The Herd Boy and the Weaving Maiden

The Herd Boy came from a poor family. At twelve he went to work for a farmer, looking after the farmer’s cow. In a few years the cow had grown big and sleek, and her coat gleamed like yellow gold. She must have been a cow belonging to the gods.

One day, while he was grazing her up in the mountains, the cow suddenly turned and spoke to him in a human voice. “Today is the Seventh Day,” she said. “The White Jade Ruler has nine daughters, and today they bathe in the Sea of Heaven. The seventh daughter is lovelier and wiser than anyone can measure. She spins the cloud-silk for the King and Queen of Heaven and watches over all the weaving that girls do on earth, which is why she is called the Weaving Maiden. If you go and carry off her clothes while she is bathing, you can become her husband and win eternal life.”

“But she is up in Heaven,” said the Herd Boy. “How could I ever get there?”

“I will carry you,” the yellow cow replied.

So the Herd Boy climbed onto her back. At once clouds came pouring out from under her hoofs and she rose into the sky. The air whistled past his ears like a gale, and they sped along as fast as lightning. Then, all at once, the cow stood still. “Here we are,” she said.

All around him the Herd Boy saw forests of green chrysoprase and trees of jade. The grass was jasper and the flowers were coral. In the middle of this splendor lay a huge square sea, some five hundred acres wide. Its green waves rose and sank, fish with golden scales swam in it, and countless magic birds flew singing above it. Even from far off the Herd Boy could see the nine maidens in the water. They had all left their clothes lying on the shore.

“Quick, take the red clothes,” said the cow, “and hide in the forest with them. However sweetly she begs, do not give them back until she has promised to be your wife.”

The Herd Boy slid down from the cow, snatched up the red clothes and ran. At that moment the nine maidens saw him and were badly frightened. “Young man, where have you come from, that you dare to take our clothes?” they cried. “Put them back at once!”

The Herd Boy paid no attention and crouched down behind one of the jade trees. Eight of the maidens hurried out of the water and dressed. “Our seventh sister, whom Heaven meant for you, has come to you,” they said. “We will leave the two of you alone.”

The Weaving Maiden stayed crouching in the water. The Herd Boy stood in front of her and laughed. “Promise to be my wife,” he said, “and I will give you your clothes.”

That did not please her at all. “I am a daughter of the Ruler of the Gods,” she said, “and I may not marry without his order. Give my clothes back quickly, or my father will punish you!”

Then the yellow cow spoke up. “Fate has meant the two of you for each other. I will gladly arrange your marriage, and I am sure your father, the Ruler of the Gods, will not object.”

“You are only an ox,” said the Weaving Maiden. “How could you arrange a marriage?”

“Do you see that old willow tree on the shore?” said the cow. “Ask it and see. If the willow speaks, then Heaven wants you to marry.”

So the Weaving Maiden asked the willow, and the willow answered in a human voice:

“On the Seventh Day, it is true,
the Herd Boy comes the Weaver to woo!”

The Weaving Maiden accepted the answer. The Herd Boy laid her clothes down and walked on ahead; she put them on and followed him. And so they became husband and wife.

But after seven days she said goodbye. “The Ruler of Heaven has ordered me to see to my weaving,” she said. “If I stay away too long, I am afraid he will punish me. We must part now, but we will meet again all the same.”

Having said this, she truly left. The Herd Boy ran after her. Just as he was about to catch up, she pulled one of the long pins from her hair and drew a line with it straight across the sky. The line became the Silver River. And so the two of them stand to this day, the river between them, each watching for the other.

Ever since, they have met once a year, on the eve of the Seventh Day. When it comes, all the crows in the human world fly up and make a bridge, and the Weaving Maiden crosses the Silver River on it. The tale explains an imagined absence of crows from the trees on that day by their work on the heavenly bridge. And a light rain often falls on the evening of the Seventh Day. Then the women and old grandmothers tell each other, “Those are the tears the Herd Boy and the Weaving Maiden weep at parting.” In this telling, the festival’s rain is explained through their tears.

West of the Silver River is the Weaving Maiden’s constellation of three stars, and right in front of it are three more stars arranged in a triangle. People say that the Herd Boy once grew angry because the Weaving Maiden did not want to cross the river, and he threw his ox-yoke at her; it landed just in front of her feet. East of the river is the Herd Boy’s constellation of six stars. Beside it lie a great many tiny stars that form a shape pointed at both ends and a little wider in the middle. They say the Weaving Maiden threw her spindle back at the Herd Boy, but she missed, and it fell to one side of him.

Where this story comes from

“The Herd Boy and the Weaving Maiden” is chapter XVI of Richard Wilhelm’s The Chinese Fairy Book, translated by Frederick H. Martens (New York: Frederick A. Stokes, 1921), in the section called “Legends of the Gods.” The book’s frontispiece, a color plate by George W. Hood, shows the crows forming their bridge for the Weaving Maiden.

Wilhelm notes that he retold the story from an oral source. The Herd Boy is a constellation in Aquila and the Weaving Maiden one in Lyra, while the Silver River between them is the Milky Way; the seventh day of the seventh month is the festival of their meeting. He adds that the Ruler of the Heavens has nine daughters in all, and that several of the Weaving Maiden’s sisters turn up elsewhere in the book: the second, for example, is the mother of Yang Oerlang.

Read the original: The Chinese Fairy Book (Project Gutenberg)

Reading guidance: older readers. Includes stolen bathing clothes used to pressure a woman into marriage and a later account of objects thrown at a partner. These acts are coercion and aggression, even when characters call the marriage destined.

Reading the story closely

The cow, the sisters and the willow all speak about what the Weaving Maiden should do before she gets her clothes back. Their agreement is not the same as a choice made without pressure. Later, she draws the river herself when the Herd Boy pursues her; in this version, the barrier is also an act she takes, not merely an obstacle imposed on two willing lovers.

Track who controls each crossing: the cow carries the boy upward, the maiden makes the river, and the crows provide the yearly bridge. Beside each event, record her own words rather than other characters’ claims about her wishes. How does the final account of the thrown yoke and spindle complicate the reunion image?

Talk about it

• How does the yellow cow help the Herd Boy, and why does the Weaving Maiden doubt her?
• Why do you think the Weaving Maiden draws the Silver River across the sky?
• What do people on earth notice each year on the Seventh Day, and how does the story explain it?

Related stories

• Yang Oerlang — the hero whose mother is the Weaving Maiden’s sister
• The Lady of the Moon — another Wilhelm legend written in the night sky
• The Girl with the Horse’s Head or the Silkworm Goddess — the legend behind silk-making