Note 4 — XII.—LEGENDS OF LOCALITY, HOUSEHOLD TALES, &c.

Shih mun kai, Kwai ku hsien shêng lai. “Stone door open; Mr. Kwei Ku is coming.” Upon this the door of the cave opened, and the speaker entered. Having remained there for some time he came out and saying “Stone door close; Mr. Kwei Ku is going,” the door again closed and the visitor departed. Chang’s curiosity was naturally excited, and having several times heard the formula repeated he waited one day until the genie (for such he was) had taken his departure and essayed to obtain an entrance. To his great delight the door yielded, and having gone inside he found himself in a romantic grotto of immense extent. Nothing however in the shape of treasure met his eye, so having fully explored the place he returned to the door, which shut at his bidding, and went home. Upon telling his grandmother of his adventure she expressed a strong wish to see the wonderful cavern; and thither they accordingly went together next day. Wandering about in admiration of the scenery they became separated, and Chang at length, supposing that his grandmother had left, passed out of the door and ordered it to shut. Reaching home he found, to his dismay, that she had not yet arrived. She must of course have been locked up in the cave, so back he sped and before long was using the magic sentence to obtain access. But alas! the talisman had failed, and poor Chang fell into an agony of apprehension as he reflected that his grandmother would either be starved to death or killed by the enraged genie. While in this perplexity the genie appeared and asked him what was amiss. Chang frankly told him the truth, and implored him to open the door. This the genie refused to do, but told him that his grandmother’s disappearance was a matter of fate. The cave demanded a victim. Had it been a male, every succeeding generation of his family would have seen one of its members arrive at princely rank. In the case of a woman her descendants would in a similar way possess power over demons. Somewhat comforted to know that he was not exactly responsible for his grandmother’s death, Chang returned home and in process of time married. His first son duly became Chang tien shih 張天師 (Chang, the Master of Heaven), who about A.D. 25 was the first holder of an office which has existed uninterruptedly to the present day. So says one popular legend. An equally credible (or incredible) version of the birth of this prodigy, however, says nothing of the magic cave, but refers the event to a visit made to his mother by the spirit of the Polar star, who gave her a fragrant herb called Hêng wei which caused her to become enceinte.4 Be the authentic version what it may, however, the fact remains that Ali Baba’s cave has its mythic representative in China.