# Eminent Chinese of the Ch'ing Period/Ho Ch'iu-t'ao

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​HO Ch'iu-t'ao 何秋濤 (T. 巨源, 願船), 1824–1862; June 30, scholar and historian, was a native of Kuang-tsê, Fukien. At the age of twenty (sui) he became a chü-jên (1843) and in the following year a chin-shih. He received appointment as a second class secretary in the Board of Punishments where he later became a proctor in the Commission of Laws. He served in the Board of Punishments for about nine years. A work by him on law, entitled 刑律統表 Hsing-lü t'ung-piao, was written about the year 1849. At the capital he made the acquaintance of many scholars, including Chang Mu and Ho Shao-chi [qq. v.]. In 1853, when Li Chia-tuan 李嘉端 (T. 吉臣, H. 鐵梅, chin-shih of 1829, d. 1880–81) was appointed governor of Anhwei, Ho accompanied Li to that province as a member of his staff. But as Li was soon dismissed Ho returned to Fukien to lecture in the academies there. In 1858 Ho and Kuo Sung-tao [q. v.] were recommended to Emperor Wên-tsung by Ch'ên Fu-ên 陳孚恩 (T. 子鶴, d. 1866), president of the Board of War (1858–60), as authorities on contemporary affairs. But as Ho was then in mourning for the death of his mother he was unable to assume office.
Nevertheless, a work by Ho on the northern borders of the Chinese empire was about this time presented to the throne. Early in 1860 he was summoned for an audience with the Emperor and the work he had presented was granted the title 朔方備乘 Shuo-fang pei-shêng or "Historical Source-book of the Northern Regions." This work, in 80 chüan, is an expansion of another in 6 chüan, entitled 北徼彙編 Pei-chiao hui-pien. It is a compendium of documentary sources with notes, commentaries, tables, and maps, and is the first comprehensive, not to say exhaustive, work on Sino-Russian relations. The 平定羅剎方略 P'ing-ting Lo-ch'a fang-lüeh, an official account of the campaigns against the Russians leading up to the treaty of Nerchinsk in 1689, which had never before been published, was included in full. Unfortunately, the presentation copy of the Shuo-fang pei-shêng was lost in the turmoil of the destruction of the Yüan-ming Yüan by the Allied Forces in the war of 1860. A copy of the work is said to have been owned by Huang Tsung-han 黃宗漢 (T. 壽臣), a fellow-provincial and a chin-shih of 1835 who died in 1864. But while the latter was preparing to have it recopied for presentation to the throne his house took fire, with the result that the second copy was destroyed too. It was not until the eighteen-seventies that a son, Ho Fang-lai 何芳徠, presented his father's original draft (which had been preserved in the ancestral home) to Li Hung-chang [q. v.], then governor-general of Chihli. As the draft was not ready for publication, Li appointed Huang P'êng-nien [q. v.] and several other compilers of the Chi-fu t'ung-chih (see under Huang P'êng-nien) to edit it. The work of editing was completed in 1881 and the Shuo-fang pei-shêng was printed. Huang P'êng-nien added to the work two maps—one of Russia and another showing the boundaries between China and Russia. Both maps were drawn by Huang's son, Huang Kuo-chin (see under Huang P'êng-nien). Annotations to the Shuo-fang pei-shêng by Li Wên-t'ien [q. v.], entitled Shuo-fang pei-shêng cha-chi (札記), appear in the two collectanea: 烟畫東堂小品 Yen-hua tung-t'ang hsiao-p'in and 靈鶼閣叢書 Ling-chien ko ts'ung-shu (1895–97).
In 1862 Ho Ch'iu-t'ao became director of the Lien-ch'ih Academy (連池書院) at Paoting, Chihli, and there he died that same year. A collection of his prose writings, entitled 一鐙精舍甲部稿 I-têng ching-shê chia-pu kao, in 5 chüan, was printed in 1879. He annotated the chapter on the "Assembly of the Princes" in the ancient historical work I Chou shu (see under Yü Chih-ting) under the title 王會篇箋釋 Wang-hui p'ien chien-shih. For this work Chang Mu wrote a preface dated 1848. As a scholar and textual critic Ho Ch'iu-t'ao edited the Mêng-ku yu-mu chi and the Yen-ch'ang ti-hsing chih, both written by Chang Mu; and he collated the 元聖武親征錄 Yüan Shêng-wu ch'in-chêng lu, an historical account of the campaigns of Genghis Khan. This last work was printed in the 知服齋叢書 Chih-fu chai ts'ung-shu (1896) and was later re-collated by Wang Kuo-wei (see under Wên T'ing-shih).
[1/490/15a; 2/73/45b; 5/20/17b, 79/7b; 邵武府志 Shao-wu fu chih (1897) 21/36b; 福建通志 Fu-chien t'ung-chih (1922) 儒林傳 38b.]
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