His apprentice stood staring for a long time and then ran after Carpenter Shih and said, “Since I first took up my ax and followed you, Master, I have never seen timber as beautiful as this. There were so many sightseers that the place looked like a fair, but the carpenter didn’t even glance around and went on his way without stopping. The lowest branches were eighty feet from the ground, and a dozen or so of them could have been made into boats. It was broad enough to shelter several thousand oxen and measured a hundred spans around, towering above the hills. Here’s a version of the story, from Burton Watson’s translation of the text:Ĭarpenter Shih went to Ch’i and, when he got to Crooked Shaft, he saw a serrate oak standing by the village shrine.
There’s an old Chinese story – from the writings attributed to the Taoist sage Chuang Tzu – about a master carpenter who was traveling with his apprentice through the countryside when the two happened upon a rather remarkable tree.
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