A Thousand Pieces of Gold (9 page)
Read A Thousand Pieces of Gold Online
Authors: Adeline Yen Mah
General Fan bared his arm to show his determination and drew closer to Master Jing. “Day and night, I have been grinding my teeth and churning my heart to come up with a solution. Now that I have heard your words, I am finally satisfied.” With that he took out a dagger and slit his own throat.
Though the crown prince was saddened by General Fan’s suicide, he saw that the deed was done and could not be undone. He placed the head in a box, then set about a systematic search for the sharpest dagger in the world. He coated the blade with the deadliest poison and tested it on several victims. Whenever a subject was cut with the blade deeply enough to draw blood, death invariably followed at once.
Next the prince found an accomplice to accompany Master Jing on his mission. Qin Wuyang was a brash youth who held no respect for life, either his own or anyone else’s. It was rumored that he enjoyed killing and committed his first murder at the age of thirteen. He was so much feared that no one dared to look at him the wrong way.
Should the two assassins be admitted into the presence of King Zheng, their chances of survival were obviously infinitesimal whatever the outcome. Master Jing knew this and delayed his departure. Day after day he drank in the marketplace with his friend the butcher and with Gao Jianli, a talented lute player. While the musician strummed his lute, the other two would sing and make merry. Afterward, all three would weep together, as if they were completely alone.
The crown prince worried that Master Jing was having regrets, so he again urged the assassin, saying, “Another day is gone, and what have you decided? Please let me send Qin Wuyang in advance of you.”
At this Master Jing became angry. He rebuked the Prince and said, “This one who will go on your mission, never to come back, is but a boy. He will be entering a hostile state that is immeasurably powerful, armed only with a single dagger. The reason I have delayed my departure was to await a certain visitor and be with him for the last time. But now that you accuse me of procrastination, I shall take my leave immediately.”
So the two men began their journey. The crown prince and those who were aware of their fatal mission came to see them off. They were all dressed in white robes and white caps, white being the color of mourning in China. First they offered sacrifices and prayed to their ancestors. Then they accompanied them on the high road as far as the banks of the Yi River, on their way westward to Qin. With the musician Gao strumming a haunting melody on his lute, Master Jing joined in with a song while the prince and his retinue wept.
The procession moved forward for a short distance. Then, accompanied by music from the lute, Master Jing sang again. The theme was that of his impending sacrifice.
The wind whispers softly,
’Tis chilly on the River Yi.
Once we warriors depart,
We can no longer return.
Now the musician Gao readjusted the strings of his lute and began playing an impassioned and fervent tune. Whereupon all the gentlemen courtiers gazed sternly straight ahead, and their black hair bristled against their white mourning caps.
Even before the strands of music faded, the two assassins had already entered the carriage. As their vehicle vanished in the distance and until the very end, Master Jing did not look back.
In Xianyang, the capital of Qin, Master Jing bribed certain high officials and was successful in securing an audience with King Zheng. His Majesty was delighted to hear that the King of Yan had sent two emissaries bearing the head of the rebellious General Fan as well as a map of the rich and fertile Province of Dukang to present to him. The severed head was first checked with a portrait of General Fan and verified to be authentic. Then, on a bright and sunny morning in 227
B.C.E.
, the two assassins were duly admitted into the inner sanctum of the royal palace.
Master Jing carried the box with the head, followed closely by his young accomplice with the map in a container. When they approached the throne, Qin Wuyang turned pale and began to tremble violently. The courtiers looked at him with amazement, but Master Jing smiled and said, “He is a simple man of northern barbarian stock and has never seen the Son of Heaven before. Therefore he trembles with fear. May it please Your Majesty to excuse him and allow me, your humble servant, to come forward instead?”
Kinz Zheng dismissed Qin Wuyang after ordering him to hand the map over to Master Jing. Then he said to Master Jing, “Show me the map.”
Master Jing, therefore, stepped forward and presented the case containing the map. The King of Qin took out the map and started to unroll it.
Tu qiong bi xian,
“when the map was unrolled, the dagger was revealed,” glittering brightly in the morning sun. Whereupon Master Jing immediately seized King Zheng’s left sleeve with his left hand and, grasping the dagger with his right, threatened the monarch with his weapon but did not stab him.
