Chapter 1855 - A Stark Contrast

Standing at the doorway after seeing Liang Cunhou off, Zhang Dai shook his head for reasons he could not quite articulate. He turned and wandered back inside, gently withdrew a sheaf of slightly yellowed papers from his personal document case, and sat down again.

"The Annals of the Stone Chest say that Emperor Gaozu of Han's achievements surpassed those of Tang and Wu, yet he grieved that his people could not extend to the four corners of the world. Our Exalted Ancestor's achievements surpassed those of Yao and Shun..." This passage was from Zhang Dai's own work, the concluding section of the "Annals of the Founding Emperor" in the first volume of his Shikui Shu. Beside it lay a hand-copied transcript of the document titled Perspectives on Huaxia Civilization.

This transcript was supposedly authored by Liu Xiang, the Australian Prefect of Guangzhou. The Liang household possessed many such "Australian documents," and Zhang Dai had browsed through quite a few. Each time he read them, he thought of Mr. Zhao from Hangzhou.

After quelling the Mid-Autumn Festival disturbance, Mr. Zhao had become a rather influential figure in Hangzhou. He subsequently helped the authorities suppress the rice riots, consolidating his foothold in the city. As an important member of the Revival Society in Zhejiang, Zhang Dai frequently associated with him and had seen many Australian books, pamphlets, and curious novelties.

"Among founding emperors throughout history, Zhu Yuanzhang belongs to the top tier of 'legitimate succession.' Setting aside the semi-mythical sovereigns of high antiquity, Zhu Yuanzhang—by virtue of 'expelling the Tartars and restoring Huaxia'—ranks alongside the First Emperor of Qin and Emperor Gaozu of Han... However, in institutional design, his insufficient knowledge, excessive faith in state coercion, and other factors led him not only to perpetuate certain undesirable Mongol-Yuan institutions but also to introduce many purely impractical administrative innovations. For example..."

Zhang Dai had always been an ardent admirer of the Founding Emperor—not out of political correctness, but genuine veneration. The diction of his own "Annals of the Founding Emperor" in the Shikui Shu made that devotion unmistakable. Reading the Australians' assessment of Zhu Yuanzhang filled him with revulsion.

Flipping quickly through his own manuscript, he found himself more concerned with another passage: "Anyone who devotes himself to the eight-legged essay must inevitably refine his mind, diminish his spirit, narrow his vision, grow pedantic in taste, wretched in appearance, and putrid in disposition... So long as the eight-legged essay is not abolished, the realm cannot enjoy a single day of peace!" This was from the chapter "General Discussion of the Examination System," which he had just completed before heading south—and Prefect Liu's lecture transcript had quoted it verbatim. Kindred spirits? Nonsense... Then how had Prefect Liu learned of this passage? Zhang Dai was quite certain he had never shown those chapters to anyone.

Reading carefully—this was now the third time—Zhang Dai felt he was beginning to discern some pattern. The transcript was a hand copy made by some secretary hired by a pseudo-Australian official, obtained under the guise of "admiration" and "request to transcribe." Certain things became visible only upon close inspection.

Most obviously, this "quoted" sentence had already been expressed once earlier in the text using "Australian vernacular"—also known among the Australians as "plain speech." Quoting it again would be redundant. Yet upon comparing handwriting and flipping back and forth, he saw that this passage, like several others, had apparently been jotted in the margins by the pseudo-Australian official. In the earlier pages, the transcriber had been careful to denote such annotations with a different script style, but by the later pages—clearly fatigued—he had neglected to do so. So was this particular "quoted annotation" the official's own addition, or something Prefect Liu had spoken extemporaneously during the lecture? Zhang Dai considered it and decided it must have been Liu's words, because the pseudo-official was obviously of limited literacy—for example, one earlier annotation rendered the difficult character "Dou" (窦, as in Empress Dowager Dou) simply as "Bean Granny" (豆老太)...

So this passage was not part of the prepared text, but something Prefect Liu had said off the cuff... Could there really be such a thing as kindred spirits?

If not... then the Liang household had probably long since been riddled with Australian moles! If this passage derived from his own work, then the Australians must have bribed or subverted one of the Liang servants to examine his manuscript. And such a servant would necessarily be of some standing—he would need to be literate... Or perhaps... the Liang family itself had already... Zhang Dai felt he should not think any further; he was only frightening himself.

"Alas! The Australian Song!" Zhang Dai sighed, though even he was unsure what he meant.

After eating two pieces of water-chestnut cake and draining the cup of Runshitang bag-brewed cooling tea, Zhang Dai sat staring at the Australian-fired porcelain cup in his hand.

