Hong xue yin yuan tu ji [An Illustrated Record of Goose Tracks in the Snow].

£18,500 · Offered by Maggs Bros Ltd

An important illustrated biography by the Manchu nobleman and official Wanyan Linqing (1791-1846) whose family belonged to the inner circle of the Imperial family as bao-yi bond servants of the Manchu Bordered Yellow Banner. He attained the jinshi degree in 1809, was made secretary at the Board of War in 1814, and four years later entered the Han-lin Academy. From 1823 he held several positions in Anhui Province, became a provincial judge in Henan Province (1829) and subsequently served as provincial Governor of Hubei (1833). In 1833 he was promoted to Governor-General of the Jiangnan watercourses and he published several works on flood prevention, river conservancy and dike-construction. All of these positions demanded a great deal of travelling throughout the empire (which he didn’t enjoy) but his narrative provides a vivid insight into the workings of the Qing administration during the first half of the 19th century. Linqing took great interest in garden architecture and seems to have missed no opportunity to visit interesting temples and gardens along the way which he describes in great detail. The style of the writing is a beautiful mix of personal observation, mixed with philosophical remarks and a deep sense of continuity in the tradition of the scholar official which would come to an abrupt end in the next generation. Linqing published two volumes of his auto-biography (under the same title as the above) in 1839 and 1841 respectively, both without illustrations, and a

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