In his terror, the king leaped backward and his left sleeve tore off in Master Jing’s hand. Though he struggled mightily to draw his sword from its sheath, King Zheng was unsuccessful. The blade was too long and there was not enough room. Meanwhile, Master Jing pursued the king, who ran round and round a pillar. The courtiers looked on in amazement.
The law as practiced in Qin at that time was strict. Courtiers were forbidden to carry weapons into the king’s upper throne room. Although the royal guards in the lower hall were armed, they were not allowed to leave their stations unless summoned. Master Jing’s sudden attack had taken everyone by surprise, and no one gave the order.
At this moment, a court physician named Xia, who had been awaiting his turn to present a pouch of medicinal herbs to the king, struck Master Jing with the pouch. While the assassin’s attention was thus briefly diverted, a guard cried out, “Draw out your sword from behind you, Your Majesty!” By doing so, King Zheng found that he had enough room to unsheathe the weapon and slash his attacker’s left thigh. Wounded and hobbling on one leg, Master Jing hurled his dagger at the king with all his might, but it missed and hit a bronze pillar. The king struck out repeatedly with his sword and cut his assailant seven more times.
Knowing that his attempt had failed, Master Jing leaned against a pillar and laughed, while bright blood seeped from his clothing and dripped onto the floor. Then he squatted down and cursed the king, saying, “I did not succeed because I wanted to capture you alive. Someone else will now have to take the pledge to avenge my prince.” The king shouted out an order. It was only then that the guards rushed forward from all sides and killed the valiant assassin.
King Zheng was outraged. After executing Master Jing’s assistant, Qin Wuyang, he sent an army into Yan. Two hundred thousand Qin troops marched across the Yan border and successfully forced the King of Yan to execute his own son and hand over the severed head of Crown Prince Dan. A few years later the King of Yan himself was compelled to commit suicide after another disastrous defeat at the hands of King Zheng. Qin annexed Yan and made it into one of its commanderies.
No one connected with the plot escaped punishment. Master’s Jing’s friend, the brilliant musician Gao Jianli, was blinded for his foreknowledge of the scheme. Filled with thoughts of revenge, he changed his name and made his way secretly to Qin. His skills on the lute gained him access to the court of King Zheng, who grew fond of his melodies and listened to his lute playing daily in his private chambers. Although his true identity was eventually revealed, he was allowed to remain after a special pardon from the king. In 219
B.C.E.
the musician loaded his lute with lead, armed
himself with a knife, and tried unsuccessfully to kill the king. He was arrested and immediately executed. But his assault had taken its toll. For the rest of his life King Zheng was fearful and was filled with the dread of dying. He kept his whereabouts a secret and allowed very few to get close to him. His paranoia and seclusion were to lead to disastrous consequences.
In the days following September 11, the recurring television images of the blazing skyscrapers disturbed me so much that I had trouble sleeping. To distract myself, I thought more about Ann’s questions: “Why do you like proverbs so much, Mom? Do you think in proverbs?” Finally one night I wrote her the following reply.
A proverb is defined in Collins’s English dictionary as a saying that embodies some commonplace experience, whereas a metaphor is defined as a figure of speech in which words are applied to an action that it does not literally denote. To my Chinese mind, the two are synonymous.
I grew up in China, and Chinese was my only language until the age of eleven. The Chinese language is full of metaphors. That is how we Chinese think, by metaphors. But why do we think in metaphors?
Because written Chinese is a pictorial, and not a phonetic, language, the characters denoting abstract qualities were initially derived metaphorically from word-pictures representing concrete objects. For example, the word
dao
means “road” or “path,” but it also means “way,” “method,” or “doctrine.” Thus when I see the Chinese word
dao,
it suggests to my mind a whole panorama of related images, and the whole effect is rather like reading poetry.
Everyday Chinese speech is riddled with figurative phrases (metaphors). For example:
For “boiled water” we say “opened water” or “rolling water.”
For “revenge” we say “snowed hatred.”
For “time” we say “light/shade.”
For “stranger” we say “raw man.”
For “friend” we say “cooked man.”
For “teacher” we say “previously born.”
A natural consequence of this type of thinking is the Chinese tendency to use proverbs, and the history behind these proverbs also, as metaphors or concrete examples to illustrate abstract ideas. Thus a proverb such as “When the map is unrolled, the dagger is revealed” would serve as a metaphor not only of “the
unraveling of a concealed plot” but also of “the exposure of a person’s hidden motive” because of the history behind the proverb’s origin. Add to this the Chinese respect toward the past, and we can understand the reasons proverbs have such emotive and long-lasting appeal in China.
