The Legend of Butterfly Spring in Dali, Yunnan

The Legend of Butterfly Spring

The Butterfly Spring was originally known as Bottomless Pool, where a woodcutter, Mr. Zhang, and an orphaned girl, Ms. Wen, lived. One day, the father and daughter went up the mountain to cut firewood, and suddenly saw a wounded deer running and falling down beside Wen Gu, yow yow wailing. Shortly after, a hunter with a bow and arrow came after him. Wen Gu picked up the poor deer and begged the hunter not to kill the deer. The hunter's name was Xiarang, and he accepted Wen Gu's plea and gave her the deer, taking the powder from his medicine bag and applying it to the deer's wound. Shizuku was very grateful to Kasuro. After that, they often met by the bottomless pool. She also gave Xiarang her "Hundred Butterfly Leaves" embroidered with a hundred butterflies as a token of her love.

Who knows, King Yu of Dali City had been coveting the beautiful Wen Gu for a long time. After his proposal was rejected, he snatched Wen Gu away on the pretext that he wanted her to go to King Yu's residence to embroider a hundred butterflies. When Mr. Zhang came to her rescue, he was beaten to death by King Yu's soldiers. Witnessing this tragic scene, the humane deer immediately dashed up the mountain to find Xia Lang, biting his clothes and dragging him down the mountain. Xia Lang came to the bottomless pool and saw Wen Gu's last letter. He buried the old man first, then he put on his bow and arrows, rode his horse and raised his sword and rushed to King Yu's mansion. Taking advantage of the darkness of the night, Xia Lang rescued Wen Gu. When King Yu found out, he hurriedly sent his chief officer to lead his troops to chase after him. Xia Lang opened his bow and arrow, an arrow shot down a pursuer ...... helpless pursuers are many, Xia Lang had to protect Wen Gu and battle and retreat, and finally retreated to the bottomless pool. At this time, Xia Lang's arrows finished, the knife also cut off. When there was no way to escape, Xia Lang and Wen Koo jumped into the bottomless pool, and the deer also jumped into the pool for the martyrdom of their master. But the two of them jumped into the pool when the sunny sky suddenly changed to lightning and thunder, and a torrential downpour of rain scared away King Yu's chief ministers and soldiers.

After the rain cleared, the birds and the flowers began to sing, and a pair of big colorful butterflies flew up in the pool, followed by another pair of colorful butterflies. Legend has it that they are the butterflies of Xia Lang, Wen Gu, Xiao Deer and the "hundred butterfly leaves" that Xia Lang carries with him.

In honor of Xia Lang, Wen Gu, people not only the bottomless pool renamed Butterfly Spring, but also in the two of them jumped into the pool of martyrdom on the 15th day of the fourth month of the lunar calendar, to the spring side of the memorial, in memory of this pair of strong and unyielding lovers. Pair of lovers, but also in this day to the spring party, singing tune, dance, pouring out the feelings of love. Colorful butterflies in all directions, but also on this day have to fly to the spring to meet, so into one of the strange landscape of Dali.

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Butterfly Spring, in Dali City, Yunnan Province, 1 kilometer north of Zhoucheng, west of the Yunnan-Tibet Highway, Cangshan Mountain, the first peak of the nineteen peaks of the cloud under the peak. Into the park, a gentle walk uphill, line about half a mile, that is a shade of green trees, walk through the ancient stone workshop, face to face there is a about 3 meters high marble monument, the monument is prismatic, the front of the right side of the handwritten by Guo Moruo "Butterfly Springs" three words, the left side of the engraved handwriting of Guo Moruo Wing Butterfly Springs Poem; monument to the back of the engraved with the tour of the Butterfly Springs, Dali, Xuhaikan a diary. On the back of the monument, there is a diary of Xu Xiake's visit to Dali Butterfly Spring. Along the forest path zigzagging forward about thirty or forty meters, only to see the ancient trees, shade, a clear spring embedded in the middle of it, the bottom of the pavement of green stone, about two or three zhang wide, with a marble railing, there are often people throw the metal coins in the pool, to see it slowly spinning down or floating in the water, which is the "Pearl Spring". Local legend says: "Drink some butterfly spring water, enough to get you drunk for ten thousand years."

