Dreams and delights

by L. Adams Beck

It is an island off the coast of China, as I said before, most holy to the Buddhists of the Far East, dear to all who know it in its beauty and religious peace and the lovely legends that cling about it, a place of purification of the heart and of a serenity that the true pilgrim may hope to carry away with him as the crowning of his toil and prayer. It is one of the Chusan Archipelago and is separated from the large island of Chusan by a stretch of water known as the “Sea of Lilies.” And it is not very far distant from the hybrid dissipations of Shanghai and the swarming streets of Ningpo and can be reached from either. Yet it is as far removed from their hard realities as if it were built on floating clouds and lit by other dawns than ours.

Shanghai concerns itself, I am told, with that ancient and universally respected Trinity of the World, the Flesh, and the Devil. I know little of it myself and accept the testimony of friends, and especially of one who knew it well. “I just think,” he said with conviction, “that if nothing happens to Shanghai, Sodom and Gomorrah were very unfairly dealt with.”

So I met my friend Shan Tao in Ningpo, and we set sail together. The island of Puto, at all events, concerns itself with a very different Trinity from that of Shanghai. For the deity of Puto is the Supreme, enthroned in eternal light, and on his right hand stands Wisdom and on his left, Love. The patron saint of this island is Kwan-yin (the Kwannon of Japan), the incarnation of divine love and pity, she who has refused to enter paradise, so that, remaining on this sad earth, she may be attentive to the tears and prayers of humanity and depart from it only when the Starry Gates have closed behind the last sinner and sorrow and sighing have fled away like clouds melting into the golden calms of sunset. Yet when I say “she,” I limit the power of this mighty Bodhisattva, or Pusa, as Buddhas-to-be are called in India and China. For that pure essence is far above all limitations of sex and, uniting in itself the perfection of both, may be manifested as either, according to need and opportunity. Be that as it may, Puto is the holiest, most immediate home of Kwan-yin, and her influence spreads far beyond its shores and makes the very sea that surrounds it sacred. Therefore it is to this day the Sea of Lilies.

For when the Dwarf-men, the Japanese, came storming down on the island from Hangchow long ago and carried off a part of the sacred relics, they woke in the dawn to find their ship moving slower and slower and finally rocking like a ship asleep in what seemed a vast meadow of lilies. Thick as snow about them lay the ivory chalices with golden stamens; thick as the coiling of snakes innumerable were the long piped and knotted stems, with the great prone leaves. Neither oar nor sail could move the ship; for the mysterious lilies, white and silent, that had sprung up from the depths in a night held it as if with chains. And then comprehension entered the hearts of the Dwarfs, and, taking hurried counsel, they put the ship about and headed for the sacred island once more. As they did so, a soft wind like the waft of a passing garment breathed on the surface of the sea, the ivory chalices closed and the crystal lymph flowed over them, and, where the leagues of blossom had spread, were now only the foam-flowers of the waste ocean. So the treasures were restored to Puto, and, when the story was told to the monks, they adored the Heavenly Lady who guards her own.

Lest it be said that the burdened consciences of the Dwarfs misled them into a dream, let the story be told of Wang Kuei, a haughty official who was sent on his Emperor’s behalf to do reverence at the shrines of Puto and did it grudgingly and with a pride that ill became him. So, when his ship set sail from the island and he sat in glory on deck, glad at heart that his service was over, suddenly her swift course was stayed. Behold, in the moonlight, the meadows of ocean had bloomed into innumerable lilies, and there was no sea-track between them, no glimmer of water in the interstices of the paving-leaves, and the ship was a prisoner of beauty! Then the story of the Dwarfs rushed into his soul. In haste he prostrated himself on the deck with his face toward the island and prayed for pardon as he had never yet prayed, and the Heavenly Lady heard him and the lilies were resumed into her pure being. The man of pride returned to Puto and, doing homage of the humblest, went back in security to his Emperor.

But who can tell the beauty of Puto, looking forth on its little sisters of the archipelago with the serenity of an elder who has attained? We put up in one of the cells allotted to pilgrims in a monastery among the hills overlooking the Sea of Lilies. Surely, I think, a lovelier place could not be. The little ways wind about the island, past great rocks sculptured with holy figures and groves of trees that climb the hills to the tiled roofs of the many temples and monasteries. And wild and sweet on the hills grows the gardenia, whence the island has its name of “White Flower.” The sunny sweetness of its perfume recalled to me the far-away, wild daphne bushes of Mount Abu in Rajputana, near the marvellous white temples of Dilwara, temples of another, yet not unallied, faith. It is easy to tell when the gods go by—it can never be common air again, but sweet, sweet unutterably.

All day I trod the bays on sand fine as powdered gold or wandered among the flowers, taking notes for my book at the various temples and talking with the monks and such hermits as are not under the vow of silence. When they found I was at work for Kan-lu-ssu in the hills, they opened their hearts and told me many things.

I suppose it is difficult for the western mind to comprehend the impulses that send a man to dwell in the solitudes of Puto, girdled with its miraculous sea, there to let the years slip from him like a vesture, unheeded, unregretted—but to me it is easy. Let me tell the story of one of these monks, gathered from his own lips and told where a ravine breaks down to the sands of a little bay; where the small waves fall in a lulling monotone, a fitting burden to quiet words softly spoken as the shadows lengthened to the hour of rest. He was named in religion “High Illumination.” His name in the world I cannot tell.

His father had been a farmer in Anhui, a well-to-do man for his class. There were two sons, and my friend was the younger. His father, of whom he spoke with deep reverence, had the utmost confidence in the elder brother. In dying, he expressed only the desire that the elder brother would make a just division with the younger of all the possessions he was leaving, and so departed.

“And I was content,” said High Illumination, “knowing my father’s wisdom and believing that his wish, uttered in the presence of us both, would be as binding upon my honoured brother as an imperial command. Therefore, when all observances of departure had been completed and the proper time came, I expected my share in peace, and the more so since my good father had provided for my marriage with a beautiful maiden, the daughter of a lifelong friend. But that was not to be.