From now on, whenever I hear the Chinese proverb “When the map is unrolled, the dagger is revealed,” I will feel the shock of reading Lydia’s poison letters to Niang, I will recall the horror of September 11 and the sleepless nights that followed, and I will see images of Master Jing dying on the floor of King Zheng’s palace.
Your Uncle James once gave me a piece of brotherly advice after I discovered my sister Lydia’s poison letters. “Your problem, Adeline” he said, “is that you’re always transferring your own feelings and reasoning into others. You wanted to believe that we all shared in your dream of a united family. In fact, no one cared except for you.”
Subsequently, I have often reflected on James’s words. I came to realize that he was entirely correct in his analysis of my previous naïve assumptions. Just because I would never have betrayed Lydia in similar circumstances if our roles had been reversed, I assumed automatically that my sister would also be true to me. Until “the map was unrolled and the dagger revealed,” I had harbored no suspicion whatsoever toward Lydia because nothing was further from my mind than treachery against a sister who was trying to help me. The thought of Lydia hatching plots to harm me simply never entered my consciousness.
In a similar vein, what happened on the morning of September 11 shocked us all with its unimaginable horror. We know that the majority of people abide by a basic, common, moral code of behavior, and we expect this behavior from them. Unfortunately, our assumptions that morning were as erroneous as my estimation of my sister Lydia. We only realized our error “when the map was unrolled and the dagger finally revealed”
(tu qiong bi xian).
And now, because I was working on this passage when I heard the news from you, my daughter, another layer of meaning for me personally has been added to the proverb. This is how metaphors grow; this is why I think in proverbs.
I
n 1979 I went back to Shanghai to visit Aunt Baba after a separation of thirty-one years. I was shocked at her dilapidated room and poverty-stricken appearance. The Red Guards had driven her out of her home in 1966 and ordered her to live in a neighbor’s house. She spoke to me in a whisper, constantly on the lookout for spies and informers, saying, “It seems incredible that we should be sitting across from each other and speaking of everything. This would have been dangerous during the Cultural Revolution just three years ago.”
I asked her about life under Mao Tse-tung, who had ruled China from 1949 until 1976. She shook her head and nervously looked over her shoulder before uttering the proverb, “
Fen shu keng ru!
‘He burned the books and buried the scholars!’”
“You mean just like the First Emperor?”
“Yes! Mao was a reincarnated First Emperor, except even more powerful.”
Mao instigated the Cultural Revolution in 1966 to topple his political enemies. Once unleashed, however, the movement threw the nation into economic stagnation, factionalism, and utter chaos, adversely affecting the lives of millions of people in all levels of society for ten long years.
General Lin Biao, Mao’s second in command, planned to murder Mao in 1971. Lin accused Mao of turning China into a giant meat grinder for strife and carnage, alleging that although Mao claimed to be a Marxist-Leninist, he was actually more of a dictator than was the First Emperor.
In 221
B.C.E.
King Zheng defeated the last surviving feudal state and finally unified China. This was a phenomenal achievement, since the various states had been at war with one another for five and a half centuries. He called a council of his ministers to advise him on choosing the appropriate title under which he would rule. Their discussion was duly recorded in the annals by the Grand Historian. After a lengthy debate, the king chose to call himself Qin Shihuang (Founding Emperor of the Qin dynasty, or First Emperor).
Soon afterward, the ministers advised the First Emperor to appoint his sons and other male relatives as new feudal lords to help rule the far-flung regions of his vast empire. Li Si, who had been appointed minister of justice, was the only one who disagreed.
He pointed out that China had last been united during the Zhou dynasty (1027–771
B.C.E.
). However, because of lack of central control and regional autonomy, the House of Zhou had fallen. According to
Shiji,
he said to the emperor, “The feudal states given by the King of Zhou to his sons, younger brothers, and other male relatives were numerous. Initially these nobles obeyed the commands of their king, but as time went by, some members of the family became estranged. Each was the de facto ruler of his own territory. They began to kill and war with one another, causing discord and suffering, without the King of Zhou being able to control them. Since China has just emerged from the chaos of warring states, why not leave it as one unit under a single command? This would prevent future dissension and would lead to long-term peace and tranquillity.”