Zhang Dai styled himself "Tao'an" and was a passionate antiquarian—a collector and connoisseur with considerable expertise in ceramics. The Zhang family were a distinguished lineage of Shaoxing, divided into East and West branches; Zhang Dai was the eldest grandson of the West Zhang. Blessed with family wealth and a love of ceramics, he had amassed a respectable collection of fine wares at a young age. Later, dissatisfied with the poor draftsmanship of potters and painters, he conceived the notion of founding his own kiln—a "Shao ware" or "Zhang ware." Using his family's influence and his own private funds, he hired veteran craftsmen from Jingdezhen and actually built an egg-kiln. He remembered the first firing vividly: four days, using the finest pine logs two chi long and as thick as a rice bowl—half aged and dry for three years, half freshly cut and still wet—consuming 45,000 jin of fuel. Yet when the kiln opened, aside from the cracked and broken failures, not a single intact piece met his standards. He fired kiln after kiln; though the proportion of intact wares increased, none achieved the effect he envisioned. The investment was enormous, initial losses were severe, and market prospects unclear. Meanwhile, Zhang Dai's examination career faltered, and eventually his family criticized him for "squandering time on trivialities." After a stern reprimand from his elders, the ceramics project was shelved.

What kind of porcelain did Zhang Dai want? In terms of color: solid-color unglazed wares should be white as salt or snow, blue as the sky or lake water, red as vermilion cinnabar or a crane's crown. For painted wares, the body must be pure, the designs exquisite, the colors harmonious. His greatest frustration with porcelain had always been the "biscuit edge"—an unglazed rim. Why could no vessel be glazed all over? Even Song-dynasty imperial wares and pieces supposedly from the palace treasury had an unglazed ring at the rim or base, or tiny pinholes on the bottom glaze like sesame seeds. To Zhang Dai, this was utterly unacceptable.

Only when he tried firing his own porcelain did he understand. Painting on porcelain was nothing like painting on paper: first, most vessels were round, and working on a curved surface was inherently difficult; second, glazes went on dry and gritty, rendering many painting techniques useless; third, the pigment color and the fired glaze color were entirely different—one painted blind, relying solely on experience. Blue-and-white pigment appeared black before firing; famille rose enamels looked dull. And that was before accounting for saggars, stilts, stacking, kiln temperature, and a host of other factors. As for the biscuit rim and pinholes—in practice, he learned that without an unglazed edge or supporting pins, the glaze would fuse to the saggar.

Yet this Australian plain-color porcelain cup was glazed all over. Shaped like a bamboo segment, the outside was green as bamboo skin, the inside yellow as bamboo splints, and even the base was glazed in that same splint-yellow—perfectly seamless. If one did not handle it closely, one might take it for an actual bamboo node carved into a cup. Turn it over and over as he might, Zhang Dai could find no biscuit rim or pin marks.

Because he had once tried his hand at porcelain, Zhang Dai truly appreciated the depth of knowledge involved—he was not the sort of pedant who dismissed all craftsmanship as "cunning trifles." Ponder as he might, he could not fathom how this cup had been made. Still less could he explain the rare Australian bone-china lotus-leaf platter he had seen in Liang Wendao's study—so thin that, held against the light, one could faintly discern the shadow of one's own fingers behind it...

If, as the Australians claimed, they were descendants of survivors of the Yashan defeat who had founded a nation overseas, and if the Central Plains had languished under barbarian rule for a century before the Founding Emperor restored Huaxia—then the two civilizations had developed separately. Judging by porcelain alone, the Great Ming's two centuries of progress lagged far behind that of Australian Song. And if one dismissed such things as "cunning trifles" and spoke only of moral philosophy and literature, then the Thirteen Classics Commentary he had seen at the Wanbi Bookshop in Hangzhou far surpassed anything in the current age. Yet according to Prefect Liu's lecture, this "far-surpassing" moral scholarship was not even mainstream Australian thought.

"In matters of personal cultivation, Confucianism offers many sound recommendations. Embracing Confucian principles in self-improvement and interpersonal relations is beneficial to oneself and to society... Viewed from the perspective of statecraft, however, Confucianism is simply 'lazy,' or one might say, escapist. It first posits an ideal social form—a society where everyone is a gentleman—and then reduces all remaining problems to the question of how to make everyone a gentleman... From a practical standpoint, this is a completely unrealistic program..." Though Prefect Liu's remarks were provocative, Zhang Dai could easily discern the Australians' attitude toward Confucianism—merely one school among the Hundred, skilled in self-cultivation, unsuitable for governance.

Unsuitable for governance! The greatest pride of Confucian scholars was that no matter who conquered the realm, in the end they had to summon the "Four Graybeards of Mount Shang," the "Zhuge Liangs"—the literati—to administer it. Yet Australian Song declared that Confucianism was unfit to govern! They not only said so but acted accordingly, managing their territories in perfect order. He had heard that across the sea on Qiongya Island, Australian Song had transformed that benighted wilderness into a prosperous land—even while absorbing hundreds of thousands of refugees from all corners of the empire—making it thrive as never before in a thousand years!

Not just a slap in the face—a slap backed by incontrovertible facts!

He must go and see for himself. He must see with his own eyes! At that moment, Zhang Dai's resolve to visit Lingao was unshakable.

(End of Chapter)