• The heart-breaking news overhelmed Meng, and she fell unconscious on the ground.

    Upon regaining consciousness, she started crying so bitterly that the sky, the earth, the sun, and the moon darkened.

    For along time, She cried, and suddenly a thunderous noise broke out and shook the earth. One scetion of the Great Wall collapsed unearthing heaps of bones.

    Meng bit her fingers and let blood drop on the bones. She prayed quietly, saying if her blood oozed into the bones, those bones were her husband's, if not, these bones were of others.

    At last, Meng found her husbnd's bones and corpse. She cried again while holding up in her arms the pile of bones of her dead husbnad.

    At that moment, Emperor Qin passed by. Fascinated by her beauty, the emperor invited her to be his concubine.

    Meng pretended to accept his offer. She required the emperor to do three things for her before they held their wedding ceremony.

    One of the three things was to invite Buddhist monds to chant Buddhism scriptures for her husband while he was buried, the scond was to hold a memorial ceremony forher husband that the emperor and all officials had to participate in, the third was that after the funeral services, Meng would take a three-day sightseeing tour.

    The emperor agreed to her three requests. After the requests were fulfilled, Meng severely scolded the emperor, and then threw herself into the sea.

    There were two big mountains by the name of Taihang and Wangwu,which had a circumstance of 700li and were 10,100feet in height.

    Originally these two mountians were located south of Jizhou and north of Heyang.

    There was an old man who was nearly ninety years old living north of the mountains and his name was Yu Gong,which means foolish od man.Yu Gong's house faced the two mountians.

    The mountains blocked their access,so each time they left their house,they had to walk all the way around the mountains. So one day Yu Gong called his family together to discuss his suggestions.

    The old man said,"I suggest that you and I put our efforts together to level the mountains.

    We can remove obstacles and open a way until it reaches the area in the south of Yu Prefecture and the Han River,what do you think of my suggestion?"

    Everyone discussed the matter and agreed with him.

    His wife had her doubts,"With your limited strength,it is impossible to remove a hill like Kuifu.

    How can you think about moving the Taihang and Wangwu mountains? Besides,where will you place the earth and rocks?"

    "We will carry them to the shores of the Bohai Sea and the places north of Yintu,"said several people.

    So Yu Gong took the lead and his three sons and grandsons who were strong enough to carry heavy rocks and earth followed him to the mountains,where they broke rocks,dug earth and carried them away in baskets to the shores of the Bohai Sea.

    A window by the name of Jing Cheng,one of the old man's neighbors,had a son who was only seven.

    He came running to offer his help due to the long distance between the mountains and the shores,they left during the winter and returned in the summer.

    In the Hequ lived another old man whose name was Zhi sou,which means wise old man.He stopped Yu Gong and said scornfully,"How foolish you are!

    At your old and ailing age,you cannot even pull up a few blades of grass on these mountains, Let alone try to move the earh and rocks to the sea shore!"

    Yu Gong gave a deep sigh and replied, " Your old follish ideas are obstinate,and you are unable to make changes.You are not even as smart as the window and her son.

    After I die,my son will still be alive,my sons will have sons and their grandsons will continue to live and have sons of their own.

    Generation after generation of sons and grandsons there is no end to it. The two mountains won't grow any higher and our hoes will certainly conquer the mountains at last.

    Zhi Sou had nothing to say.

    A god with snakes on his arms heard of what the foolish old man said,and he was afraid that the old man would keep digging,so he reported it to the God of Heaven,Impressed by the old man's determination, the God of Heaven orderd the two sons of Kua Ershi,a god of unusual strength,to carry away these two mountains on their backs and place one mountain in the east of Shou and the other south of the Yong Prefecture.

    From then on ,there were no more maintains between Jizhou Prefecture and places in the south of the Han River. This story occurred during the Qin Dynasty when Emperor Qin unified the country.

    The construction of the Great Wall was under way which required the physical labor of thousands upon thousands of people.

    Local soldiers across the country rounded up as many men as possible to send them to the construction sites where they had to do hard physical labor around the clock.

    The work was exhausting and led to many deaths.

    A scholar named Fan Qiliang in Suzhou hid himself wherever possible in order to escape being caught by local soldiers.

    One day he arrived at a village where he saw a garden. He quietly walked into the garden and stayed there through the night.

    The garden happend to blong to Meng Jiangnv's family, Meng was a beautiful and clever girl.

    The next moring Meng strolled into the garden. She came across Fan as she enjoyed viewing flowers. Soon after that her parents came, and Fan told his story.

    Meng and her parents decided to hide Fan in their home. Meng's parents liked the young scholar and thus arranged Fan to marry their daughter.

    They got married but three days after the wedding ceremony, Local soldiers broke into Meng's house and took Fan away to the construction site at the Great Wall.

    Meng wept day and night, and prayed earnestly, wishing her husband to come back. She waited half a year without a sign of him.

    Late autumn came. The shrilly wind blew, and the weather was getting colder day by day. Meng sewed some winter clothes for her husband to wear.

    Meng left the village and started her thousand-li journey to the construction site where her husband worked.

    Meng experienced much hardship and trouble along the way, but finally arrived at the foot of the Great Wall.

    Workers there immediately recounted how her husbnad had died and was buried inside the newly built wall.
    2013/9/7 0:02:53
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