Page:A history of Chinese literature - Giles.djvu/148

 136 CHINESE LITERATURE

never to rise again. They were buried where they fell, and now in the Middle Kingdom they are dubbed Spirits of Wine.

"Alas, I could not bear that the pure and peaceful domain of Drunk-Land should come to be regarded as a preserve of the ancients. So I went there myself."

The period closes with the name of the Emperor known as Yang Ti, already mentioned in connec- tion with the poet Hsieh Tao-heng. The murderer, first of his elder brother and then of his father, he mounted the throne in A.D. 605, and gave himself up to extravagance and debauchery. The trees in his park were supplied in winter with silken leaves and flowers, and birds were almost exterminated to provide a suffi- cient supply of down for his cushions. After reigning for thirteen years this unlikely patron of literature fell a victim to assassination. Yet in spite of his otherwise disreputable character, Yang Ti prided himself upon his literary attainments. He set one hundred scholars to work editing a collection of classical, medical, and other treatises ; and it was under his reign, in A.D. 606, that the examination for the second or "master of arts" degree was instituted.

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