Gems of Chinese Literature/Ch‘ü P‘ing-The Genius of the Mountain

←

Gems of Chinese Literature
translated by Herbert Allen Giles

The Genius of the Mountain by Ch‘ü P‘ing

→

CH‘Ü-P‘ING.

4th century b.c.

[A famous poet and minister of one of the feudal princes. Being unjustly dismissed from favour, he committed suicide by drowning, and his death gave rise to an annual spring festival, known as the Dragonboat Festival, at which an imaginary search for his body is made in every available stream of water throughout the Eighteen Provinces.]

1520885Gems of Chinese Literature — The Genius of the MountainHerbert Allen GilesCh‘ü P‘ing

Methinks there is a Genius of the hills, clad in wistaria, girdled with ivy, with smiling lips, of witching mien, riding on the pard, wild cats galloping in the rear, reclining in a chariot, with banners of cassia, cloaked with the orchid, girt with azalea, culling the perfume of sweet flowers to leave behind a memory in the heart. But dark is the grove wherein I dwell. No light of day reaches it ever. The path thither is dangerous and difficult to climb. Alone I stand on the hill top, while the clouds float beneath my feet, and all around is wrapped in gloom.

Gently blows the east wind: softly falls the rain. In my joy I become oblivious of home; for who in my decline would honour me now?

I pluck the larkspur on the hillside, amid the chaos of rock and tangled vine. I hate him who has made me an outcast, who has now no leisure to think of me.

I drink from the rocky spring. I shade myself beneath the spreading pine. Even though he were to recall me to him, I could not fall to the level of the world.

Now booms the thunder through the drizzling rain. The gibbons howl around me all the long night. The gale rushes fitfully through the whispering trees. And I am thinking of my prince, but in vain; for I cannot lay my grief.^[1]

↑ The above translation of what is more correctly a song has been versified and published without a word of acknowledgement by Mr. Cranmer-Byng in his “Lute of Jade” (which has been called a “Loot of Jade”), p. 32, as follows:―

Methinks there is a genius
Roams in the mountains,
Girdled with ivy
And robed in wisteria (sic), etc., etc.

[1] The above translation of what is more correctly a song has been versified and published without a word of acknowledgement by Mr. Cranmer-Byng in his “Lute of Jade” (which has been called a “Loot of Jade”), p. 32, as follows:―

Methinks there is a genius
Roams in the mountains,
Girdled with ivy
And robed in wisteria (sic), etc., etc.

[1]