In the original the last two lines refer definitely to "the Prefect of Yin-chung." This was Wêi Shang of the Han Dynasty. He was a venerable official at Yüng-chung near the Tartar border and was removed on account of his age. But when the Tartars began to advance, he was restored to his post by the Emperor and gave distinguished service.
112. Nan-king, called formerly and in the original of this poem Chin-ling, was the capital of the Six Dynasties (317-589).
113. In Giles's History of Chinese Literature the latter two lines of this poem are mistakenly ascribed to Tu Fu.
114. Sent by the Emperor Wu Ti of Han (140-87 B.C.) as envoy to the Huns, Su Wu was held captive by them near the Gobi Desert and lived there for nineteen years as a shepherd. When he returned, in 86 B.C., the first year of the reign of Chao Ti, he was rewarded with "two paltry millions and the chancellorship of the Tributary States . . . not a foot of soil . . . while some cringing courtier gets the marquisate of ten thousand families." Poems of great beauty and interest were interchanged between Su Wu and the renegade general Li Ling.
115. In the original text of the second line the poet, indicating himself, names Ch'ien-lou, a well-known but indigent scholar who finally starved to death; and in the later lines which we translate
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