Yué ngueou po sien jou,
Tan lou ty tchan yué,
Ou yun king tai pan
Ko ou, pou ko choué.
Fou fou teou lo ty
Ho ho yun kiang tché
Ou-tsuen y ko tsan
Lin-fou chang ché pié.
Lan ku Tchao-tcheou ngan
Pó siao Yu-tchouan kiu
Han siao ting sing leou
Kou yué kan hiuen tsué,
Joan pao tchen ki yu
Tsiao king sing ou kié,
Kien-long ping-yn
Siao, tchun yu ty.
TRANSLATION
The colours of the Mei hoa are never brilliant, yet is the flower always pleasing: in fragrance or neatness the fo-cheou has no equal: the fruit of the pine is aromatick, its odour inviting. In gratifying at once the sight, the smell and the taste, nothing exceeds these three things: and if, at the same time, you put, upon a gentle fire, an old pot, with three legs, grown black and battered with length of service, after having first filled it with the limpid water of melted snow; and if, when the water is heated to a degree that will boil a fish, or redden a lobster, you pour it directly into a cup made of the earth of yué, upon the tender leaves of superfine tea; and if you let it rest there, till the vapours which rises at first in great abundance, forming thick clouds, dissipate by degrees, and at last appear merely as a slight mist upon the surface; and if then you gently sip this delicious beverage, it is labouring effectually to remove the five causes of discontent which usually disturb our quiet: you may feel, you may taste, but it is impossible to describe the sweet tranquillity which a liquor, thus prepared, procures.
Retired, for some space of time, from the tumults of business, I sit alone in my tent, at liberty to enjoy myself unmolested: in one hand holding a fo-cheou, which I bring nearer to my nose, or put it farther off, at pleasure; in the other hand holding my dish of tea, upon which some pretty curling vapours still appear: I taste, by intervals the liquor; by intervals, I consider the mei-hoa—I give a fillip to my imagination, and my thoughts are naturally turned towards the sages of antiquity.—I figure to myself the famous Ou-tsuen, whose only nourishment was the fruit of the pine; he enjoyed himself in quiet, amidst this rigid frugality! I envy, and wish to imitate him.—I put a few of the kernels into my mouth; I find them delicious.
Sometimes, methinks, I see the virtuous Lin-fou, bending into form, with his own hands, the branches of the mei-hoa-chou. It was thus, say I to myself, that he relieved his mind, after the fatigues of profound meditation, on the most interesting subjects. Then I take a look at my shrub, and it seems as if I were assisting Lin-fou, in bending its branches into a new form.—I skip from Lin-fou to Tchao-tcheon, or to Yu-tchouan; and see the first in the middle of a vast many tea-cups, filled with all kinds of tea, of which he sometimes tastes one, sometimes another; thus varying incessantly his potation: while the second drinks, with the profoundest indifference, the best tea, and scarcely distinguishes it from the vilest stuff.—My taste is not their's; why should I attempt to imitate them?——
But I hear the sound of the evening bell; the freshness of the night is augmented; already the rays of the moon strike through the windows of my tent, and with their lustre brighten the few moveables with which it is adorned. I find myself neither uneasy nor fatigued; my stomach is empty, and I may, without fear, go to rest.——It is thus that, with my poor abilities, I have made these verses, in the little spring of the tenth moon of the year Ping-yn, of my reign Kien-long.
[22] Fo-hii, Shing-tong, or Whoang-tii—Some of the first emperors of China; who invented the eight qua's, together with the kay-tse, and created colsus.
[23] An eminence in the center—Meaning Windsor, probably.
[24] Tse-hiu and Chang-lin—Two celebrated parks, which belonged to the emperors of the Ty.