Page:A history of Chinese literature - Giles.djvu/248

 236 CHINESE LITERATURE

But who across the centuries

can hope to mark each spot

Where fool and hero, joined in death, beneath the brambles rotf n

The grave student Ch'eng Hao wrote verses like the rest. Sometimes he even condescended to jest :

" I wander north, I wander south,

I rest me where I please. . . . See how the river-banks are nipped

beneath the autumn breeze ! Yet what care I if autumn blasts

the river-banks lay bare f The loss of hue to river-banks

is the river-banks' affair."

In the eleventh and twelfth centuries HUNG CHUEH- FAN made a name for himself as a poet and calligraphist, but he finally yielded to the fascination of Buddhism and took orders as a priest. This is no trifling ordeal. From three to nine pastilles are placed upon the shaven scalp of the candidate, and are allowed to burn down into the flesh, leaving an indelible scar. Here is a poem by him, written probably before monasticism had damped his natural ardour :

" Two green silk ropes, with painted stand,

from heights aerial swing, And there outside the house a maid

disports herself in spring. Along the ground her blood-red skirts

all swiftly swishing fly, As though to bear her off to be

an angel in the sky. Strewed thick with fluttering almond-blooms

the painted stand is seen; The embroidered ropes flit to and fro

amid the willow green.

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