NOTES ON PRINCE GONG'S MANSION
May 1979, Department of Architecture, Tongji University
It happened a long time ago, yet it seems pretty new. Whenever the Prince Gong's Mansion is mentioned, a mixture of melancholy and excitement would well up in my heart. In winter 1961, I joined He Qifang (1912-1977)1, Wang Kunlun (1902-1985)2 and Zhu Jiajin (1914-2003)3 in a survey of this mansion, reportedly the former site of the legendary Grand View Garden that appears in the celebrated 18th-century novel A Dream of Red Mansions. Today, however, Qifang has been gone for two years, which makes our joint survey more than a decade ago look like a dream. How could I not feel down and blue?
When I returned from overseas last winter to spend some time in Beijing, Feng Qiyong (1924- ), whom I regard as my younger brother, asked me to see the mansion again and probe the possibility for a memorial hall to be set up there in honour of Cao Xueqin (c. 1715-c. 1763), author of the aforementioned novel. Now that springtime had returned to this land and energized my fatigued body, I was naturally thrilled by his invitation, even though I could not but be nostalgic about my first visit with my friends.
I remember seeing photos of Prince Gong's Mansion in the book Gardens of China written by Osvald Sirén (1879-1966)4 and published in Britain in 1949. Its majestic lofts, belvederes, rock formations and ponds, bright and clear vistas of trees and waters looked rather enchanting to me. Later, when I rambled the mansion's garden for the first time in my life during a trip to Beijing, the scenes and sights described in A Dream of Red Mansions kept flashing into my mind despite the fact that though somewhat faded through the years, its former glory was still there. How many changes had happened to the mansion in so many years! "The late poet should recognize me if he was sentient enough", as the Tang-dynasty poet Wen Tingyun (c. 812-866) says. If Cao Xueqin could feel it in his grave, my second survey of the mansion would not come in vain.
Sitting south of the Silver Ingot Bridge at the Lake of Ten Temples5, Prince Gong's Mansion has, over and above its large garden, the most delicately structured and best laid out architectural complex among all the extant princely mansions in Beijing. A royal-mandated rule has it that the front gate of a princely mansion should face east rather than south, with all the gates inside of it aligned from south to north. Prince Gong's Mansion is no exception, but the pity is that its original plan has been altered. In spite of this, the pomp and pageantry of its bygone years are still there, albeit somewhat vaguely. Its surrounding wall covers an immense circumference, but only its eastern section has retained its simplistic classical shape, characterized by a stocky body tapering off at the top, a shape that is identical to, and a bit more imposing than that of the Shrine of Monarchs of Various Dynasties on Goat Market Street at the Xisi subdistrict. The royal temple was first built on the site of the Peace-Sustaining Temple in 1530, the ninth year of the Jiajing reign of the Ming, and rebuilt in 1729, the seventh year of the Yongzheng reign of the Qing. This very fact testifies to the venerable history of Prince Gong's Mansion.
The buildings in the mansion fall into three columns, but only two gates remain of the central column because its central hall has been destroyed. The horizontal board inscribed with the name "Hall of Auspicious Joy" in the posterior hall is said to have come from the Mansion of Heshen (1750-1799)6 during the Qianlong reign, which somewhat indicates when this hall was built. The eastern column is three rows deep, with its first row featuring a smaller five-pillared frame often seen in buildings dating back to the Ming, according to Ji Cheng's The Craft of Gardens, but has virtually disappeared in those built after the Qianlong reign of the Qing. The buildings in the other two rows are built of the same materials as those in the first row, whose forms are as tall and graceful as, but in striking contrast to, the thick and sturdy ones dating back to the Qianlong reign. The bricks used on these structures indicate that they were all built during the Kangxi reign. The western column is three rows deep as well, and the horizontal board "Celestial Fragrance Court" hanging on the floral pendant gate of the rear row and another board "Chamber of a Prized Jin Calligraphy Model"7 in the central suite are both original to Prince Gong's Mansion. The plinths are carved and the interiors partitioned, and the boudoirs and suites, arranged along the four sides of a quadrangle yard, are so wonderfully appointed that they rival the Belvedere in Keeping with an Original Wish in Emperor Qianlong's garden in the Imperial Palace. It was the flowering season when I arrived here, with pear flowers clustered like clouds and falling crabapple flowers drifting like rain, whilst snowy cloves interacted with well-spaced lush bamboos so dramatically that I could not but chant the poem "Gazing Afar after the Spring Rain" by Yang Ning (?-802)8:
The southbound road ends where sky joins ocean,
The outlet for the lovesick exists only in the moon.
