Sometime during the T'ang dynasty (618--907) there lived a leisured gentleman named Ma Cheng, who liked to wander about the country and climb mountains, no matter how steep or high.

Once when he was in Hunan Province he took the opportunity to visit the Temple of the Tiger-Quelling Zen Master on Mount Heng. He found the temple solemn and orderly, with silver trays of fresh fruit and flowers laid out inside. A sturdy old monk with snowy white eyebrows came up to greet him saying, "It just happens that my assistants are all away at the moment. Could you possibly send your Servant down to the nearby market to buy me some salt and vinegar?" After Ma Cheng sent his servant off, he found that the old monk had disappeared.

Soon a hermit named Ma Chao came to the temple, too. Ma Cheng was cheered at the prospect of company, but Ma Chao told him, "On the way here just now I saw someone get eaten by a tiger." As Ma Chao described the man's clothing, Ma Cheng realized with a shock that the victim was his servant.

Ma Chao went on, "After the tiger finished eating him, it took off its skin, put on a robe, and turned into an old monk." Ma Cheng was terrified.

After a while the old monk reappeared, and Ma Chao whispered, "That's him!" The monk still had traces of blood around his mouth.

That night the two men lodged in the refectory. They shut the door tight and stayed awake, burning a bright candle and peering out through the crack in the door. A furious tiger tried to break in several times. Luckily the door was firmly locked and held fast.

Quaking with fear, the two men ran over to a statue of Pint'oulu, a Buddhist lohan, where they burned incense and beat their heads against the floor. Suddenly the statue spoke:

A man of stripes in unseen water drowns;

A pair of M's the argent metal share.

Should Chin Niu bend his bow a second time,

The passing general will surely die.

The two tried to make sense of it. "The 'man of stripes' must be the tiger," they said, "and the 'unseen water' a well. We're the 'pair of M's' and the 'argent metal' must be silver. But what does the rest mean?"

The next morning, the old monk knocked on the door and invited the men to breakfast. According to their plan, they pretended to see something in the well, called the monk over to look, and pushed him in. He changed back into a tiger, but they threw down stones and killed him.

When they saw the tiger was dead, they took the silver trays and headed back down the mountain. As it grew dark, they came upon a hunter setting up a bow-and-arrow trap by a tree. "It's a long ways down the mountain," the hunter said, "and there's a fierce tiger about. Why don't you hide here with me?"

Trembling, they climbed up the tree with the hunter. They had hardly calmed down a bit when forty or fifty men and women came running up shouting, "Two thieves killed our master this morning. And now someone is plotting to shoot our general!"

The hunter quickly let fly an arrow. When the men asked him why, the hunter replied, "Those people are zombies killed by the tiger. Now they serve him without knowing it." The men asked the hunter his name. When they heard it was Niu Chin, the exclaimed happily, "Niu Chin must be the lohan's 'Chin Niu.' And his 'general' must be the tiger." The hunter reset his bow and waited.

Suddenly the tiger rushed up with a roar. But as soon as its forepaw touched the trap, an arrow pierced its heart. The zombies gathered around the corpse, weeping, and crying, "Now someone's killed our general!"

The three men stared down and shouted, "Stupid creatures! Have you forgotten how this tiger killed you? Instead of thanking us for revenging you, you carry on like a bunch of idiots!"

The zombies fell silent. Finally one of them cried out, "Did we really mistake this tiger for a general?" Then they all began cursing the tiger, after which they thanked the three men and went away.

Ma Cheng and Ma Chao shared the silver with the hunter. Then they each went happily home.

This story is one of the strange tales of the T'ang dynasty recorded in the T'aip'ing Miscellany. Pint'oulu is one of the 18 lohans. "To be a zombie for a tiger" is a Chinese saying broadly used for someone who helps a villain to do evil.