The wonders of the Butterfly Spring have attracted countless magnificent poems. In the Ming Dynasty, Yang Shen's poem "Butterfly Playing with Pearl Flowers" reads: "The Lacquer Garden's fairy dream has come to the image palace, and the vivid light smoke curls up in the wind. Nine curved golden needles could not be pierced, Yao Hua light broken in the moonlight." Sha Shen, a poet of the Qing Dynasty, praised the Butterfly Spring in his poem "Butterfly Spring in Shangguan", saying, "There are thousands of butterflies in the misty Butterfly Tree, and their tails are like tassels brushing against Cuitian. Butterfly Spring who will not believe, the shadow streamers cover the butterfly solemn."

In 1962, Guo Moruo came to visit, listening to the local comrades introduced the love legend of A Ji, A Xia, improvised a 76-line poem "Butterfly Spring", beginning with: "Butterfly Spring head of the Butterfly Tree, the butterflies flew ten million counts. Butterflies come by the millions. The head and tail are connected by several meters, and the inflorescences are suspected to be hanging down from the tree. They are colorful like flowers, fluttering in the wind for days and nights. Butterflies will be much curious tourists, with objects hit the scattered still gathered." After recounting the tragedy of the love of this pair of young people, wrote: "the four sides of the butterflies all fly, the first and last together as a thousand dances, from now on every year the butterfly will be open, April Gan five years once. This is a strange scene in the world alone, strange this matter can be a fugue. I'm sorry that it's too late, but I hope I won't miss it again in the spring of next year."

The cause of the Butterfly Spring, and the environmental conditions of this area. The spring west of the Cangshan Mountain, east of the Erhai. Cangshan towering, towering as a screen, mountain top snow, through the summer crystal. The cloud gathering produces rain, abundant precipitation, plants per item. The Erhai Sea covers a total area of about 240 square kilometers, beautiful scenery, flowers and branches constantly, four seasons like spring. Cangshan Mountain and Erhai not only provide human beings with "silver Cangyu Er" ornamental beauty, but also constitute a natural environment for butterflies and other insects to reproduce and grow in large numbers.

The Butterfly Spring is located in the north-east disk of the Erhai Fracture, which has formed numerous caves and caverns under the dissolving action of underground water, and is recharged by atmospheric precipitation and surface water, forming a karst aquifer. Groundwater in this aquifer flows along the dissolution pipe, and is intercepted by the fine-grained loose material in the contact part with the washed and flooded material, and forms the Butterfly Spring after overflowing to the surface. The spring gushes water at 18.77 liters/second up and down. The mineralization of the spring water is less than 0.5 g / liter, calcium bicarbonate, magnesium-type water, odorless, tasteless, water quality light beauty. The water is odorless and tasteless, and the water is light and beautiful. With the beautiful spring water and the acacia tree near the spring, the butterflies are naturally happy to visit. From this, we can see that the butterfly will not be caused by the shipwreck of the lovers, but by the special environmental conditions there.

It is regrettable that in recent years, people have been difficult to see the beautiful butterfly event, sometimes, although the butterflies gathered, but the number has been less. According to local elders rumors: butterfly springs, the original dense leaves, a canopy, white flowers, hair fragrance of the Zipeng, flower branches wrapped around the trunk of the horizontal sloping spring, butterflies along the sagging branches of the flowers in a string. Nowadays, the butterflies have been removed, and the tree trunks on the surface of the spring are drying up. In addition, the natural environment around the spring has been damaged, and a lot of pesticides have been used in the fields, injuring a lot of butterflies by mistake, so the spectacle of the butterflies with hooks and feet hanging on the surface of the spring has long been disappeared. It seems that only by seriously studying the laws of butterfly growth, strengthening the protection of the natural environment, and striving to maintain the ecological balance, can the fascinating butterfly event be restored and flourish.