冥報記 3.14

3.14

According to the custom of the market neighborhoods of Chang'an, every year after New Year's Day, people would take turns preparing food and drink to invite one another, calling it 'passing the seats.' Zhao Shici, a brush-maker of the Eastern Market, was due to host it. A guest arrived early and went to the privy, where he saw on the mill-stand a young girl of about thirteen or fourteen, wearing a green skirt and a white blouse, with a hemp rope tied around her neck, bound to the post of the mill-stand. Weeping, she said to the guest, 'I am the host's daughter. Formerly, before I died, I stole one hundred coins from my parents, intending to buy rouge and powder, but I died before I could do so. That money is now inside the kitchen wall in the northwest corner. Although I never used it, having already stolen it, I was found guilty on this account, and now I must repay it with my life.' Having finished speaking, she transformed into a blue-black sheep with a white neck. Frightened, the guest informed the host. The host asked about her appearance, and it was indeed his young daughter, who had been dead for two years. He sent someone to the kitchen wall and retrieved the coins, which looked as though they had been kept there for a long time. Thereupon he sent the sheep to a Buddhist monastery, and his entire household ceased eating meat (related by Lu Changli).