苏轼·《石钟山记》英译

The <?xml:namespace prefix = st1 ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:smarttags" />Stone Bell Mountain

Su Shi <?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" />

It is said in Shui Jing (1) that at the mouth of the Pengli (2) Lake is the Stone Bell Mountain. Geologist Li Yuan (3) assumed that there was a deep pond at the base of the mountain, and that the hollow chime of a big bell was created by the waves beating against the mountain rocks in a gentle wind. However, there are those who view his theory with disbelief. If a bell or a stone qing (4), let alone a solid rock, is put into the water, even the watery bombardment of a tempest cannot induce it to ring.

Then Li Bo (5) in the Tang dynasty, following Li Yuan's footsteps, came to the site and found two "rocks" resting on the bank of the pond. When struck with a drumstick, the southern rock sounded dull and indistinct whereas the northern one rang with crystalline clarity. When the striking stopped, the sound lingered for quite a while. Li Bo thought that he had discovered the mountain's secret. But I doubt the truth of his discovery. There are rocks everywhere that make random sounds when struck by man. Why is that mountain so special as to warrant the name "Stone Bell"?

On the ninth day of June in the seventh year of Yuanfeng (6), I went by boat from Qi'an to Linru (7). It happened that, Su Mei, my eldest son, was going to take up the office of magistrate in Dexing County of Raozhou (8). I accompanied him to Hukou (9) so that we had the opportunity of seeing the so-called "Stone Bell". A monk of a Buddhist temple sent a boy to find some rocks in a jumble of mountain rocks and strike them with an ax. They rang with a hollow sound, and I smiled with skepticism. At nightfall, my son and I rowed a boat to the foot of the precipice in the bright moonlight. Its stone face reared up before us, rising a thousand feet above the pond, like some predatory beast or monstrous behemoth poised to engulf us. A gu, a kind of fierce bird, was startled from reset by our voice, flew up with a squawking sound towards the sky. Then a sound like the coughing and laughing of an old man echoed through the misty valley. "It is the cry of a water bird," the boatman said. A chill of fear crept over me. Just as I began to give leave for our return, a thundering chorus of unseen bells, arose from the water and continued without cease. The boatman was terrified. I looked around and saw that the rocks at the foot of the precipice were full of crevices and cavities of unknown depths, from which this sound issued when the scourging waves surged and reverberated among them. On the way back, our boat followed a winding course nestled between two mountains. Before we entered the harbor, I spotted a huge rock standing in midstream. It is so big that about one hundred persons could sit on it. It was hollow and had many cavities. Wind and water swept in and out of them, making pounding sounds like the striking of the bell and beating of the drum, in almost deliberate counterpart to the previous sound. I said to my son with a smile, "Do you know that the first sound is called 'Wushe', after the sound produced by a bell cast during the reign of Emperor Jing of the Zhou Dynasty (10), and that the second sound resembled that produced by the 'Music Bell' given to Wei Jiang by a prince of the Kingdom of Jin (11)? It seems that the ancient people did not deceive us by calling this mountain the Stone Bell Mountain."

Is it right for one to assume that something exists without seeing or hearing it on one's own? Li Yuan saw and heard about the same things as I did, but he did not write a detailed description of the scene. The scholar bureaucrats did not discover the true cause of the sound because they were loath to visit the precipice by boat at night. And although the fishermen and the boatmen knew the reason, they could not write it down. This explains why most people were denied the knowledge of why the mountain was so named. They were pleased to explain the phenomenon by striking the rocks with an ax. I recorded this experience to show that I felt sorry for the sketchiness of Li Yuan's description and could not help laughing at Li Bo's inept efforts.

1) Shui Jing is a book of geology, written in either the Han Dynasty or the Jin Dynasty.
2) The Pengli Lake is the Poyang Lake, located in the northern part of Jiangxi Province.
3) Li Yuan is another name for Li Daoyuan,a geologist in the Northern Wei Dynasty. He was said to be the one who made detailed notes on Shui Jing.
4) Qing is said to be a percussion instrument.
5) Li Bo was a scholar of the Tang Dynasty, not to be mistaken for Li Bai, the famous poet of the Tang Dynasty.
6) Yuanfeng was the title of Emperor Shengzong's reign of the Song Dynasty. The seventh year of Yuanfeng was 1084.
7) Qi'an is a county in Hubei Province. Linru, a county in Henan Province.
8) Dexing County is in today's Jiangxi Province where the Stone Bell Mountain is located.
9) Hukou was today's Hukou County, Jiangxi Province where the Stone Bell Mountain is located.
10) The date of the reign of Emperor Jing of the Zhou Dynasty was 544 B.C-520 B.C. In the twenty-fourth years of his reign he had the bell "Wushe" cast.
11)Wei Jiang was an official of the Kingdom of Jin during the reign of the Spring and Autumn Period. It is recorded in history that the ruler of the Kingdom of Zheng gave two sets of brilliant bells to the prince of Jin, who sent one set to Wei Jiang.

（罗经国 译）