THE SHE KING; OR, THE BOOK OF ANCIENT POETRY

294 THE BOOK OF POETET. [PART HI. I. Til.] THE BOOK OF POETET. 295
1 Tfae-jin was pure, of rev'rent life,
From whom our king Wan sprang.
Fit was she for his father's wife,
And well she loved Chow Keang. ,
T'ae-sze inherited her fame ;
Through her an hundred sons there came.
2 Wan formed himself upon his sires,
Nor gave their Spirits pain.
Well pleased were they. - Next he inspires
His wife. His brethren fain
To follow were. In every State
The chiefs on his example wait.
3 In palace see him,—bland, serene ;
In fane, with rev'rent fear.
Unseen by man, he felt still seen
By Spirits always near.
Unweariedly did he maintain
His virtue pure, and free from stain.
4 Some great calamities there came,
Which he could not control.
But none his generous aim might blame,
Nought darken his bright soul.
Untaught, the right he ever saw;
Reproof he needed not, nor law.
5 Grown men through him in virtue grew;
Young men attainments made.
Aye to himself our prince was true,
Nor weariness displayed.
His officers acquired great fame;
To him they owed their deathless name.
VII.
The Smang e; narrative. SHOWING THE UISE OF THE HOUSE OF
CHOW TO THE SOVEREIGNTY OF THE KINGDOM THROUGH THE EAVOUK
OF GOD. THE CASES AND ACHIEVEMENTS OE KING T'AE, KING KE,
AiJD ESPECIALLY OE KING WAN.
King T'ae is T'an-foo, who was kinged under this style by the duke of
Chow, and stanzas 1 and 2 are descriptive of his settlement in K'e-chow,
and labours in clearing the country. Ke was T'ae's third eon;—that
is the meaning of Ke. There was an elder brother, known as T'ae-
pih, who ought to have succeeded to T'ae. The old chief, however, was
BO charmed with the precocious virtues of Ch'ang—afterwards king
Wan—the young child of Ke, that he wished the State to fall to Ke, and
through him by and by to Ch'ang. This could not have been if T'ae-pih
had remained in Chow. Ke, his younger brother, would never have con
sented to take his place. T'ae-pih on this, seeing their father's wishes,
fled from Chow altogether, along with his second brother, and settled
among the rude people of what was afterwards the State of Woo, far
away in the south and east of the country. Thus the way was opened
for the purpose of God concerning Wan to take effect, and Ke so con
ducted himself as to make the act of T'ae-pih appear in its true glory.
In st. 5 we come to Wan, who has now succeeded to his father as lord
of Chow. Meili was a State ruled by K'eihs,—in the present Tsing-ning
Chow, department P'ing-leang, Kan-suh. Yuen was a State adjacent to
Meih, and Kung must have been a place or district in it.
It would appear that after the subjugation of Meih, Wan made a tem
porary change of his principal city, but the place to which he moved
could not be far from king T'ae's first settlement in Chow.
Stanzas 7 and 8 describe his subjugation of Ts'ung, the marquis of
which, we are told by Sze-ma Ts'een, had slandered him to the king of
Shang, who threw him into prison. By and by he was re-instated in his
position as president of the States of the West, with more than his former
powers, and proceeded to deal with the State of Ts'ung as is here described.
1 Oh ! great is God. His glance on earth He bent,
Scanning our regions with severe intent
For one whose rule the people should content.
The earlier lines of kings had practised ill,
And ruling, ruled not after God's just will.
He therefore 'mong the States was searching still.
Searching for one in whom He could confide.
From the great States He westward turned aside,
And there a place did for our House provide.
2 T'ae then was chief, who made wild nature trim,
And cleared the forest of the rotting limb.
Impervious tracts grew pervious by him.
He felled and dressed the bosky clumps and rows;
He drained the marshes where the willow grows;
He thinned the mulberries, rising thick and close.
When this wise chieftain God to Chow had given,
The Kwan hordes fled away, by terror driven ;
And sons came from the wife T'ae got from Heaven.