was a commentator on the Classics, dealing especially with the Four Books, a writer on miscellaneous topics, and a most successful administrator. He rose to high office, and was noted for always having his room hung round with maps of the province in which he was serving, so that he might become thoroughly familiar with its geography. He was dismissed, however, from the important post of Viceroy of the Two Kuang for alleged incapacity in dealing with a plague of locusts.
YUAN MEI (1715-1797) is beyond all question the most popular writer of modern times. At the early age of nine he was inspired with a deep love for poetry, and soon became an adept at the art. Graduating in 1739, he was shortly afterwards sent to Kiangnan, and presently became magistrate at Nanking, where he greatly distinguished himself by the vigour and justice of his administration. A serious illness kept him for some time unemployed ; and when on recovery he was sent into Shansi, he managed to quarrel with the Viceroy. At the early age of forty he retired from the official arena and led a life of lettered ease in his beautiful garden at Nanking. His letters, which have been published under the title of Hsiao Tsang Shan Fang Ctiih Tu, are extremely witty and amusing, and at the same time are models of style. Many of the best are a trifle coarse, sufficiently so to rank them with some of the eighteenth-century literature on this side of the globe ; the salt of all loses its savour in translation. The following are specimens :
" I have received your letter congratulating me on my present prosperity, and am very much obliged for the same.
�� �
