Page 44 - Nov 28 Chinese Art Hong Kong

The inscription on the lantern decorated with
landscapes, may be translated as follows:

Circular panel:
‘At leisure after my official duty, I wear a cloak
trimmed with crane’s down, put on a Daoist cap
and hold in my hand a volume of the Book of
Changes, and then burn incense and sit in silence
to pass away the time without anxiety. Besides
the river and hills, the things I see are only the sails
of boats, birds on the sands, the mist, clouds,
bamboo and trees. When I recover from the
strength of the wine and after I stop drinking tea
and burning incense, I say goodbye to the setting
sun and welcome the white moon. These are also
pleasantries during the period of my banishment.
Inscribed by the Emperor in the Qianlong period.’

Oblong panel:
‘The mist vanished; the characters can be seen.
The moss has fallen off; the texts appear.
The writings are like the waves under the moonlight;
the literary piece is as bright as metal in the
sunshine.
It makes known the ancestral line traced back
for eight thousand years,
and also the high reputation of the last three
generations.
Some are ever-happily married, as happy as
male and female birds.
Others were famous artists depicting the clouds
and the frost.
Inscribed by the Emperor in the Qianlong period’.

The inscription on the lantern decorated with a
bamboo grove can be translated as follows:

Circular panel:
‘He did not consider the high official mansion with
the large flag as his glory, nor the Huan-kui (a jade
tablet which as a token was conferred upon a
Duke) and the ceremonial embroidered robe as the
symbols of his nobility. He was only interested in his
virtuous conduct which would benefit the people, his
meritorious acts which would benefit the nation, and
these achievements would be recorded on the metal
and stone tablets and praised in poems and songs to
dazzle the future generations for ever and ever, and
that was his ambition and the scholars expected him
to have this ambition. So his outlook or aim was not
limited to a little glory in a tiny market town.’

Oblong panel:
‘When it was stone, it was as small as one’s fist.
When it has been fashioned into an article, its beauty
is not due to the one-hundred processes of refining
It is described in green characters in a book which is
kept in a jade box with a golden thread.
The rocks (from which the stone was hewn) from the
hills of various sizes are small; the greenness of the
fragrant trees there is not beautiful.’

42 | BONHAMS