Sea of Ink (2 page)

6
The Manchus retained their organization of the Eight Banners and began stationing garrisons of banner soldiers in key places. They adopted the existing Chinese administrative system without any major changes and did not touch the landowners’ estates. They did not break their rice bowls, as the saying goes, for the Manchus were full of admiration for Chinese culture. And so it happened that scholars moved to the capital in droves to offer their services in administrative posts.

The government in Nanking tried negotiating with the Manchus. They sent an embassy to Peking to
suggest
that the Manchus limit their conquests to the area north of the Great Wall. But the envoys returned with the counter-suggestion that Nanking, too, should recognize the sovereignty of the new rulers. On that condition Nanking could remain as the seat of a vassal state in southern China.

Secretly, neither side was seriously interested in
negotiations
or any sort of compromise. While the envoys were still on their journey back to Nanking, the
Manchus
were preparing their army for the conquest of the south.

When they attacked the city of Yangzhou on the northern bank of the Yangtze, they encountered their first meaningful resistance. General Shi Kefa defended the city heroically against the offensive by superior forces. He held Yangzhou for eight days; on the ninth, the Manchus broke through the gates.

When they saw the soldiers flood in, the men cowered on the ground. Nobody dared take flight. They lowered their heads, bared their necks and waited for the swish of the sword. The young women tried to buy their lives with their bodies and offered themselves up to the
soldiers
. Some hid in rubbish heaps, smeared themselves with muck and sought to disguise themselves. But the soldiers prodded the refuse with spears until the last of them crawled out like startled rats.

The general was taken prisoner. In his situation many would have gone over to the Manchus. But he refused and remained loyal to his former masters.

Shi Kefa was executed in the most grisly way imaginable.

The Chinese general Hong Chengchou was one of those who sided with the enemy. After the fall of Yangzhou he led the Qing armies further south. In the summer of 1645 they stood at the gates of Nanking. The Prince of Fu’s government collapsed under the pressure of this threat. One of his own generals handed the prince over to the Qing forces. They dragged him back to Peking and his fate was sealed. A few months later he was dead.

Some Ming princes were still trying to prolong the rule of their dynasty. Their attempts proved futile, however. The Prince of Lu set himself up as regent in Zhejiang province. But without resources and supplies he was unable to hold out for long.

Another, the Prince of Tang, was named emperor in August 1645. His closest ally was a former pirate, Zheng Zhilong, who had since blossomed into a wealthy businessman and official. As a military leader, however, Zheng was no match for the might of the Manchus. When he finally surrendered, the conquerors were able to cross the mountain passes he had been guarding to Zhejiang and Fujian. Now the Manchus could continue their expansion into new prefectures and provinces unopposed.

The prince escaped to Hunan. Once there he found himself confronted by the last scattered troops of the rebel leader Li. His attempts to put together a powerful army failed. The prince fell into the hands of the Manchus and was executed on the spot.

His younger brother managed to flee to Canton, where he lasted another two months, a shadow of the former ruling power. When the Qing troops, led by a turncoat Chinese general, finally invaded Canton, the shadow vanished too. The sun of the Ming dynasty was extinguished.

7
When power changed hands Zhu’s father died. The Prince of Yiyang had just turned nineteen. At the court he had earned a reputation as a speaker with a sparkling wit; in debate he was indefatigable.

Now he stared tight-lipped at his dead father and said nothing. The same image reappeared in his mind’s eye: the long stem of a lotus flower snapping in the wind and falling into the dirty water of a pond where the white bloom gradually sank.

He did not say anything the following day, either, when his wife addressed him several times. He behaved like this on the third and fourth days, too.

These days became weeks. Zhu had forgotten how to speak.

One day he got up and painted a large symbol on his door:
ya
– dumb.

The news of the master’s death spread amongst
calligraphers
and many came to express their condolences to Zhu. He received them with animated gestures and meaningful looks, but did not exchange a single word with any of them. In conversation he made use of his hands and his entire body. If he was in agreement with somebody he would nod; if not, he shook his head vigorously.