After due reflection, the First Emperor replied, “Because of the system of feudal lords established during the Zhou dynasty, the whole world (that is, China) has suffered from unceasing warfare for hundreds of years. Thanks
to the help of my ancestors, the empire has finally been united and pacified for the first time. For me to create again the same system (of feudal lords) would be to reinsert warfare among us. It would then be impossible to reestablish peace and order. The minister of justice is correct.”
He therefore divided his empire into thirty-six commanderies
(qun),
each under the rule of three ministers, selected on the basis of ability, without regard to blood or family connections. These consisted of a governor for military matters, an administrator for civil duties, and an overseer to report directly to the emperor. This was a significant development because it marked the end of feudalism. The new hierarchy was based upon merit and ability, no longer on noble birth.
To prevent rebellion, the First Emperor disarmed the nation by confiscating all the weapons of the populace. He transported them to Xianyang, now capital city of the empire, melted them, and cast the metal into twelve giant metal human figures, each weighing seventy tons. He then placed the statues in the imperial palace.
To remove the last vestiges of feudalism, he separated the rich and noble families from their ancestral homes and landholdings and compelled them to live in the capital.
Shiji
reports that 120,000 wealthy families were moved from all over the empire and resettled in Xianyang.
Every time Qin conquered another feudal state, a replica of its ruler’s palace was copied and rebuilt on the hills to the north of the capital overlooking the Wei River…. Connected to each other by elevated courtyards and wide boulevards, they were filled with the instruments, gadgets, and beautiful women captured from the defeated states.
Under the emperor’s watchful eye, the new arrivals were encouraged to use their talents to benefit the Qin empire. This forced assemblage of ability and wealth transformed Xianyang into the premier city of China, as well as its political, cultural, military, administrative, and economic center.
The First Emperor issued an edict that extended freehold land ownership to all farmers. He looked down on commerce but encouraged agriculture and husbandry, considering them fundamental occupations. Private trade was discouraged through government monopolies of basic substances such as salt and iron. However, he increased taxes mercilessly. Tax grain amounted to half of all agricultural production. Taxes on the profits derived
from the sale of salt and iron were increased thirty times during his reign. He also initiated a poll tax.
He conscripted hundreds of thousands of men as laborers into his army and ordered them to work on his massive building projects. Besides the Great Wall and his tomb, he built canals, bridges, roads, and palaces. According to
Shiji,
the conglomeration of palaces that he built in the capital extended for a distance of seventy miles (two hundred
li
s). Of these residences, two hundred and seventy were reserved for his own use and that of his family. The enormous A Fang Palace measured 2500 feet from east to west and 500 feet from north to south and could seat ten thousand people. All the palaces were lavishly furnished with priceless furniture and art objects.
By all accounts, he was a dedicated and driven monarch, handling one hundred and twenty pounds of reports (written on bamboo slips) daily. Life was not all work, however, because
Shiji
states that the First Emperor used to keep jesters at his court to amuse him.
Like many powerful conquerors, the First Emperor was terrified of death. He filled his days with work, consulted astrologers, and became obsessed with orderliness and uniformity. Deeply superstitious, he came under the influence of Taoism and the School of Five Elements.
Shiji
relates:
The First Emperor believed in the theory of the cyclic rotation of the Five Elements [earth, wood, metal, fire, and water]. This school of thought claimed that each period of history is dominated by one of the five elements, which will then be succeeded by the next element in a fixed and endless cycle. For example, if metal is the dominant element at any one time, it will inevitably be replaced sooner or later by the next element in the series, which is fire [ fire melts metal]. After a certain period, fire in its turn will be replaced by water, since fire is extinguished by water. This process will continue in an endless cycle, which will determine the course of history. Because the authority of the previous unifier of China [the Zhou dynasty] had been replaced by that of his Qin dynasty, the First Emperor concluded that Zhou’s element was fire and Qin’s was water. He considered his reign the era of the Power of Water. The New Year was changed from the first day of the First Month to the first day of the Tenth Month. Black became the chief color of court dress, banners, and pennants because black was the color of water. Condemned criminals and prisoners of war were dressed in red since red was the color of fire. The number six was his
favorite number because it had the same pronunciation as the word
current.
Official tallies and headgear were six inches long. Chariots were six feet wide. One pace was a measure of six feet, and the imperial carriage was drawn by six horses.
He renamed the Yellow River the Powerful Water. In order to inaugurate this new era of the Power of Water, he ruthlessly repressed everything that did not conform with his laws. He believed that only the most implacable severity could harmonize the Five Elements. Thus his reign was harsh and devoid of amnesties.
