Page:Chinese Fables and Folk Stories.djvu/134

130 and sat down under the Fa-Nien-Ts'ing tree, and soon he slept.

Suddenly he heard a noise. He awoke thinking his pupils had come, but seeing no man he lay down again to sleep. Once more he heard the same noise, and looking upward he saw the Mön-Tien-Sing and the Fa-Nien-Ts'ing trees looking into each other's faces; but they were not happy. The Mön-Tien-Sing's face was distorted with anger, and in great wrath she said to the Fa-Nien-Ts'ing, "If I were the Creator, I would not allow you to live. A year and a year passes by and you do not grow. You eat much food and you have more earth than I, and still you do not grow. I never heard that you did any good thing since you were born, and it is said you have lived here five hundred years. Your branches are crooked and your bark is rough.

"You are not even good to look upon. Do you think the children of men care for you? No, for you have neither flowers nor fruit. If people sit under your shade when the wind blows hard, I should think your sharp, ugly leaves would fall on them and stick them.

"It is a strange thing that the woodcutter does not chop you down—useless thing. If I were the Creator, I would not allow the sun to shine on you, nor would I