Or he just stared into the distance.

In the evenings he drank liquor with old friends of his father’s. They told him of the turmoil in the country and the atrocities they had seen. Suddenly Zhu got up and started laughing and crying in turn. Later he sang songs.

At least I’m not dead, he thought. But what use is not being dead? If I were a fish I’d simply dive down into the depths. At the moment I’m like a fish out of water.

8
Nothing changed over the following months and years. He began to fast, physically and spiritually. It was as if he had been turned to stone. People would find him half naked, without a shirt, sitting on the floor with his legs apart, utterly still.

When the Manchus invaded Jiangxi province and attacked the city of Nanchang, they occupied the palace. Zhu Da hurriedly separated from his wife and young son and fled to the Fengxin mountains, a few days’ ride to the north-west of the city. There he entered a monastery.

He shaved his head and, as a monk, took the name Chuanqi. In the peace and solitude of the monastery he buried himself in the study of Buddhist teaching.

As the last of the Mings, the Prince of Gui endeavoured to maintain rule in the south. He lived in Guandong, the province to the south of Jiangxi, but soon afterwards, in 1647, he was forced to flee to Guangxi province to the west. Following the twists and turns of the war, he spent the next dozen years drifting around south-west China, in the provinces of Sichuan and Guizhou as well. His warriors attacked wherever they could, without ever winning any ground. Over time they became worn down and once again divisions appeared within the Chinese ranks.

The prince himself was pursued by the Qing armies under the leadership of General Wu. He finally found refuge in Burma, although there they regarded him as a foe rather than a guest and he was held prisoner for several years. Wu maintained pressure on the Burmese until they finally handed over the prince and his family. The general led them to the east, into the remote province of Yunnan, where the Prince of Gui and his son were strangled with a bowstring.

Thus were the forces of the southern Mings wiped out. The prince’s last loyal and devoted general died of grief when he heard of his master’s downfall. Only bitterness and enmity remained.

Jesuits, who had come from distant Europe, worked at the court of the last Ming emperor. Under their influence the mother of the emperor, his wife and his son had converted to Christianity. In 1650 the Polish Jesuit Michał Boym left for Rome with a letter from the emperor addressed to the superior general of the Jesuits and the pope, begging for assistance to save the Ming dynasty.

After a two-year journey, Boym reached Venice. The pope’s reply took three years and the envoy did not return to China until 1659. By now, all offers of
assistance
were too late. Nothing remained of the court and Michał Boym died that same year without having handed over the papal message.

As soon as Qing rule had been consolidated, the Jesuits returned to the court in Peking.

9
While the Qings severed the last few veins of the old dynasty, letting the blood seep away, in the monastery Chuanqi was studying the teachings of peace and quiet, Chuanqi the monk who had once been a prince called Zhu Da.

The old empire was destroyed, but the mountains of Fengxin were still the same. The trees and rivers had not changed, and the cawing of the crows sounded no different from before.

In 1653 Chuanqi was admitted to the small circle of pupils of Abbot Hongmin. Four years later he completed his master’s examination. Now he was qualified to pass on the tenets of Buddhist wisdom to the younger scholars.

His former life as a prince seemed ever more unreal, as if it had been a lengthy preparation for the path he had now chosen.

‘Teach yourself how not to get involved,’ the abbot said. ‘Do not act; rather acquaint yourself with the feeling of wanting to act, but not doing so. Only act when what you are able to do corresponds with what you wish to do.’

The abbot smiled and added, ‘We were all princes once.’

Sometimes Chuanqi would stroll down into town, driven by curiosity to see what had changed. He
wandered
through the streets, gesticulating wildly and creating quite a sensation with his sobbing fits and outbursts of screaming. In the local taverns he drank wine until he fell down senseless.

People thought he was a madman.

