DONGJING MENG HUA LU / 卷七
駕幸臨水殿觀爭標錫宴
The race is a drill.
Before the race, puppets, swings and acrobats on floating stages; then four kinds of boat and a towed flagship; then five flag signals that turn racing into formation, with the prize as the last signal.
WATCH FROM THE HALL ↓1. The floating stages.
駕先幸池之臨水殿，錫宴群臣。殿前出水棚，排立儀衛。近殿水中橫列四綵舟，上有諸軍百戲，如大旗、獅豹、掉刀、蠻牌、神鬼、雜劇之類。又列兩船，皆樂部。又有一小船，上結小綵樓，下有三小門，如傀儡棚，正對水中樂船。上參軍色，進致語，樂作，綵棚中門開，出小木偶人。小船子上有一白衣人垂釣，後有小童舉棹划船，遼遶數回，作語，樂作，釣出活小魚一枚。又作樂，小船入棚。繼有木偶築毬舞旋之類，亦各念致語、唱和、樂作而已，謂之「水傀儡」。又有兩畫船，上立鞦韆，船尾百戲人上竿，左右軍院虞候、監教，鼓笛相和。又一人上蹴鞦韆，將平架，筋斗擲身入水，謂之「水鞦韆」。水戲呈畢，百戲樂船並各鳴鑼鼓，動樂舞旗，與水傀儡船分兩壁退去。
The emperor first visits the waterside hall of the pond and bestows a banquet on his ministers. In front of the hall a water platform is put out, on which the guard of honor is drawn up. Near the hall, four colored boats are lined crosswise in the water, carrying the hundred entertainments of the various armies: great banners, lions and leopards, pole-blade drill, Man shields, gods and demons, zaju skits and the like. Two more boats are set out, both carrying the musicians. There is also a small boat with a little colored tower built on it, with three small doors underneath like a puppet booth, directly facing the music boats on the water. On the music boat the canjun performer steps forward and delivers the opening address; music plays, the middle door of the colored booth opens, and small wooden puppets come out. On a little boat is a man in white fishing, and behind him a small boy raises an oar and poles the boat; they circle several times, he speaks lines, music plays, and he hooks out one live little fish. Music again, and the small boat goes back into the booth. Next come wooden puppets playing ball, dancing and turning, each also reciting an address, singing in response and having music played, and no more; this is called “water puppets.” There are also two painted boats with swings set up on them; on the stern, performers of the hundred entertainments climb a pole, while the inspectors of the Left and Right Army Yards and the drill supervisors beat time with drums and flutes answering one another. Then another man mounts the swing and kicks it up, and when it is almost level with the frame he somersaults and throws himself into the water; this is called the “water swing.” When the water plays are finished, the boats of the hundred entertainments and the music boats all sound gongs and drums, strike up music and wave their flags, and withdraw to the two sides, together with the puppet boats.
The first thing launched is a program, not a race. The text lays out the floating stage in fixed rows: four boats of soldiers’ entertainments, two of musicians, one puppet barge, then two swing boats. The puppet scene is narrated like a stage script, with a stock performer giving the opening address, music, a door that opens, a fisherman and a boy, a live fish at the end of the line, and the boat returning behind the doors. The puppets speak, sing and play ball in turn, and the text says this is all they do (而已). The swing act is the only one with a named risk: a somersault into the water from near the level of the frame. The officers who beat time are named by their offices. By the end the water has been cleared by music and flags, and the same signals, flags and gongs, will run the race.
