A statement reporting that the rebels of the Fujian circuit were lured into surrender奏誘降福建道草賊狀
1He Kao, Zhang Yan and E Jusong, with eighty thousand followers
福建道溪洞草賊何嵪張延鄂璩悚等徒伴共八萬人
He Kao, Zhang Yan, E Jusong and the other rebels of the streams and caves of the Fujian circuit, with eighty thousand followers in all.
2A single letter in place of an attack
右件賊徒。自去年冬。侵劫信州界內。臣以其道途阻闊。溪洞險艱。若欲討除。恐爲勞役。遂於今年二月內。差節度衙推諸葛成。充東面招諭使判官。便齎委曲職牒。招諭其賊首何嵪等三人。雖行匪有師。而卜能從吉。一時應響。三窟除姦。纔當言下歸投。兼乞軍前展效。臣再與委曲補職名。追赴軍前。俾申忠節。臣伏以小人興叛。所迷者貪競之心。上帝垂恩。所惡者殺傷之事。終能耀德。固可弭兵。與其繼獻捷書。曷若盡收降款。是以。遠飛折簡。便倒群戈。塵不假於曳柴。風自行於偃草。溪頭洞口。免汚煙霞。閩嶺鄱江。豁通道路。況乃各期後效。盡願前驅。能令八萬餘人。永不二三其意。有以見陛下皇威天覆。玄德日新。四郊之煙壘將銷。萬國之梯航競集。則乃軍中士卒安身而永別戰場。宇內生靈携手而齊登壽域。臣無任歌詠屛營之至。其何嵪等下補職名。願隨臣征行及放散人數。請續具申奏。謹錄奏聞。謹奏。
The band of bandits named above have been raiding and plundering within the borders of Xinzhou since the winter of last year. Your servant, seeing that the roads there are blocked and far and that the streams and caves are steep and hard, feared that an attempt to put them down would come to heavy toil. So within the second month of this year I sent Zhuge Cheng, judicial aide of the military commission, to serve as administrative assistant to the commissioner for summons and persuasion on the eastern side, and had him take a detailed letter and a certificate of office to summon and admonish He Kao and the two others who head the bandits. There were no troops in what he did, and yet the divination could follow what was auspicious. In one moment they answered like an echo, and the crookedness of the three dens was done away with. The words had hardly left his mouth when they came over and submitted, and asked besides to show what they could do at the front of the army. Your servant again filled out their titles by a detailed letter and had them summoned to the front, that they might set forth their loyalty. Your servant humbly considers that when small men raise a revolt, what misleads them is a heart of greed and contention, and that when the Lord on High lets down his grace, what he hates is the business of killing and wounding. If in the end virtue can be made to shine, then arms can surely be laid to rest. Rather than present dispatches of victory one after another, it is better to gather in every pledge of surrender. And so a short letter was sent flying far off, and at once the whole forest of spears was turned about. The dust did not depend upon dragging brushwood; the wind went of itself and laid the grass flat. The stream heads and the mouths of the caves are spared the staining of their mist and glow, and the Min ranges and the Po river have been thrown wide open. How much more so when each of them looks to prove himself hereafter and all wish to go in the van, so that eighty thousand men and more can be kept from ever being of two or three minds. By this one sees that Your Majesty's august might covers all like heaven and that your dark virtue is made new day by day, that the smoking ramparts of the four suburbs are about to melt away, and that the ladders and boats of ten thousand states gather in rivalry. Then the soldiers in the camps will rest their bodies and part forever from the battlefield, and the living souls within the world will take one another by the hand and climb together into the land of long life. Your servant cannot bear the fullness of his singing and his trembling. As for the titles filled out for He Kao and those below him, and the number of those who wish to follow your servant on campaign and of those who have been released, I ask leave to draw it up and report it hereafter. With respect I set this down and report it. Respectfully submitted.
Interlinear notes 1
The text speaks of three men at the head of the bandits, but the received text has many missing graphs, so it is hard to tell where the third name begins and ends. — tr.