Nobody knew, or even suspected, that inside Chuanqi the monk was the Prince of Yiyang from the last
generation
of the Ming dynasty.

The silence in the temple comforted him. He learnt to forget and he felt a powerful sense of calm permeate his whole being.

The pavilion afforded an expansive view across the plain to a distant chain of hills. One day – it was winter and had been snowing – he stood with the master by the balustrade on the terrace, enjoying the fantastic view.

‘Chuanqi,’ the abbot said, ‘you see the faintly curved line of the distant horizon in the snow? Practise
absorbing
this line inside you. Become one with things and flow away with them. This is the basic rule for preserving life.’

In spring, when the snow had melted, Chuanqi appeared before the master and said, ‘That line you talked about: I’ve absorbed it.’

Without moving, Abbot Hongmin gave him a long stare. Then he said, ‘Chuanqi, it is now time to discard your novice’s name. Today I will give you a new one. From now on you will be called Xuege – snow aside. You are now a master of the inner world and ready for the teachings of the outer world.’

10
Abbot Hongmin knew of Xuege’s desire to become a painter, but until then he had strictly forbidden him to touch a paintbrush. On that day in spring 1658, in the fourteenth year of the Qing dynasty, he believed the moment had come to begin the painting lessons.

The master gave Xuege a brush which was as long as his legs and as thick as a young tree trunk. He instructed his pupil to stretch out his arms and hold the brush by its loop so that the tips of the bristles just touched the floor.

In the tea room the master had made a large square with rolls of rice paper. The abbot pointed to a wooden tub in the corner and said, ‘Dip the brush into the bucket and wipe off the ink a few times on the rim. Then go back to your place without delay.’

When the brush was saturated with black ink it was considerably heavier. Xuege had trouble lifting it high enough to wipe it on the edge of the tub. He returned to his place, held the brush with outstretched arms as the master had instructed and watched a black dot appear on the paper, which began expanding rapidly as the ink flowed out.

The master stood behind him, breathing words into Xuege’s ear: ‘Pace out a circle, painting it as you move. Keep going in a circle until the trace of your brush has faded.’

His muscles tensed, Xuege held the brush vertically over the sheet so that the tips of the bristles were just touching the paper, and moved forwards, step by step. After the first circle Hongmin noticed that Xuege’s lips were pressed tightly shut.

‘You should paint, not stop breathing.’

In fact Xuege had great difficulty concentrating on the brush tip and the imaginary midpoint of his circle at the same time. He could not stop and rest because he would waste ink; moreover it was almost harder to hold the brush while standing still.

Xuege went on and the shining black bristles left behind a thin trace on the paper. After another circle his teacher said, ‘You went in a circle but you did not draw one. Do not make any detours. Go on, improve the circle.’

The abbot said no more as Xuege completed his third, fourth and fifth circles. Then he forgot to count. Each step became a torture. He was just blindly following his own track.

The line became ever fatter, for the brush sank lower and lower with Xuege’s vanishing strength. His arms trembled and the brush transferred even the slightest movement onto the paper.

The abbot now sounded dictatorial: ‘Your line is
starting
to shudder, Xuege. Let it go on for as long as there is still ink left. Stand up straight. Listen to what I tell you!’

After another half-turn Xuege’s back started giving way. But all of a sudden he felt the short, sharp stroke of a bamboo cane in his side. He completed the circle. Was it the ninth? Or the tenth? His master’s gaze burnt into his back, but he knew that he would not be able to manage yet another circle.

Then he collapsed on top of the brush. His body fell onto the cluster of bristles, squashing them so that the last remaining ink flowed out and made large dark stains on the paper as well as on his white robe. He looked like a dying man lying in his own blood.

When Xuege glanced up, his face contorted with pain, expecting a second, possibly harder stroke of the bamboo cane, he saw his master’s severe expression.

‘If you ever wish to become a Master of the Great Ink you must learn to hold the brush firmly. Let it go only when no ink is left. Never before.’