The First Emperor issued a decree to his ministers, ordering them to unify all laws into a single, coherent, universally applicable system throughout his empire. He vigorously and compulsively standardized every aspect of his subjects’ lives, reducing all in a uniform manner. Weights and measures, size of acreage, agricultural implements, and even the axles and wheels of wagons had to be made of a standard gauge. The “knife” money of Qi, “spade” coins of Haan, Zhao, Wei, and Yan, and the “checker” pieces of Chu were all replaced by the “round money” of Qin. Local customs and writing that did not conform to the new system were vigorously repressed.
To further clarify his laws and make them understood throughout the land, the First Emperor, with the help of Li Si, also standardized the system of writing. Previously, there was such great divergence that men from one state could hardly understand the written language of men from the other states. Besides establishing a common tie between people from all parts of the empire, it also secured a line of communication with the literature of the past.
To this day, modern Chinese writing is based on the system proposed by Li Si over 2000 years ago. The script has changed so little that I, who left China at the age of fourteen, am still able to read and understand the ancient Chinese classics with the help of a dictionary. The literature of millennia is thus open to anyone who can read Chinese. The oldest Chinese dictionary,
shuo wen,
was published in 100
C.E.
It is still in print, for it is the basis of every Chinese dictionary that followed. It never fails to thrill me to be able to open my copy of
Shiji
and be stirred by the same words written by a historian who lived 2100 years ago.
Because of the First Emperor’s standardization of the written Chinese language, China has maintained its cultural continuity ever since. Of all the great civilizations
that used to exist, such as Egyptian, Greek, or Roman, China’s is the only one to have survived intact. Many attribute this to the immutability and universality of the written Chinese language.
Recently, my husband and I visited Vietnam. On the streets of Ho Chi Minh City (Saigon), I noticed that the billboards and shop signs were all lettered in the French alphabet but with Vietnamese spelling. I asked the young Vietnamese tour guide who was showing us around, “Mr. Nguyen, when did the French colonize Vietnam?”
“Nineteenth century,” he replied.
“What was the written language of Vietnam before the French came?” I wondered.
Mr. Nguyen would not answer. He shrugged his shoulders and walked away. At first I thought he did not hear me, but after being rebuffed twice more, I finally understood that his silence was intentional. For some reason he did not wish to answer me.
Two days later we were taken by bus to visit the ancient imperial city of Hue. One of our destinations was an ancient pagoda built in the sixteenth century.
“Surely,” I told Bob, “we will be shown monuments with ancient Vietnamese writing at the pagoda. I’m really curious to see some samples of Vietnamese writing before the French arrived on the scene.”
The Thien Mu Pagoda was built in the style of a Ming dynasty Chinese tower. On its surface were many engraved sayings, well preserved and perfectly legible. To my astonishment, I could read every word because they were all written in Chinese. It dawned on me that before the French came the written language of Vietnam was Chinese. Our tour guide knew this. When I questioned him, he had remained silent precisely because he could see that I was Chinese. For reasons of his own, he did not wish to admit that historically, Vietnamese culture was the same as that of China’s.
A brochure informed me that the very name of Vietnam was derived from two Chinese characters,
yue
and
nan.
The word
yue
is pronounced “viet,” and
nan
is pronounced “nam” in Vietnam, but they are written the same way and have the same meaning as Chinese. Yue means “to cross” or “climb over.” Nan means “south.” Thus
Vietnam
or
Yue Nan
means “to climb over the south.” Alternately, it can also mean “south of the state of Yue.”
During the Warring States period, the state of Yue used to be an independent kingdom south of the Yangtze River. Later, it was absorbed into Chu, which in turn
was conquered by King Zheng in 223
B.C.E.
From then on, the word
Yue
was used to describe the southern coastal provinces of China such as Guangzhou (Canton).
Shiji
states that after unification, the First Emperor elevated the status of farmers but deported “merchants, vagabonds, and other useless people” to populate the distant and “barbaric” region known as Yue. Vietnam is immediately south
(nam)
of Yue
(Viet);
hence its name.
If the First Emperor had not united the seven states, today’s China would probably be more like Europe, consisting of a collection of different countries, each with its own government, spoken and written language, currency, laws, religious beliefs, customs, grievances, and perhaps wars.