Soulstealers: The Chinese Sorcery Scare of 1768 (27 page)

Properly suspicious, the interrogators brought all the principals into court and examined them. One problem was that the hair in the
red silk bag had two strands of white in it-hardly to be expected
from a woman in her late twenties. However, Ch'en was brought into
court, and kneeling before the governor's bench was ordered to
unbind her hair. Indeed, it matched exactly. Further, she maintained
under insistent questioning that Chueh-hsing had used no potion on
her, and that she had yielded to him out of affection.

The official judgment was that none of the suspects (including
those who had posted the placards) had anything to do with the
queue-cutting sorcerers. (With such compromising evidence in hand,
how easy it would have been to convict to please the zealous monarch!) Monk Chueh-hsing, under a criminal substatute on liaisons
between monks and married women, was to be beaten and then exiled
for three years (his crime was aggravated by his having falsely implicated another monk for supposedly teaching him to make the magic
potion-even though the false statements were uttered under torture). Wife Chen was sentenced to exposure in the cangue for a
month but might redeem the sentence with a money payment. Innkeeper Liu was permitted to divorce or keep her, as he wished. All
monk Chueh-hsing's traveling companions were released.

By October 2, the frustrated Hungli had reached his own conclusions: soulstealers were scattered everywhere, but their main gang
was moving from province to province. Having come north from
Kiangnan into Shantung, Chihli, and Jehol, they now were plainly
moving westward into Shansi, Shensi, and the middle Yangtze area.
Their traces faded in one province, only to emerge in another.
Furthermore, it was now evident that the plotters were trying to
incite tonsure violations by scaring the common people into cutting
off their own queues. Hungli was certain of this because queueprophylaxis had virtually stopped, now that it was officially forbidden. "This shows that the belief [in queue-prophylaxis] was
unfounded" (that is, had no preexisting basis in popular lore), and that
it therefore could only have resulted from traitors' "concocting evil
doctrines to delude ignorant commoners." The culprits caught so far
were all small fry. This meant that there must be others behind them,
men who harbored seditious designs, who sought "to injure the
Dynasty's established institutions" (that is, the tonsure decree) to
provoke rebellion. 18

Three days later he amplified these somber thoughts in an unusual
court letter to all province chiefs, but with a new perspective: the plotters might be hoping to touch off a major uprising by stirring up
popular anger against the bureaucracy. In response to harsh measures by local officials, "the people will surely become fearful," which
may result in "touching off uprisings." The plotters would then be
able to "stand on the sidelines" and yet attain their seditious purposes.
Clearly the campaign could not be stopped in its tracks merely out
of fear of the people's anger. But province chiefs must now use special
care. Being "neither lax nor oppressive," they must ensure that the
innocent are not injured while the malefactors are hunted down.
Even the monks and beggars that are swept up in provincial dragnets
must be treated gingerly. When a culprit is first brought to court, he
must be questioned "impartially." Inquisitors must neither "seek by
punishment" (that is, fish for incriminating admissions by applying
torture) nor keep culprits locked up unreasonably. Of course, if there
are "suspicious circumstances," then the full force of inquisition may
be applied. If not, the culprits are to be released. Here Hungli
appears to be reaching for a principle of "probable cause," a twostage process in which neither torture nor lengthy imprisonment can
be used in the early phases of investigation. Yet due care was not to
mean relaxing the intense hunt for the main plotters, who must still
be in Kiangnan. "If they are not treacherous monks, then they must
be disheartened scholars. Their intentions are extremely dangerous,
and their movements are extremely secretive." They must be hunted
relentlessly, not only in the traditional bandit lairs around Lake T'ai,
but also throughout the countryside in "secluded villages and derelict
temples." How such an invasive manhunt was to be reconciled with
proper concern for the innocent was a question that Hungli left to
the practical sense of his provincial officials."'

An Obdurate Case

How difficult provincial officials found these contradictory instructions was soon to be seen in the case of master-sorcerer Ming-yuan.
According to his apprentice, Han P'ei-hs:ien, whose confession we
heard in Chapter 4, this sinister monk was supposed to be awaiting
his queue-laden agents at the Three Teachings Temple in Hai-chou,
but he had so far eluded the authorities. In Chekiang, Governor
Yungde's agents had combed through monasteries and temples and
had turned up a monk with the dharma-name Ming-yuan, who had
been quickly shipped to the summer capital for questioning. But it was not until October g that the real Ming-yuan seemed finally to be
in hand, captured in Anhwei Province, near the city of Hofei. A
monk named Yu-ming, from a small local temple, who bore the
"style" or second dharma-name of Ming-yuan, had been arrested for
queue-clipping. Among his belongings had been found a small
wooden doll, a charm written on cloth, two suspicious wooden seals,
a curious sign, and a pair of scissors; but no queues.

