Page:Eminent Chinese Of The Ch’ing Period - Hummel - 1943 - Vol. 2.pdf/266

 highest button granted to those who were not officials.

Wu Ch'ung-yüeh had a taste for literature and the fine arts and patronized scholars and literary men. He built at great cost a luxurious garden, styled Wan-sung Yüan 萬松園, to which he often invited poets and artists; and he owned a rich collection of rare books, manuscripts, paintings and calligraphy which he deposited in his library known as Yüeh-ya T'ang 粵雅堂. On the basis of this collection he printed numerous books, and gained distinction as the publisher of four collectanea. In these ventures he merely played the role of financier—the actual editorial duties falling to the scholar whom he patronized. The most significant of the collectanea published under the name of Wu Ch'ung-yüeh was the Yüeh-ya t'ang ts'ung-shu, printed in 30 instalments over a period of some thirty years in the middle of the 19th century—a supplement being printed in 1875 by his son. This collectanea comprises some 200 rare works composed between the T'ang and Ch'ing periods inclusively. The other three collectanea consist of writings by natives of Kwangtung. Their titles are as follows: 嶺南遺書 Ling-nan i-shu, printed in 6 instalments during the years 1831–63, comprising 55 works by Ming and Ch'ing scholars, and 6 by scholars of an earlier period; 粵十三家集 Yüeh shih-san-chia chi, printed in 1840, consisting of the literary collections of thirteen writers of the Sung, Ming and Ch'ing periods; and 楚庭耆舊遺詩 Ch'u-t'ing ch'i-chiu i-shih, 21 + 21 + 34 chüan, printed in the eighteen-forties, comprising a collection of poems written by contemporary authors. Among other books printed by Wu must be mentioned the 輿地紀勝 Yüeh-ti chi-shêng, a geography of China in the Southern Sung period, completed in 1227 by Wang Hsiang-chih (see under )—his preface being dated 1221. It was long regarded as lost and was overlooked even by the compilers of the Ssŭ-k'u ch'üan-shu (see under ). Nevertheless, manuscript copies of a text lacking 32 chüan were preserved by several bibliophiles, and of these Wu obtained two copies: one owned by a fellow-townsman, Ch'ên Ch'i-k'un 陳其錕 ; the other by Yang Wên-sun 楊文蓀, a bibliophile of Hai-ning, Chekiang. On the basis of these texts, Wu printed the Yüeh-ti chi-shêng during the years 1855–60. Neither Wu nor his editor, T'an Ying, seem to have been aware that this work had been printed at the end of the eighteen-forties by the Chü-ying Chai (懼盈齋) Library of the Ts'ên (岑) family at Yangchow. Ts'ên's edition contains a reconstruction, in 10 chüan, of the missing 32 chüan, compiled by Ts'ên Chien-kung 岑建功. It contains also a criticism of the entire text in 52 chüan, written by and his son, —both accomplished scholars of the School of Han Learning (see under  and ).

[ Lo-chih t'ang wên-lüeh 4/18b, 23a; Kuang-chou fu-chih (1879) 129/25b; Nan-hai hsien-chih (1873) 14/48a; Liang Chia-pin, "Negotiations on the Stoppage of Trade at Canton" (in Chinese), National Sun Yat-sen University Monthly, Institute of History and Language, vol. 1, no. 1 (1932); see bibl, under and .]

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 WU-ê-kung-a. See under.

 WU Hsi-ch'i 吴錫麒, 1746–1818, man of letters, was a native of Ch'ien-t'ang (Hangchow). A chin-shih of 1775, he first was appointed a sub-reader in the Hanlin Academy. After having passed through several positions, including that of second-class compiler, he finally became a libationer. In 1796 he served in the Imperial Study as tutor to the imperial great-grandson. He was on particularly good terms with for whom he often wrote colophons, and for whom on one occasion he wrote a plaque. Having asked permission of the authorities to return home to support his parents, he went to Yangchow (1798) where, aside from other duties, he was director of the An-ting 安定 Academy. He then went to Peking and was re-instated in his original position, but he again asked permission to return home to support his parents. Later he once more became director of the An-ting Academy where he assisted in collating the Ch'üan T'ang wên (see under ). He is pictured as a man without personal ambition who enjoyed discussing literary topics with his friends. The publication of his poetry and prose, nevertheless, brought him great fame. Even the emissaries from Korea and the Loochoo Islands, bringing tribute to Peking, vied with each other to buy up as many copies as possible and to take them back to their homes.

Wu's collected works are entitled 有正味齋集 Yu-chêng-wei chai chi, 52 chüan. The preface is dated 1808. This collection is divided into 868