the death of a villager Behind the house where I live, in the middle of the vast courtyard, there is an Arhat Hall.The slightly lower place on the left side of it is the kitchen in the temple. Because there are several other kitchens, it is specially called the big kitchen.Pass through here, go out of the board door, and you can walk out of the mountain.A little spring water from the bottom of the shallow creek pit flows down the temple and passes in front of the board gate.There is a bridge over the stream.There are two or three big trees beside the bridge, which have become a shed, and it is very cool even at noon. The grooms and villagers often sit on the stones under the trees, chatting and resting.I also often go for a walk in the morning and evening.It happened to be the summer vacation of the elementary school, and Feng Yi came to the mountains and stayed for two weeks. We usually went together to pick up small round stones at the bottom of the stream pit, or stood on the bridge to watch the flow of the stream.Among the groom's many donkeys and horses, there is also a female donkey with a calf. Feng Yi loves to look at that cute little long face with a slightly dull face.

-------- ① Feng Yi, the eldest son of Zhou Zuoren, born in 1912 (Zhou Zuoren was 28 years old at the time), was originally named Feng Maru, but later changed his name to Feng Yi, and his name was obtained.In the 10 years of imprisonment, he created and published effective articles. In the late 1970s and early 1980s, he wrote "Miscellaneous Memories of Dilu" in Japanese and published it in the Japanese magazine "Biaofeng". I don't know how many people there are in the big kitchen.It's just that when going in and out from there, in a corner of the room where a horse is turning the mill, I often see a man sitting next to the big wooden box, stepping on a stick with his foot, making the box rattle.Feng Yi taught me that it was the man who kept the two horses in the temple, and now he divided the husk and flour of the wheat ground by the horses into two places.He probably often went to see the horses in the temple alone, so he was very familiar with the man, and sometimes called him and asked him various childish words.

This is the day of Zhongyuan in the old calendar.The person who was cooking for me came up and said to me that there is a very heavy patient in the big kitchen.There was nothing a month ago, and I saw him go shopping from time to time.At the end of June in the old calendar, it was a bit bad, so I went to Qinglongqiao, more than ten miles away, to seek medical treatment from Chinese medicine.But it didn't work. I fell on the bed for two or three days and couldn't get up.Today the carpenter working in the temple put the old boards together to make his coffin.This disease seems to be a lung disease.In an old stove that was no longer used by his bed, there was a lot of spit, and the stove was full of flies.He said and advised me that to go up the mountain, you have to walk by the side of that room, so it's better not to go now.

I felt slightly uncomfortable.So I went for a walk in front of the main hall, and felt that I didn't want to go up the mountain, and I haven't been there yet. That night, there was a flame mouth offering food in the temple.The abbot and two other monks recited mantras, and the abbot's disciples beat the bells and drums.I also wanted to take a look, but felt troublesome, so I finally gave up and went to bed early.Woke up suddenly in the middle of the night, heard the sound of cymbals somewhere, thought to himself, now it is sending ghosts, so the feeding will be over, and then fell asleep.

After breakfast, the cook came to inform again that the man finally died early in the morning.He added: "He seems to be waiting for the coffin to be finished." What kind of person?Or I have seen it before and I don't know it, but I can't know it now. He was single and seemed to have few relatives.The temple cleaned him up, and he was buried in the field beside the road outside the mountain gate in the morning. In various stores, there are many debts left.There is more than one yuan in a noodle shop, and about four yuan in a sauce shop.When the people in the store heard that he was dead, they immediately tore off the page from the account book and burned it, and brought paper money and burned it to the dead man.The head carpenter bought five cents worth of paper money and burned it.The old women who lived in the low huts outside the mountain gate also took a little paper money to hang him.After hearing this, I said it was a superstition as usual, and I didn't have the courage to kill him with a smile.

Made on August 30, 1921 Second soda seller There's a soda man next door to me.In the left corner of the Prajna Hall courtyard, there are two houses, one is my kitchen, and the other is where the soda seller lives. In summer, many people come to visit Xishan, and the soda business is also very good.They are sold from the soda factory for a dollar a dozen, and the expensive ones are sold to customers.If you have some knowledge or are good at bargaining, a bottle of two cents is enough, otherwise it will cost three or four cents.When there are many tourists on Sunday, they can be sold for fifteen or sixteen yuan, which is almost ten yuan a day.The shopkeeper who sold soda was originally a mason who ran a coal shop. One day he came to work in the temple, and suddenly thought that selling soda here would be a good business, so he opened his business.Because I was very busy with the store and work, I hired a guy to watch it for him. He just came over occasionally to inspect it.The buddies are not paid at first, but food, food and necessary pockets are provided by the palm.

