To such beauty the Chinese are peculiarly sensitive. All the way up, the rocks are carved with inscriptions recording the charm and the sanctity of the place. Some of them were written by emperors; many, especially, by Chien Lung, the great patron of art in the eighteenth century. They are models, one is told, of calligraphy as well as of literary composition. Indeed, according to Chinese standards, they could not be the one without the other. The very names of the favorite spots are poems in themselves. One is “the pavilion of the phoenix”; another “the fountain of the white cranes.” A rock is called “the tower of the quickening spirit”; the gate on the summit is “the portal of the clouds.” More prosaic, but not less charming, is an inscription on a rock in the plain, “the place of the three smiles,” because there some mandarins, meeting to drink and converse, told three peculiarly funny stories. Is not that delightful? It seems so to me. And so peculiarly Chinese!
中国人更宜于欣赏此类美景。沿山路而上，岩石上镌刻着文字，它们记载的是泰山的魅力与神圣。这其中有些出自帝王之手，十八世纪伟大的艺术赞助人乾隆皇帝便题字不少。到此的游人被告知，那些文字既是书法艺术之经典，又是文学创作之范例。实际上，据中国标准来看，书法艺术与文学创作彼此依存，浑然一体。最受游客青睐的景点，其名字本身就充满诗意。有亭曰“凤凰亭”、有泉称“白鹤泉”、有塔名“灵岩塔”、有山顶之门叫作“云门”。另有更为朴实却魅力不减的一处景致是块刻着“三笑处”的石头，因为有官员聚集于此饮酒时畅谈了三个极其有趣的故事而得名。很有意思吧？的确，中国人颇具谐趣。
It was dark before we reached the summit. We put up in the temple that crowns it, dedicated to Yü Huang, the “Jade Emperor” of the Taoists; and his image and those of his attendant deities watched our slumbers. But we did not sleep till we had seen the moon rise, a great orange disk, straight from the plain, and swiftly mount till she made the river, five thousand feet below, a silver streak in the dim gray levels.
登峰之时天已暮黑，于是我们就在山顶的寺庙里留宿。这庙是为道教神祇玉皇大帝而建，因此，我们就在玉帝和他身边诸位神明的塑像注视下休息，但直到月亮升起之时我们方才入睡。那是一轮橙色的圆月，从地平线上升起，轻盈地爬上天空，月光从五千英尺的山顶一泄如注，将山底流淌的河流映成了一条银色的带子。
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