"The White Monkey."

Author Unknown

Summary: The White Monkey was an ugly chieftain. He and his people, who lived in a desolate land, took their wives by kidnapping. And what they took, they would never give back. General Ouyang’s young, pretty wife was taken by the White Monkey.

After many efforts to recover his wife, Gen. Ouyang and his band of soldiers came to the White Monkey’s land. The White Monkey treated the general and his men as honored guests. But Gen. Ouyang’s wife broke free and ran to the general. The White Monkey challenged the general to a lover’s contest—an archery contest. The General lost. The White Monkey said if Gen. Ouyang’s wife did not bear him a baby by the next year, he would give her back to the general.

When the general came to claim her, she had borne the White Monkey a son and she now refused to return with the general. “Thereafter [General Ouyang] was a broken man.”

Famous Chinese Short Stories. Re-told by Lin Yutang. New York: The Pocket Library. 1954.