Ming-yuan told his inquisitors that he supplemented his begging
income by practicing medicine (just as Han had indicated in his
confession). On July 26, he was out on the road, with his belongings
loaded on a donkey, some fifty miles northwest of his home temple.
At a village near Shou-chou, he stopped to drink from a well. Because
there was no bucket to dip the water, he approached a house where
three children were playing in the dooryard. They ignored him when
he asked to borrow a bucket, so he just patted a boy on the head and
walked on, still thirsty. He had gone less than a mile when he was
overtaken by several villagers, who accused him of clipping the boy's
queue.

I couldn't argue them out of it. They grabbed me and searched my kit,
but there was no queue. Then they took me to Liu Ming-ch'i's house
and tied me up and beat me and stabbed me with an awl. They couldn't
find a queue-end, but they demanded that I guarantee the father that
his child wouldn't die. Because I had been beaten and stabbed, I had
to draw him a charm for protection. He also wanted a written guarantee.
Because I was desperate to save myself, I wrote one that said there'd
been no queue-clipping.

The injured monk was let go and allowed to depart for his home
temple. But government runners heard what had happened and went
to investigate. Liu Ming-ch'i showed them the charms and guarantee,
whereupon they alerted Ho-fei authorities, who tracked down Mingyuan and arrested him.

In preliminary questioning, the culprit tried to explain the suspicious paraphernalia from his baggage (which, to officials, were plain
evidence of "evil arts"). The two wooden seals were for "increasing
the respect" of prospective donors. One read "Monk Aided by the
Five Kings" (wu wang-yeh t'i seng) ;20 the other, "Yin-kung Department
Assistant Magistrate." Ming-yuan explained that his grandfather had
held a post as brigade-general, which meant that the monk was falsely
claiming an official title for himself. What about the suspicious
wording on the sign (evidently a medical practitioner's placard for setting up by the roadside), which read, "Ming-yuan, from the Capital, by Grace of the Censorate"? This, he replied, was merely advertising to make prospective patients believe that his remedies had been
used by high officials. The cloth charm was for "warding off sorcery"
(chen-hsieh-of the sort discussed in Chapter 5). Here was just the
sort of humbug one would expect to find in the kit of a traveling
medicine man. To Ming-yuan's inquisitors, however, it was sinister
stuff: he was "undoubtedly a major criminal," and the truth would
now have to be extracted by torture.

Ming-yuan proved an obdurate case. He would say nothing under
torture except that he had clipped no queues. The inquisitors, who
included Governor Feng himself along with subordinate prefects and
magistrates, did their best to encourage frank testimony. Whatever
it was that they did, within a week it had killed him. When Hungli
was told, he asked angrily if Ming-yuan had been tortured to death
or somehow allowed to take his own life. Not at all, insisted Governor
Feng. The prisoner had died of "a cold contracted in prison." The
inquisitors had surely not tortured him to death, as examinations by
the coroner and physician would attest. Alit they did was to have the
criminal kneel on chains for three days, during which time no chiakun was used on his legs, and the finger-press was applied only once.
Then he was questioned nonstop by relays of officials for two more
days and nights. "Whenever he closed his eyes, they shouted at him"
to prevent his dozing. Fearing he might be somewhat "fatigued" by
the ordeal, Feng ordered him kept in prison for a few days before
interrogation was resumed. Before he could be questioned again,
however, the jailers reported his death. (Vermilion: "Noted." )2'

That was the shape of the case as it reached its final stage: a review
of all the evidence by the Grand Council itself. The grand councillors
had pushed the prosecution loyally for three months as instruments
of the implacable Hungli. There is no documentary evidence, so far,
to suggest that they had been anything but fully committed to the
antisorcery campaign. Yet as they began their final task, we have to
wonder what they must have thought of the record as it appeared
by mid-October: confused by perjury, cluttered with trivia, and
strewn with dead prisoners.

