver but shinier.

“That's done it,” said Pig, “that's done it. The master's run into evil spirits. We'd better go and rescue him straight away.”

“Stop yelling, brother,” said Monkey. “Neither of you can see just what's there. Wait while I go and take a look.”

“Do be careful, brother,” said Friar Sand.

“I can cope,” Monkey replied.

The splendid Great Sage tightened his tigerskin kilt, pulled out his gold-banded cudgel and took a few strides forward to see that the silken ropes had formed something like a web with thousands of strands. When he felt it with his hands it was somewhat soft and sticky. Not knowing what it was, Monkey raised his cudgel and said, “Never mind thousands of strands. This cudgel could break through tens of thousands of them.”

He was just about to strike when he stopped to think, “If they were hard I could certainly smash them, but then soft ones would only be knocked flat, and if I alarm the demons and get caught myself that would be a disaster. I'd better make some enquiries before I do any hitting.”

Who do you think he asked? He made a spell with his hands, said the words of it and sent for an old local god, who ran round and round in his shrine just as if turning a mill. “Old man,” his wife asked, “what are you rushing round and round for? You must be having a fit.”

“You don't understand,” the local god replied. “There's a Great Sage Equaling Heaven here. I didn't go to meet him. But he's sending for me.”

“Go and see him then,” his wife replied, “and that'll be that. Why charge round and round in here?”

“But if I go and see him that cudgel of his hits very hard,” the local deity said. “He doesn't care what you're like-he just hits you.”

“He won't possibly hit you when he sees how old you are,” his wife replied.

“He's been cadging free drinks all his life,” the local god said, “and he really loves hitting old people.”

After talking for a while with his wife the local god had no choice but to go outside and kneel shivering and shaking by the roadside, calling out, “Great Sage, the local deity kowtows to you.”

“Get up,” Brother Monkey replied, “and stop pretending to be so keen. I'm not going to hit you. I'm just passing through. Tell me where this is.”

“Which way have you come, Great Sage?” the local deity asked.

“I've come from the East and I'm heading West,” said Monkey.

“Which mountain have you reached on your journey from the East?” the local deity asked.

“That ridge there,” Monkey replied. “Our baggage and the horse are there, aren't they?”

“That is Gossamer Ridge,” the local deity replied. “Under the ridge there's a cave called Gossamer Cave where seven evil spirits live.”

“Male or female ones?” Monkey asked.

“She-devils,” the local deity replied.

“How powerful is their magic?” Monkey asked.

“I'm much too weak and insignificant to know that,” the local god replied. “All I can tell you is that a mile due South of here there is a natural hot spring called the Filth-cleansing Spring,” the local god said, “where the Seven Fairies from on high used to bathe. When the seven evil spirits settled here and took over the Filth-cleansing Spring the good spirits didn't try to fight them for it. They let the spirits have it for nothing. I reckon that if even good spirits from Heaven don't dare offend them the evil spirits must have tremendous powers.”

“What have they taken the spring over for?” Monkey asked.

“Ever since taking the bathing pool over the monsters have been coming to bathe there three times a day,” the local god replied. “It's already after eleven. They'll be along at noon.”

“Go back now, local god,” Monkey said when he heard all this, “and wait while I capture them.” The old local god kowtowed to him and went back to his shrine all of a tremble.

The Great Sage then gave a solo display of his magical powers, shaking himself, turning into a fly, and landing on the tip of a blade of grass to wait beside the path. A little later he heard a rustling, hissing sound like that of silkworms eating leaves or an ocean tide coming in. In the time it takes to drink half a cup of tea the silken ropes had all gone, and the farm looked just the same as it had before. Then there was a creaking noise as the wicker gate opened and the seven women came out laughing and talking noisily. Monkey watched carefully from where he was hiding and saw them talking and laughing as they held each other by the hand and walked shoulder to shoulder across the bridge. They were real beauties:

Compare them with jade and they were more fragrant;

They were like flowers but able to talk.

Their willowy brows were like distant hills;

Sandalwood-scented mouths were bursting cherries.

Hair ornaments were of jade;

Golden lotus feet darted out under crimson skirts.

They were like the moon goddess come down to earth,

Immortal girls descending to the world.

“No wonder the master wanted to come begging for food,” thought Monkey with a laugh, “with all these lovelies here. If these seven beauties have captured him he won't be enough for a single meal for them. They couldn't make him last a couple of days. And if they take it in turns to have their way with him they'll kill him straight off. I'd better go and listen to what they're plotting.”

The splendid Great Sage flew over with a high-pitched buzz and landed on the topknot of the woman who was walking in front. When she was over the bridge the women behind her caught up with her and called out, “Sister, let's have a bath before we steam the fat monk and eat him up.”

“These monsters aren't at all economical,” Monkey smiled to himself. “They'd save a lot of firewood if they boiled him. Why steam him instead?” The women walked South, picking flowers and throwing grass at each other, and were soon at the bathing pool, where a very magnificent wall and gateway appeared, with fragrant flowers, among them a bed of orchids, growing all around. One of the women behind him stepped forward and with a whistling sound pushed the double gates open, revealing the pond of naturally hot water inside. As for this water,

When heaven and earth were first separated

There were ten suns in the sky

Till Yi, the fine archer,

Shot nine of the sun-crows down to the earth,

Leaving only one golden crow star,

The true fire of the sun.

The nine hot springs in heaven and earth

Are the other nine crows transformed.

These nine hot springs are

Cool Fragrance Spring,

Mountain-companions Spring

Warm Spring,

Donghe Spring,

Mount Huang Spring,

Xiao'an Spring,

Guangfen Spring,

Hot Water Spring,

And this Filth-cleansing Spring.

There is a poem about it that goes:

The same vital force runs in all four seasons;

Spring continues throughout the autumn.

The scalding water bubbles like a cauldron;

The snow-white waves are boiling hot.

If the waters are spread they help the crops to grow;