I
(第一)風雲雪
Once there was a great quarrel between the winds, the clouds, and the snow. [[87]]
And suddenly, without any warning, there came the angry roar of the thunder and the sharp cracking of the forked lightning as it separated the heavens.
Then the north winds, the south winds, the east winds, and the west winds came together a thousand and a thousand strong.
And the sun was no longer seen, for the earth was covered with a deep blackness as of the night. The clouds were coming to the east, but the wind drove them all back to the west side of the heavens and finally much hail and snow were thrown down to the earth.
The clouds said to the snow, “Why do you go to earth? You are not wanted there. In the warm south land you are never welcomed. Your people would be killed at once if they went there. Even here you are allowed to stay only for a short time.”
“We do not come to this earth for our own pleasure,” answered the snow. “It was pleasanter where we were. We came to earth to help its people.”
At this the clouds frowned until their faces became black and they said, “We can not believe that.”
“It is true,” answered the snow. “In the summer time you will see how the people cry for pressed snow. They pay three pennies for one little cup of water that we have made cold. [[88]]
“You say we are not liked in the south land, but we tell you that the south-land people send many oxen, horses, and men to the north to find the snow.
“They pack us in the storehouses so that we may last until the hot weather, and when the summer fever comes all people need us.”
“You have been studying this one great need of man a long time, we think,” and the clouds bowed in scornful mock sympathy.
“We do many good things for man,” continued the snow. “Thunder and lightning do him much harm and he fears them greatly; but the Creator sends us to comfort him. The lightning disappears from the earth for a time when the season of our appearance comes.”
“You should wear a crown,” suggested the clouds sneeringly.
“A king who wore one—the old King Dai-Sung—once said of us, ‘Oh, snow, snow, how beautiful you are. It is good for flowers, good for grass, and good for trees that you are here.’
“And he said to the rose bushes, shrubs, and trees who were asleep, ‘If you wish beauty in the spring time, you must have our friend the snow in the winter.’
“He laid his hand gently on his horses’ necks and said, ‘True helpers that are both feet and legs to me, it will soon be time for the green grass to appear. You [[89]]will have plenty this year, for we had a thick cover of snow this winter.
“ ‘It will soon be hot weather, but I do not fear the heat, for I have plenty of hard snow, pressed and packed for the summer time.’
“So you see the snow is useful to man. We could have stayed where we were in the sky and kept clean, and we need not have worked hard flying all the way down to the ground.
“We never hear that the clouds do any good thing,” said the snow.
“The time may come when you will have finished talking,” said the clouds. “Then we can tell you some things.”
“We saw the big Ti-San Mountain to-day,” continued the snow, “and many of the cloud children were playing around its summit, but what good did they do? None.
“A hunter was looking for wild beasts and your children were naughty and covered his eyes so that he could not see. Do you remember how he scolded your children and said, ‘I do not like these cloudy, foggy days’?
“Once the General San Chi led his soldiers to fight against his nation’s enemy, and one night he went out to learn how many of the enemy could be seen. [[90]]
“The moon and stars tried to help him, but you came and covered them and it grew so dark that he lost his way. Then the enemy took his horse and gun and he nearly lost his life.
“He hid in a cave and said, ‘Those clouds have caused my death, I fear.’ He lay in the dark cave until the morning came and he could see to find his way.
“We do not see why the Creator made clouds to hang around in the sky from north to south, and east to west,” said the snow, angrily.