Page:Romance of the Three Kingdoms - tr. Brewitt-Taylor - Volume 1.djvu/379

 the rank, saying with tears, “I am a renegade and a fugitive. It is my good fortune that you spared my life and how can I accept a price for Lulung camp? I would rather die than accept the marquisate.”

Tsʻao recognised that reason was on his side and conferred upon him another office. Tsʻao then pacified the Shanyu chieftains; collected a large number of horses and at once set out on the homeward march.

The season was winter, cold and dry. For two hundred li there was no water, and grain also was scanty. The troops fed on horse flesh. They had to dig very deep, thirty to forty chang, to find water.

When Tsʻao reached Ichou he rewarded those who had remonstrated with him against the expedition.

He said, “I took some risk in going so far but by good fortune I have succeeded; with the aid of Heaven I have secured victory. I could not be guided by your advice but still they were counsels of safety and therefore I reward you to prove my appreciation of advice and that hereafter you may not fear to speak your minds.”

The adviser, Kuo Chia, did not live to see the return of his lord. His coffin was placed on the bier in a hall of the government offices and Tsʻao went thither to sacrifice to his manes. Tsʻao mourned for him, saying, “Alas! Heaven has smitten me; Fêng-hsiao is dead.”

Then turning to his officers he said, “You, gentlemen, are of the same age as myself, but he was very young to die. I needed him for the future and unhappily he has been torn from me in the flower of his age. My heart and my bowels are torn with grief.”

The servants of the late adviser presented his last testament, which they said his dying hand had written, and he had told them to say, “If the Minister shall follow the advice given herein then Liaotung will be secure.”

Tsʻao opened the cover and read, nodding his head in agreement and uttering deep sighs. But no other man knew what was written therein.

Shortly after, Hsiahou Tun at the head of a delegation presented a petition saying, “For a long time Kungsun Kʻang, the Prefect of Liaotung, has been contumacious and it bodes ill for peace that the brothers Yüan have fled to him. Would it not be well to attack before they move against you?”

“I need not trouble your tiger courage, gentlemen,” said Tsʻao smiling. “Wait a few days and you will see the heads of our two enemies sent to me.”

They could not believe it.

As has been related the two brothers Yüan escaped to the east with a few squadrons of horse. The Prefect of Liaotung