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| 0527 |
Notes on Marco Polo : vol.1 |
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Chou's notice in the Pei-Ch'i shu (44, 4 b; cf. also Pei shih, 81, 11 a-b) does not seem much to
countenance this attribution, and the Commissioners of the Ssŭ-k'u... (117, 20-22; they used a
copy divided into 10 chs.) do not discard the possibility that the Liu-tzŭ may be a forgery of
T'ang times due to Yüan Hsiao-chêng himself. This is certainly an error. Liu-tzŭ's remark on
a name given by Chou people to a dead rat (§ 16) is quoted in an original note to ch. 6 of Fa-lin's
Pien-chêng lun (辯, VIII, 55 b), completed c. 626, and clearly as taken from an authoritative work
already of some age. Moreover, as remarked by Lu Wên-ch'ao, who knew Yüan Hsiao-chêng's
work (Ch'ün-shu shih-pu, 29, 1 a), the difference in style and value between the text and the com-
mentary precludes the possibility that both should be the work of one and the same man.
The passage in § 44 of Liu-tzŭ reads as follows : « Wên of Chin sowed husked rice (mi), and
Tsêng-tzŭ planted sheep (管文種米 [粢 ts'ai, 'vegetables', given in the Yüan-chien lei-han,
436, 15 b, followed by the Tz'ŭ-yüan hsü-pien, is a wrong reading] 曾子植羊); it was not
because they were stupid by nature, but they did not discriminate between regions (方域); being
men with a great destiny, they were not trained in petty matters. » Wên of Chin is probably the
famous Duke Wên of Chin, 重耳 Ch'ung-êrh, who lived in the 7th cent. B. C. (cf. GILES, Biogr.
Dict., No. 523), and whose biography in the Shih chi (ch. 39; cf. CHAVANNES, Mém. histor., IV,
267-308) presents all the characteristics of a historical novel. Tsêng-tzŭ is certainly 曾參 Tsêng
Shên, a disciple of Confucius (GILES, Biogr. Dict., No. 2020), and one of the paragons of filial
piety. But, in the sources available to me, I find no trace of the tradition alluded to by the Liu-
tzŭ for either Duke Wên of Chin or Tsêng Shên. At any rate, this « planting of sheep » has no
direct bearing on the story of the « ground born sheep » which we have next to investigate.
Before passing on to it, I must say something, however, of a text which may serve as a link
between the two traditions. Yüan Hsiao-chêng had not only written a preface to Liu-tzŭ, but
also a commentary. Ch'ien-lung's Commissioners say that both have been lost since Ming times,
but, since they mentioned that Liu-tzŭ was included in the Tao-tsang, they might have known
better : not only the text, but the commentary is there (cf. WIEGER, Canon taolste, No. 1018),
though without any preface; the Sung edition described in the Ch'in-ting t'ien-lu lin-lang shu-mu
hou-pien, 5, 19-20, which gives the commentary, also lacks the preface. On the passage translated
above, Yüan Hsiao-chêng's commentary says (Tao-tsang, Commercial Press ed., 9, 4 b) : « Wên
of Chin, studying [the methods of] foreign countries, sowed husked rice; although the seeds did
not grow, [the text means] to say that his designs were great... Tsêng Shên of the Lu kingdom,
studying [the methods of] men of foreign countries, cut into small pieces (割 ts'o) the skin of
sheep, and sowed them with some earth; although they did not grow, his designs were great. »
However unsatisfactory, Yüan Hsiao-chêng's gloss implies that there was an early tradition, which
I cannot trace, about the sowing of pieces of sheep skin.
The earliest account in the long series of parallel texts concerning the « ground born sheep »
occurs in Chang Shou-chieh's commentary on the Shih chi, ch. 123 (TAKIGAWA ed., 123, 12; in
his reconstruction of the extant fragments of the K'uo-ti chih of 642, Sun Hsing-yen [Tai-nan-ko
ts'ung-shu ed., 8, 13 a] holds that the quotation is not taken by Chang Shou-chieh directly from
the I-wu chih, but is part of a passage of the K'uo-ti chih in which the quotation was already
included; I do not see, however, any serious ground for such an opinion) : « 宋膺 Sung Ying's
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631
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