PROLOGUE

The Snake Sisters-Bai Suzhen and Xiaoqing

Once upon a time, there were two sister snakes. The elder sister was white, white from the top of her head to the end of her tail. She was whiter than the whitest cloud. The younger sister was green, green from her tail to the top of her head. She was greener than the greenest wood in spring. They lived in far away hills, among the clouds and the stars.

There Death came to the mountains every year. It carried off the young and the old, the sick and the healthy. The white snake hid in the clouds and the green snake hid among the trees. Death was never able to catch them. They lived for many hundreds of years.

They knew every tree on the hills, every cloud that flew by. They made friends with the wind, and learnt about the ways of the earth. They talked to the stars, and they came to understand the ways of sky. They became wise, and the secret of life was shown to them.

On the night that they became a thousand years old, they took human shape and turned into two beautiful women. The elder sister dressed in white, the younger sister in green.

They walked day and night in the woods, they talked and sang on the mountain tops. But soon they became tired of this way of life. They wanted to see what lay beyond mountains.

One night they said goodbye to the woods and the hills, the wind and the stars, and left for the cities.

Mortal Man- Xu Xian

After many dark, cold days, spring came to Lake West. It was the most beautiful time of the year, although it rained sometimes. People from all over China came to see Lake West in spring. Some came in groups. Some came in pairs. Some came alone and Xu Xian was one of them. However, he did not come to see the beautiful countryside. He came to Lake West because his parents were buried there. Every year around this time, he came to pay his respects to them.

The rain came very suddenly in the afternoon. It had been a very nice and sunny morning. The weather had been almost warm. The rain sent the people running for shelter. The lake, which had been filled with rowing boats, was not left in peace.

The rain sent up mist from the lake. The cold that had been forgotten in the sunshine a moment ago, returned. The people in bright coloured clothes went as quickly as the came. Soon there was no other noise, but that of the rain. It fell on the thin new leaves. It fell on the roofs covered with straw. It fell on the lake.

It was perhaps the best time to enjoy the beauty of Lake West. Only those who were trapped in the rain saw the beauty of it. But they just wanted the rain to stop, so that they could go away.

Xu Xian was ready for the rain and he had brought along an umbrella then je walked to the edge of the lake. He waited patiently for the boat that he had hired. He lived in a town just across the lake.

Xu Xian was a nice looking young man of about twenty. People in those days in China married young. By the time he was twenty, if he was not too poor, a man would have a wife and children. But Xu Xian was still not married.

Both his parents had died when he was very young. He was brought up by his sister who was a lot older than him. She ruled her little brother's life. She ruled her own husband's life as well as his business. If you let her, she would rule the world. She was the kind of woman. Her husband owned a small shop selling medicines in the town where they lived.

Since he was a boy, Xu Xian had a very little to be happy about. Sometimes he was not sure if his sister really cared about him. But she always said she did.

"Stay home and clean up the kitchen. Playing with those boys out there will only make you a good for nothing."

If he disobeyed her, she would beat him. She never had a kind word for him.

The rain stopped suddenly as he heard noise coming from behind him. People were running out of their shelters. The sky still looked grey and the rain was likely to fall again.

He hear the voices of two young women, talking and laughing. They were coming his way.

"Oh there's a boat coming. There's a boat coming," cried one of them.

"Just in time too," said the other one. "I hate rain. I hope it's not going to fall again. My shoes are wet and dirty."

The boat was rowed up to small pier which was made of bamboo. A number of people get off the boat. The boatman called out to Xu Xian.

"Have i kept you waiting for very long, sir? The water is a little rough today. Hard rowing. It's hard life being a boatman, you know. In winter,, you stand in the cold wind the whole day to wait for someone to come. Now you row the whole day. You don't even have time to say you're tired. I tell you, sir, this is a hard life…"

The boatman went on. He wore a raincoat made from dry leaves and was an old man.

Xu Xian walked out to the pier, and stepped down on on to the boat. Just at this moment, the rain began to fall again.

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