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“On a great river arrows are the best,” said Zhuge Liang.

“Your opinion and mine agree. But at the moment we are short of them. I wish you would undertake to supply about a hundred thousand arrows for the naval fight. As it is for the public service, you will not decline, I hope'“

“Whatever task the Commander-in-Chief lays upon me, I must certainly try to perform,” replied Zhuge Liang. “May I inquire by what date you require the hundred thousand arrows?”

“Could you have them ready in ten days?”

“The enemy will be here very soon; ten days will be too late,” said Zhuge Liang.

“In how many days do you estimate the arrows can be ready?”

“Let me have three days; then you may send for your hundred thousand.”

“No joking, remember!” said Zhou Yu. “There is no joking in war time.”

“Dare I joke with the Commander-in-Chief? Give me a formal military order; and if I have not completed the task in three days, I will take my punishment.”

Zhou Yu, secretly delighted, sent for the secretaries and prepared the commission then and there. Then he drank to the success of the undertaking and said, “I shall have to congratulate you most heartily when this is accomplished.”

“This day is too late to count,” said Zhuge Liang. “On the third from tomorrow morning send five hundred small boats to the river side to convey the arrows.”

They drank a few more cups together, and then Zhuge Liang took his leave.

After he had gone, Lu Su said, “Do you not think there is some deceit about this?”

“Clearly it is not I! It is he who has signed his own death warrant,” said Zhou Yu. “Without being pressed in the least, he asked for a formal order in the face of the whole assembly. Even if he grew a pair of wings, he could not escape. Only I will just order the workers to delay him as much as they can, and not supply him with materials, so that he is sure to fail. And then, when the certain penalty is incurred, who can criticize? You can go and inquire about it all and keep me informed.”

So off went Lu Su to seek Zhuge Liang, who at once reproached him with having blabbed about the former business.

Zhuge Liang said, “He wants to hurt me, as you know, and I did not think you could not keep my secret. And now there is what you saw today and how do you think I can get a hundred thousand arrows made in three days? You will simply have to rescue me.”

“You brought the misfortune on yourself, and how can I rescue you?” said Lu Su.

“I look to you for the loan of twenty vessels, manned each by thirty people. I want blue cotton screens and bundles of straw lashed to the sides of the boats. I have good use for them. On the third day, I have undertaken to deliver the fixed number of arrows. But on no account must you let Zhou Yu know, or my scheme will be wrecked.”

Lu Su consented and this time he kept his word. He went to report to his chief as usual, but he said nothing about the boats. He only said, “Zhuge Liang is not using bamboo or feathers or glue or varnish, but has some other way of getting arrows.”

“Let us await the three days' limit,” said Zhou Yu, puzzled though confident.

On his side Lu Su quietly prepared a score of light swift boats, each with its crew and the blue screens and bundles of grass complete and, when these were ready, he placed them at Zhuge Liang's disposal.

Zhuge Liang did nothing on the first day, nor on the second. On the third day at the middle of the fourth watch, Zhuge Liang sent a private message asking Lu Su to come to his boat.

“Why have you sent for me, Sir?” asked Lu Su.

“I want you to go with me to get those arrows.”

“Whither are you going?”

“Do not ask; you will see.”

Then the twenty boats were fastened together by long ropes and moved over to the north bank. The night proved very foggy and the mist was very dense along the river, so that one person could scarcely see another. In spite of the fog, Zhuge Liang urged the boats forward as if into the vast fairy kingdom.

There is a poem on these river fogs:

Mighty indeed is the Great River!

Rising far in the west, in the Omei and Min Mountains,

Plowing its way through Wu, east flowing, resistless,

Swelled by its nine tributary streams, rolling down from the far north,

Aided and helped by a hundred rivulets swirling and foaming,

Ocean receives it at last welcoming, joyful, its waters.

Therein abide sea nymphs and water gods,

Enormous whales a thousand fathoms long,

Nine-headed monstrous beasts, reptiles and octopi,

Demons and uncouth creatures wondrous strange.