Page:Eminent Chinese Of The Ch’ing Period - Hummel - 1943 - Vol. 2.pdf/337

 an ch'i-wên (奇聞), 8 chüan of 292 chapters (囘), was probably written in the middle of the eighteenth century.

[Yü Hsiang-ch'in kung nien-p'u (chronological biography); 1/134/9a; 1/285/10a; 2/8/43a; 3/160/14a; 4/75/7b; 4/76/13a; 34/204/26a; Yung-ting ho chih (1815), chüan 2 and 4.]

2em

 YÜ Chi 余集, Jan. 29, 1739–1823, man of letters, painter and calligrapher, was a native of Jên-ho (Hangchow). A hsiu-ts'ai of 1757, he became a chü-jên in 1762. When his father died in Kwangtung in 1763 he made a journey to that province to bring back the remains. In 1766 he became a chin-shih, but was not chosen to be a member of the Hanlin Academy. The reason for this decision, according to his own account, was his habit of writing certain characters in their archaic form. Be that as it may, another account asserts that as a painter he was celebrated primarily for his drawings of female figures, and for that reason was nick-named, "Yü, the Painter of Beauties" (余美人). We are told that owing to this, conceivably undignified, reference he was excluded from membership in the Academy.

When the Bureau for the compilation of the Ssŭ-k'u ch'üan-shu was instituted in 1773 (see under ) Yü Chi was recommended by and, together with,  and others, was made an assistant editor. At the same time he was raised to the rank of a member of the Hanlin Academy as of the year 1772. He served among other posts, in the course of his official career, as chief examiner of the Hupeh provincial examination (1786), associate examiner of the Szechwan provincial examination (1794), and finally rose to be a reader of the Hanlin Academy. After 1804 he retired to become director of the Ta-liang 大梁 Academy at Kaifeng, Honan, for a period of eight years. In 1822, on the sixtieth anniversary of his becoming a chü-jên, he was given the rank of a third-grade official and participated in the banquet known as Lu-ming yên (see under ), held in honor of the successful competitors in the provincial examination of that year.

In addition to being a skillful painter, Y&uuml: Chi was an accomplished calligrapher and poet. A collection of his poems was printed early in his life time under the title 秋室百衲琴 Ch'iu-shih po-na ch'in. His miscellaneous literary collections, entitled Ch'iu-shih hsüeh-ku lu (學古錄), 6 chüan; 梁園歸櫂錄 Liang-yüan kuei-chao lu, 1 chüan; and 憶漫庵賸稿 I-man an shêng-kao, 1 chüan, were printed in 1822. It is worthy of note that Yü Chi was the collator of the first printed edition of the Liao-chai chih-i (see under ).

[1/509/2b; 2/72/27a; 3/130/28a; 26/2/20b; Hangchow fu-chih (1922) 146/12b; L.T.C.L.H.M. 93b.]

2em

YÜ-ch'ien (Yukien) 裕謙, 1793–1841, Oct. 11, official, belonged to the Borjigit clan and the Mongol Bordered Yellow Banner. His great-grandfather,, the first Duke Ch'êng-yung (誠勇公 ), committed suicide in 1755 near Ili during the revolt of. His grandfather, Balu (see under ), the second duke, fought under in the conquest of Turkestan, and served as military governor of Chahar (1768–70). His father, Ch'ing-lin 慶林 (麟) or the third duke, served in Tibet as Imperial Agent (1786–89, January), but because of mismanagement of border troubles with the Gurkhas (see under ), was discharged and deprived of his hereditary rank. The dukedom was given to Kuan-hui 宮惠, a cousin of Ch'ing-lin.

Yü-ch'ien was well versed in Chinese literature. In 1817 he became a chin-shih and was selected a bachelor of the Hanlin Academy. In 1819, when the bachelors were graded, he was discharged from the Academy and was appointed an expectant secretary in the Board of Ceremonies. After a delay of five years he received the secretaryship, and a year later was promoted to be an assistant department director in the same Board. In 1826 he was sent to Hupeh as prefect of Ching-chou-fu. Up to this time his name was Yü-t'ai (see above), but because his superior, Yü-t'ai (see under ), then financial commissioner of Hunan (1826-31), had the same name, he was ordered to change it to Yü-ch'ien. In 1829 he was transferred to Wuchang where he served for five years.

In 1834 Yü-ch'ien was promoted to be an intendant in Hupeh, but was soon made provincial judge of Kiangsu. In the years 1836–38 he retired to mourn the death of his mother and to convalesce from an illness. But in 1838 he was again sent to Kiangsu as provincial judge 939