As the chill of Manchurian autumn seeped into the summer capital,
the court was preparing for its stately progress back to Peking. Duke
Fuheng, however, was still vexed by soulstealing suspects who had
been brought to him, and whose agonized testimony he strove to
untangle. It will be recalled that Hungli had ordered the whole group
of Shantung queue-clippers sent north, some to Peking and others
all the way to Ch'eng-te, for interrogation by the grand councillors,
once it became apparent that their confessions had led Kiangsu officials on it wild goose chase. Other criminals entrusted to the Grand
Council were the singing beggar Chang Ssu and his son, and all the
culprits from the spring soulstealing cases: mason Wu and the Hsiaoshan monks, along with the Soochow beggar Ch'en Han-ju and the
monk Ching-chuang and his companions who had been so nearly
lynched at Hsu-k'ou-chen. Some of the criminals had already arrived
in the summer capital. Others remained at Peking, where they were
interrogated by those grand councillors who had stayed behind at
the Forbidden City. Now the empire's most powerful ministers would
clear up this affair, which had so mightily troubled the court for the
past three months. As they began their job, however, the inquisitors
were aware of some recent unpleasantness that had clouded the
already ►nurky case.

Maledictions among the People

Sedition in the Family

Early in September a man of the lower elite (a county student, shengyuan) journeyed the six hundred miles from his Shansi home to
Peking on a mission of state. He carried a sample of "seditious writings" to turn over to the Censorate, along with a report that these
had been composed by his father's younger brother. Although the
record does not reveal their content, these writings were hostile
enough to infuriate Hungli when the Censorate duly brought them
to his attention. Deputies from the Grand Council rushed to Shansi
to join Governor Surde in his investigation. A delegation of silkgowned dignitaries searched the uncle's house but found "no traces
of seditious writing." Searching the homes of confederates named in
the accusation proved just as futile. The uncle protested that he was
unjustly accused, and even the accuser's father said he knew nothing
of the charges and believed them to be groundless. The county
student, Chang T'ing jui, was now questioned. The investigators'
report:

At first his testimony was evasive, but after we had gone over it repeatedly and checked its accuracy, he bowed his head and wept bitterly. He
confessed that his uncle, Chang Ju-t'iao, and his aunt had ruled like
tyrants over the joint family estate. His own father and mother were
weak and had suffered their oppression for many years. Student Chang
had wanted to report the true situation to local officials, but feared that
he would not only fail to receive a fair hearing but would, on the
contrary, suffer his uncle's retribution. He brooded about it day and
night, weeping and losing his desire to live. He therefore composed
some seditious writings himself and went to the capital to present his
accusation. All this he now regrets extremely.

The investigators could hardly believe that, for such a trifling
cause as a family property dispute, student Chang would have fabricated a treason charge, or would have implicated so many people.
Further, the uncle might indeed have been engaged in illegal activities, so the investigation would continue. But Hungli sensed what
had happened. He noted in vermilion: "It probably is indeed
a false accusation." The Code's "most extreme penalties" were to be
applied.'

A Persistent Creditor

A Chihli man, Kuan Te-lin, was accused of queue-clipping by Chang
Erh, who had found a clipped queue in Kuan's possessions. The case
was quickly taken out of provincial hands and brought before the
grand councillors at the summer capital. Their Excellencies must
have used persuasive methods on all parties, for they reported to
Hungli on September 20 that the matter was not as it seemed. Kuan
Te-lin was originally a Chinese bannerman from a garrison near
Peking. In line with the government policy of reducing the number
of Han bannermen, however, he had changed his registration to that
of an ordinary subject.2 In the process he moved to Ch'ang-p'ing,
some twenty miles northwest of Peking. From Chang Erh, a villager,
he rented land to farm. Later he moved back to the Peking area,
where he lived in his own family cemetery and went into business as
a peddler. He had loaned his former landlord, Chang Erh, the sum
of 6,ooo cash, and repeatedly asked that he be repaid. When landlord
Chang claimed that he did not have the money, Kuan simply moved
into Chang's house. He abused Chang relentlessly and even
demanded his wife for sexual services. Offended and furious, Chang
stormed out of the house and went over to the home of a neighbor,
Liu San, to buy some warm wine. There he spied some discarded
hair, recently trimmed from the head of Liu's daughter-in-law. This
he took and bound into three queues. Later, when Kuan was out, he
stuffed the false queues along with his wife's scissors into Kuan's sack,
then hurried to the local constabulary post to accuse his creditor of
queue-clipping)