Peony Lantern Notes

The custom of admiring the lanterns is very ancient.

A student, widowed, indulged in anguish and did not go to the festival. Just stood at the gate. I noticed a maid with a lantern in the form of a pair of peonies and a beauty of rare beauty. Tailed after them.

The beauty addressed the student with a word of hello, and he invited her to his house. She told about herself that she had lost all her kin, an orphan, wandering in a foreign land with the maid Jinlian, love began between them.

The old neighbor suspected something was amiss. Spied: powdered and a student sat side by side under a flashlight. He approached the student with questions, he denied. But, frightened that he was living with a werewolf, he heeded the advice of the old man and went to look for the dwelling of the beauty and the maid.

In the evening he wandered into the temple. There was a coffin. An inscription hung from the lid: "The coffin with the body of young lady Li, daughter of the judge of Feng Hua County." Nearby is a lantern in the form of two peony flowers and a statue of a handmaid. Horror embraced the student. He rushed for help to the wise Taoist. He gave him magic spells and did not order to go to that temple. Since then, no one has come to him.

Once, drunk away, the student still wandered into the temple. The damsel was already waiting for him. She took her hand, pulled her to the coffin, the lid lifted, and the student and her lover entered the coffin. There he died.

The neighbor grabbed the student. I found that temple and saw a piece of the student’s dress peering out from under the coffin. They opened the coffin, and there a dead student in the arms of his dead girlfriend. So they were buried together at the West Gate.

Since then, on foggy evenings, late passers-by have met the whole trinity: a student with a beauty and a maid at the peony lamp. Ailment began to overcome such unfortunate people; he brought many to the grave. Everyone was in awe. Turned to Taoist. He sent them to the immortal hermit.

The hermit summoned the heavenly army and ordered to gang up on evil spirits. The werewolf was seized and punished with whips. The Trinity repented. The Taoist hermit thought for a long time over the sentence and ordered: the lamp emitting double light to burn, to take all three of them into custody and to send to the most terrible prison of the lower, ninth, underworld. Shook off the dust from the sleeves and disappeared. People did not even have time to thank him.

Biography of the Virgin in Green

Zhao Yuan buried his parents. While he was not yet married, he decided to go wandering and comprehending science. Settled near Lake Xihu.

I accidentally met a girl dressed in green clothes. Immediately flared mutual love. Only the beauty refused to give her name, but asked to call her the Virgin in green.

Once, in the hop, Yuan joked about his lover's green dress. She was offended, thought, he hints at her despicable position of a concubine - the lawful wives put on yellow. I had to tell such a story. In a past life, both Yuan and the maiden served in a rich house. They passionately fell in love with each other, but they were punished by death with a denunciation. Yuan was reborn in the world of people, and it was listed in the Book of restless souls. Now Yuan realized that the threads of their destinies were tied back in their previous birth, and he began to be much more tender towards his beloved. And you delighted him with stories and taught to play chess - she was a great craftswoman in this matter.

Time has passed. It's time for the maiden to leave. She became ill, and when Yuan was about to click the doctor, she explained that according to the tablets of fate their conjugal love had ended and it was useless to resist it. The virgin lay on the bed, turned to the wall and died. In great tribulation, Yuan performed the funeral rites. Only now the coffin seemed too light. Opened - and there is only a green dress, studs and earrings. So the empty coffin was buried.

And Yuan took the tonsure.

Notes on the Hairpin - Golden Phoenix

Rich neighbors conspired with their young children, and a golden hairpin in the shape of a phoenix was presented to the future bride.

Soon the groom's father was transferred to a service in a distant land, and for fifteen years not a word came from them.

The girl, without a narrowed, yearned, fell ill, and died. In deep sorrow, parents put their daughter’s body in a coffin, and stuck a golden hairpin in their hair - the memory of the groom.

Two months later the groom himself appeared, the young Mr. Tsui. Over the years, he was orphaned, and the inconsolable parents of the bride offered him shelter and food. Once, the younger sister of the deceased dropped a golden hairpin from a palanquin. Tsui wanted to recover the loss, but could not get to the female half of the house. Suddenly, late at night, the younger sister herself appeared - as if behind a hairpin, and began to seduce the young man. He resisted, but surrendered.

Realizing that they would not succeed in hiding love affairs for a long time, they decided to run away from home to the old faithful servant of Father Tsui. So they did. A year has passed. The fugitives thought of returning home, falling at the feet of their parents and begging forgiveness. Tsui was the first to go, and in evidence to present the phoenix hairpin that his lover had given him.

The adoptive father met him as if nothing had happened. He could not understand the excuses in any way, for his youngest daughter had already gone down a year ago and was not even able to turn around herself. Then Tsui showed a hairpin. The adornment of the deceased elder sister, which they put in the coffin with her, was recognized in it.

And suddenly the youngest daughter appeared. She explained that the thread of fate that connected the elder sister with the bridegroom had not yet been torn and she, the youngest, must marry, otherwise her life would die out. The voice of the youngest daughter was surprisingly reminiscent of the voice of the deceased. Parents were horrified.

The father began to rebuke the daughter who returned from the next world. She explained that the head of the gloom found her innocent and allowed her to live the year of her worldly life. And she collapsed dead to the ground. They sprayed the body with healing broth, and the girl came to life. As the elder promised, the illnesses and ailments of the younger disappeared, and she did not remember the past events, as if from a heavy dream she woke up.

They soon got married. The young gentleman sold the gold hairpin, bought with the proceeds everything that was needed for the thanksgiving, and instructed the Taoist monk to complete the ceremony. After that, in a dream, the deceased appeared to him with words of love and good wishes. Strange, isn't it?