Original Text
The scholar Yu Jing, styled Xiao Song, a native of Yidu, was studying in the Liquan Temple. One night, as he was turning pages and reciting aloud, a woman suddenly praised him from outside the window, saying, "Master Yu, how diligently you read!" Yu Jing wondered to himself, where could a woman come from in these deep mountains? While he was still pondering, the woman had already pushed open the door and entered with a smile, saying, "How diligently you read!" Startled, Yu Jing rose to his feet and saw that she was dressed in a green robe and long skirt, exquisitely beautiful and incomparably lovely. Knowing she was not human, he repeatedly asked where she lived. The woman said, "Do you think I am a man-eating monster? Why do you press me so?" Yu Jing, delighted with her, lay with her. When she untied her silk jacket, her waist was so slender it could barely be encircled by one hand. Just after the fifth watch, she fluttered away gracefully. From then on, she came every night without fail.
One evening, the woman drank wine with Yu Jing, and during their conversation she revealed her mastery of music. Yu Jing said, "Your voice is delicate and tender; if you could sing a song, it would surely enchant one's soul." The woman smiled and replied, "I dare not sing, for fear of enchanting your soul." Yu Jing repeatedly urged her to sing, and she said, "It is not that I am being stingy, but I fear others might hear. Since you insist, I will humbly oblige, but I must sing softly, just enough to convey the feeling." Then, lightly tapping the edge of the bed with her slender foot, she sang:
The crow and magpie in the tree have tricked me into parting at midnight.
She does not complain that her embroidered shoes are wet, but only fears that her beloved has no companion.
Her voice was as delicate as a mosquito's hum, just barely allowing one to discern the words of the song. Yet when listened to with a quiet heart, the melody rose and fell with grace, round and clear, pleasing to the ear and stirring the soul. After finishing the song, the woman opened the door to look outside and said, "We must beware of anyone lurking beyond the window." She circled the room, inspecting every corner, before finally entering again. Yu Jing asked, "Why are you so full of suspicion and fear?" The woman smiled and replied, "As the proverb says, 'A ghost who steals life ever dreads the living.' That is me." Then they went to bed together, but she was anxious and uneasy, her heart heavy with sorrow. "Our lifelong bond," she said, "I fear ends here." Yu Jing urgently asked why she spoke thus, and she answered, "My heart suddenly races; perhaps my fortune is spent." Yu Jing comforted her, saying, "A racing heart or twitching eye are but common things—why speak so suddenly of this?" The woman cheered slightly, and they embraced once more in tender passion.
After the fifth watch, the woman draped her robe over her shoulders and rose from the bed. As she was about to open the door, she hesitated and turned back, saying, "I know not why, but my heart is filled with fear. Please see me to the door." Yu Jing indeed got up and escorted her to the threshold. The woman said, "Stand here and watch me; once I have climbed over the wall and gone, you may return." Yu Jing replied, "Very well." He watched as she turned past the corridor and vanished without a trace. Just as he was about to go back to sleep, he heard the woman's urgent cries for help. Yu Jing rushed to the spot and looked around, but there was no sign of her; the sound came from beneath the eaves. He raised his head and peered closely, and there he saw a spider the size of a pellet, clutching an insect and twisting it about—it was the insect that was emitting the desperate, piercing wails. He tore the web, picked off the insect, and removed the silken threads binding it, only to find it was a green bee, gasping and near death. Yu Jing carried the green bee back into his room and placed it on the desk. After a long stillness, the bee was able to crawl. It slowly climbed onto the inkstone, dipped its body into the ink, then emerged and crawled across the table, its trail forming the character for "gratitude." Then it fluttered its wings repeatedly and flew out through the window. From that day on, the green-clad woman never appeared again.
Commentary
If "The Lotus Princess" bears obvious traces of imitating Tang dynasty tales, resembling a practice piece, then "The Green-Clad Maiden" is Pu Songling's uniquely crafted creation, a light and ethereal ode to a creature or a fairy tale. Through the scholar Yu Jing's seeing, hearing, feeling, and sensing, it portrays the beautiful, elegant, frail, and timid maiden transformed from a bee in the author's mind. Dan Minglun greatly admired the artistic skill of this piece, saying: "It depicts color and sound, form and spirit, all subtly drawn from the bee. At the end, a single stroke reveals the truth, and then with ink cast to form characters and wings vibrating to pierce the window, it leaves words unfinished—a short piece that captures the marvel of describing an object." The French Impressionist composer Debussy once wrote a piano piece titled "The Girl with the Flaxen Hair," using music to shape a beautiful and gentle maiden. Here, Pu Songling, through language, shapes the maiden transformed from a bee—one sunny, one shadowy—yet both reach the pinnacle of the temple of plastic arts.