Ma Tsu-jan l| @ ^ • Died A.D. 880. A man of the T'ang 1487 dynasty, who possessed a wide knowledge of simples and was in great request as a doctor. He could also consume a whole picul of wine without getting drunk, from which he came to be called iS ^* ^^ studied Taoism and was ultimately taken -up to heaven aliTC.
Ma Wen-Bheng l| ^ ^ (T. ^ H )• ^D. 1426-1510. A 1488
distinguished statesman, who graduated as chin $hih in 1451, assisted Hsiang Chung to suppress the Shensi insurrection of 1468, and was made Governor of that province. He was degraded in 1478, owing to the bad management of the war by Wang Ytteh, but two years later he succeeded him in command on the frontier. In 1476 he reformed the Ldao-tung army, earning the enmity of the Governor and of Wang Chih, who three years afterwards upset his arrangements and caused him to be banished to Chungking on account of the insurrection they themselves had provoked. Wang Chih fell in 1488, and a year later Ma returned to Liao-tung as Governor, to the great joy of its people. He was soon transferred to be head of the Grain Transport, in order to cope with a famine; and on the accession of the Emperor Hsiao Tsung he became President of the Censorate. In 1488 he caused the Taoist books c<^ected by the last Emperor to be destroyed, after which he was placed at the head of the Board of War. He dismissed useless officers, and thereby became so unpopular that the Emperor provided him with a body-guard. In 1501 he became President of the Board of Civil Office, and on the accession of the Emperor Wu Tsung in 1505, he turned out 768 officials who had been irregularly appointed during the previous reign. The new Emperor, however, favoured eunuchs, and Ma took the first opportunity to retire. Liu Chin caused him to be degraded; but on the fall of Liu, he was canonised as jjl^ ^ .