2. The fleet and the flagship.
有小龍船二十隻，上有緋衣軍士各五十餘人，各設旗鼓銅鑼。船頭有一軍校舞旗招引，乃虎翼指揮兵級也。又有虎頭船十隻，上有一錦衣人，執小旗立船頭上。餘皆着青短衣、長頂頭巾，齊舞棹，乃百姓卸在行人也。又有飛魚船二隻，綵畫間金，最為精巧，上有雜彩戲衫五十餘人，間列雜色小旗、緋傘，左右招舞，鳴小鑼、鼓、鐃、鐸之類。又有鰍魚船二隻，止容一人撐划，乃獨木為之也，皆進花石朱勔所進。諸小船競詣奧屋，牽拽大龍船出詣水殿。其小龍船爭先團轉翔舞，迎導於前，其虎頭船以繩牽引龍舟。大龍船約長三四十丈，闊三四丈，頭尾鱗鬣皆雕鏤金飾，楻板皆退光。兩邊列十閤子，充閤分歇泊。中設御座、龍水屏風。楻板到底深數尺，底上密排鐵鑄大銀樣，如卓面大者，壓重，庶不欹側也。上有層樓、臺觀、檻曲，安設御座。龍頭上人舞旗，左右水棚排列六槳，宛若飛騰。至水殿，艤之一邊。
There are twenty small dragon boats, each carrying fifty-odd soldiers in scarlet, each equipped with flags, drums and bronze gongs. At the bow a military officer waves a flag to lead and signal; he is of the enlisted ranks of the Tiger Wing regiment. There are also ten tiger-head boats, each with one man in brocade holding a small flag standing in the bow. All the rest wear short blue jackets and long head-cloths and ply the oars in unison; they are commoners, “xiezai-hang men” (the phrase is obscure). There are also two flying-fish boats, painted in colors with gold in the gaps and the most delicate of all, carrying fifty-odd performers in mixed-color costume, with small flags of various colors and scarlet parasols set among them, beckoning and dancing to left and right, sounding small gongs, drums, cymbals, handbells and the like. There are also two loach boats that hold only one man to pole and paddle, made of a single log; all of them are what Zhu Mian, of the flowers-and-rocks tribute, presented. The small boats race one another to the inner shed and haul the great dragon boat out toward the waterside hall. The small dragon boats vie to be first, wheeling and soaring to lead the way in front; the tiger-head boats draw the dragon boat on ropes. The great dragon boat is about thirty or forty zhang long and three or four zhang wide. Head and tail, scales and mane are all carved and gilded, and the hull planks are all finished in matte lacquer. Along both sides are ranged ten cabins, serving as berths for rest and mooring. The middle holds the imperial seat and a dragon-and-water screen. The hull planking goes down several feet to the bottom, and on the bottom are packed rows of cast-iron “silver ingots,” some as large as a table-top, as ballast, so that she will not list. Above are storied towers, terraces and curved railings, in which the imperial seat is set. On the dragon’s head a man waves a flag, and along both flanks six oars are set out so that she seems to take wing. When she reaches the waterside hall, she is moored along one side of it.
The text counts the fleet before it describes any contest: twenty small dragon boats of fifty-odd soldiers each (over a thousand men by the text’s own numbers), ten tiger-head boats, two flying-fish boats with fifty-odd performers, and two one-man loach boats. It also records who sits where. Soldiers of a named regiment crew the dragon boats, commoners row the tiger-head boats, and a man in brocade stands at each of the tiger-head bows. The loach boats are credited to Zhu Mian, the official associated with the flowers-and-rocks shipments of this reign; the text mentions the tribute only in passing. The flagship is described in dimensions, decoration, ballast and cabin layout. If a zhang is taken at roughly three meters, the stated length is hard to credit as a literal measurement, and the page leaves the figure as transmitted. The ballast detail is the most practical sentence in the unit: cast-iron ingots as large as table-tops so that she does not list.