The 160-meter-long storied posterior building lying crosswise in this row features slender, straight balustrades and exquisite windows through which the enticing reflections of human figures and the aroma from ladies' apparels make one reluctant to depart. Its stairway used to be where the country's only wooden artificial mountain was located. This storied structure was built in a later period. Construction of the mansion itself began in the east and gradually extended westward.
Spreading behind this posterior building is the mansion's garden, whose eastern section contains a small court where, gleaming amidst emerald bamboo leaves, the corridor is roomy, the chambers are quiet, curtains are transparent and tea tables spick and span, and the décor is elegant in a subtle way. This small court was a latecomer, but its layout accords with the mansion's old pattern; in front of its floral pendant gate there stand four pagoda trees so weather-beaten that their hollowed trunks stand testimony to this garden's olden age. The small court turns out to be home to the Bamboo Lodge9, where a roofed walkway links all the buildings, and pavilions and belvederes spread out amidst green pines, emerald cypresses, ancient pagoda trees and weeping willows.
The presence of water and rock formations brings to life an otherwise arid and lonesome northern Chinese garden like Prince Gong's Mansion. Spreading out at the foot of its northern wall and screened by an artificial mountain is a bat-shaped hall, a three-bay structure whose front portico is designed to let in sunlight from morning till dusk. The only one of its kind in Beijing, the Bat Hall (or Bliss Hall, for in Chinese, "bat" pronounces the same as "bliss") is said to be on the former site of the Happy Red Court10. Judging from its architectural style, characterized by a roofed walkway in its left wing that conducts to the western part of the garden, it is original to the Prince Gong's Mansion. The artificial mountain in front of the hall in the western part consists of two sections, but the rear section, built of slates, was added at a later time; its frontal section, built of Lake Tai rocks and therefore original to the mansion, has a belvedere atop it and a cave built into it with a stone lintel, a technique that was in use prior to the Qianlong reign. The trees planted in the mountain are apparently of old age. The rear section of the artificial mountain are all built of slates, where the trees look as new as those in the nearby Mirror Garden—they should have been built during the lifetime of Prince Gong. The crenulated wall whose name "Elm Pass" is inscribed in a stone tablet and the Green Cloud Mountain with its name engraved in a stone in the front of the western section of the garden were also built at a later time. There used to be a pavilion in the center of the lake in the garden's backyard, but with the lake filled a long time ago, the rippling water surface is no more. The glamorous and commodious theater in the back of the eastern end of the garden is the only one of its kind that has remained intact to this day in the city.
According to Yu Tongkui (1876-1962), father of modern China's chemistry education who also contributed immensely to the restoration of classical Chinese architecture,
The garden sits at the rear of Prince Gong's Mansion; the mansion itself was Emperor Qianlong's wedding gift for his youngest daughter, Gulun Princess Hexiao (1775-1823), when she was married to Fengshenyinde (1775-1810), the eldest son of the emperor's right-hand man Heshen…. In 1799, the fourth year of the Jiaqing reign, when Heshen's property was confiscated, the garden became Prince Qingxi's mansion.11 In about 1851, during the Xianfeng reign, it was given to Prince Gong, who had a garden built behind it.
Thus it is apparent that the mansion gained its status as a prince's mansion as early as the Qianlong reign (1736-1796), and was expanded as a result.
This mansion is elaborately documented in "A Brief Review of the History of Prince Gong's Mansion" written by Shan Shiyuan (1907-1998)12, which was carried in the Journal of Fu Jen Catholic University forty years ago. This short account of mine is the result of an initial survey of the mansion's buildings and artificial mountains. I cannot come up with a detailed report about its buildings because their frameworks are concealed behind ceilings, which makes it impossible for me to take a close look.
In foreign countries, famous people's former residences are well protected and open for all to see. Prince Gong's Mansion was not really the Grand View Garden described in A Dream of Red Mansions, but its author Cao Xueqin must have frequented the mansion of Nalanmingzhu (1635-1708)13, which was later procured by Heshen. Furthermore, Cao had lived in south China for some time as a visitor. He must have also visited the famous gardens in the Jiangnan area. This being the case, I share Yu Mingheng's14 view that the Grand View Garden is but a synthesis of the art of Chinese gardens, and Cao's story about it is just another folk tale being told and retold in the same way as the Golden Hill Temple in Zhenjiang, which was flooded by the White Maiden15, and the Sweet Dew Temple, where Liu Bei (161-223)16 won the heart of the younger sister of Sun Quan (182-252)17. I therefore see nothing improper to designate Prince Gong's Mansion as the venue of a memorial hall for Cao Xueqin. In this way, it will become the only princely mansion in Beijing to be opened to the public as a showcase of our motherland's cultural heritage and a repository of Cao's historical records. When this happens, I surmise no one will accuse me of talking nonsense in this article.