After I came here, the clerk has changed quite a bit. The one here recently is a young man surnamed Qin who is about twenty years old. He has a good physique and a slightly dark round face. The innocent place. The place where soda is sold is under the tower, commonly known as the tower courtyard.In the square behind the temple, a square platform tens of feet high is built, and five stone pagodas are erected on it. The so-called pagoda courtyard is the top of this high platform.From my house to the bottom of the pagoda courtyard, I have to go through fifty or sixty steps, but they are divided into four or five sections, so I can still go up. As for the steps of the pagoda courtyard, there are always more than two hundred steps, and they are very steep. I was dazzled even when I saw it, thinking that this must be impossible, I never thought of going up there.There are many big trees under the pagoda courtyard, which is very cool. I often go there with Fengyi to look at the stele and take a walk casually.

One day, while walking outside the stele pavilion, Qin also raised rice from the bottom.An oblong wicker basket is worn on the left wrist, and a cluster of cherry-like fruits with branches and leaves is held in the right hand.Seeing Feng Yi, he suddenly stretched out his hand and said loudly: "This is for you." Feng Yi jumped and walked, and also asked loudly: "what is this?" "Yu Li." "Where did you get it?" "You don't need to worry about it. Just take it." He said, showing a friendly smile on his cunning face, and handed the fruit to Toyoichi.His mouth was moving, as if he was eating the fruit.We picked a red one and ate it. It smelled like plums, but it was very sour.Feng Yi still wanted to ask him something, but Qin had already jumped to the bottom of the steps, saying "one, two, three", took two or three steps as one step, walked up, and soon entered the first stone vault gate in the pagoda courtyard , then disappeared.

This was half a month ago.Toyoichi also went home because school was about to start. Yesterday morning, the shopkeeper's nephew came over.He suddenly told Qin that the store was closing and told him to go back tomorrow morning.Everyone felt strange about this incident. After careful inquiry, they found out that because the shopkeeper knew about Qin's cheating, he sent his nephew to investigate and deal with it.The soda sold for three or four cents was charged to two cents, and the rest was confiscated and stored with a monk. I don't know who used the phone to tell the shopkeeper about this matter.After the nephew came, he did not know where to inquire a lot about what kind of good food Qin bought and smoked several packs of cigarettes in half a month, so the evidence was convincing and he finally decided to drive him away.

Qin Tianran didn't want to go out, he was very depressed, and made many excuses, but it didn't work.This morning, Qin, who usually got up very early, was still asleep. His nephew woke him up. He said he had a headache and refused to get up.However, it was useless. In less than thirty minutes, Qin quietly left the Prajna Hall. I was walking outside the door where the big black brass Maitreya Buddha was sitting.Qin walked in front of me, with a quilt on his shoulder, and a wicker basket containing a little daily necessities in one hand.A tenant from a monastery coming from the opposite side saw him and asked:

"Where are you going?" "Go back to Beijing!" He replied in a happy voice, deliberately trying to hide his melancholy mood. I feel very lonely.The sly face with a friendly smile that I saw at the base of the pagoda at that time reappeared clearly in front of my mind before I knew it.I stood still, watching for a while his lonely figure walking down the long stone steps. August 30 at Biyun Temple in Xishan -------- These two essays were made when I was in Xishan this autumn, and sent to the magazine "Growing Stars" run by some Japanese friends, and they were published in Volume 1, Issue 9, and now they have been translated into Chinese and published once.Although it is my own work, the rewriting at this moment is really only the atmosphere of translation, not the atmosphere of writing.After a period of time, my mood has changed before and after, and I can no longer recall the mood at that time.So I wrote sentence by sentence, just transcribed from another piece of paper, not from my heart, and the difficulties in choosing words and making sentences and other translations also besieged me.Although this level cannot be regarded as an excuse for poor writing, it can be regarded as its explanation. Addendum dated December 15, 1921. (August 1921, from "Past Life")