Page:Historical eclipses.djvu/14

 the Shû King is rendered more difficult by the fact that all copies that could be discovered were destroyed by the energetic and utilitarian emperor Shi Hwang-ti, who in B.C. 212 ordered the destruction of all books except those devoted to the three useful branches of learning: agriculture, medicine, and divination. The destructive law was abrogated six years later and an incomplete copy of the Shû King, recovered from a wall in which it had been bricked up, provided an authentic text for the books which it contained. The book in which the eclipse is mentioned was not included in this copy and, although copies containing it were afterwards circulated, the prevailing opinion among both native and western scholars is that the additional books not contained in the first recovery are mere literary restorations made from quotations and references found in other works that had survived, with the aid of a preface or table of contents which would appear to have been made from the genuine text before the burning of the books and probably with the aid of other books or traditions that might bear on the subject.

The preface to the book in which the eclipse is mentioned runs as follows:

'Hsî and Ho, sunk in wine and excess, neglected the ordering of the seasons, and allowed the days to get into confusion. The prince of Yin went to punish them. Descriptive of this, there was made "The Punitive Expedition of Yin".'

Hsî and Ho, I must explain, were the hereditary