3. The flag signals and the prize.
水殿前至仙橋，預以紅旗插於水中，標識地分遠近。所謂小龍船，列於水殿前，東西相向，虎頭、飛魚等船布在其後，如兩陣之勢。須臾，水殿前水棚上一軍校以紅旗招之，龍船各鳴鑼鼓出陣，划棹旋轉，共為圓陣，謂之「旋羅」。水殿前又以旗招之，其船分而為二，各圓陣，謂之「海眼」。又以旗招之，兩隊船相交互，謂之「交頭」。又以旗招之，則諸船皆列五殿之東，面對水殿，排成行列。則有小舟，一軍校執一竿，上掛以錦綵銀盌之類，謂之「標竿」，插在近殿水中。又見旗招之，則兩行舟鳴鼓並進。捷者得標，則山呼拜舞。并虎頭船之類各三次爭標而止。其小船復引大龍船入奧屋內矣。
From the front of the waterside hall to the Immortals’ Bridge, red flags have been planted in the water in advance to mark off the distances. The so-called small dragon boats are drawn up in front of the hall, facing each other east and west, with the tiger-head and flying-fish boats and the like deployed behind them, like the posture of two armies. After a moment, on the water platform in front of the hall, an officer beckons with a red flag, and the dragon boats, each sounding gongs and drums, move out of line, ply their oars and wheel to form a single circle, called the “whirling net.” In front of the hall the flag beckons again; the boats split into two, each forming a circle, called the “sea’s eye.” The flag beckons again; the two squadrons cross and interlace, called “head to head.” The flag beckons again, and all the boats line up east of the Five Halls, facing the waterside hall, drawn up in ranks. Then a small boat appears with an officer holding a pole from which hang brocade, silks, silver bowls and the like; this is called the “prize pole,” and it is planted in the water near the hall. When the flag is seen to beckon again, the two lines sound their drums and advance together. The winner takes the prize and salutes with the mountain-cry, bowing and dancing. The tiger-head boats and the rest then each contest the prize three times, and it ends. The small boats then lead the great dragon boat back into the inner shed.
The race is the shortest part of the narration. The text spends its words on stations and signals: red flags marking the distance, two lines that resemble two armies, and an officer on the water platform who beckons five times. The first three signals produce formations (a circle, two circles, an interlacing of the two squadrons), each with its own name. The fourth lines the boats up in ranks facing the hall. Only after that is the prize pole planted, and the fifth signal sets the two lines racing. The whole contest turns on that one flag, and “the winner takes the prize” takes a single clause, followed by the bows and the formal shout. The tiger-head boats and the rest then run three heats each, and a coda returns the great boat to its shed. In this account the pond’s best-known spectacle is mainly a drill under signal, performed for the hall; the text reports no crowd on the banks, although the previous entry has just rented them places.
Three places where the text resists.
The Siku witness reads 充閤分歇泊, with 閤 repeated; modern editions print 充分歇泊. The page keeps the Siku wording and translates it loosely as berths for rest and mooring.
Siku writes 掉刀 here and 木棹刀 in entry 57; one modern edition prints 棹刀 in both. The page keeps the Siku glyph in each place and translates both as a pole-blade.
The phrase is obscure; the text uses it to say that the tiger-head rowers were commoners, not soldiers. It is left in the original and the translation marks it as provisional.
Wooden puppets staged on a small boat fitted with a puppet booth.
A swing on a boat, from which a performer somersaults into the water.
The spoken or sung address that opens a performance.
The first formation: all the dragon boats wheel into a single circle.
The pole hung with brocade and silver bowls, planted in the water near the hall.
The military unit whose enlisted men crew the small dragon boats.
Entry 54 shows the pond as a place of rehearsed order. A banquet in the hall, a floating program, a fleet counted by type, and five flag signals that arrange the boats before a fifth one lets them run. The next entry leaves the water for the Qionglin Garden across the avenue.
捷者得標，則山呼拜舞。The signals are Meng’s. The punctuation is editorial.
The primary text is read from the Siku-family witness (Kanripo KR2k0111, 卷七); punctuation and the standardization of Siku variant glyphs are editorial. The Siku 一軍人校 in the dragon-boat sentence is read as 一軍校, as in the later 一軍校 passages; glyph variants such as 叅→參, 舉掉→舉棹 and 銕→鐵 are standardized silently.