CH 20

Chapter 20: Hunting

Giuseppe Castiglione, The Qianlong Emperor Hunting Hare, 1755. Source.

One day when the weather was getting warmer, Emperor Kangxi suddenly felt that he needed to exercise his muscles and bones, so he issued an imperial edict to all the palaces to go hunting.

When Yinyou received the imperial decree, he was a little surprised. He didn’t expect that he would have a share in this hunting. In the past, Kangxi never took him no matter whether it was Chengde summer resort, the hunting expedition, or the southern tour. At last, he had finally leved up. The servants were also very happy for their Master, and they carefully gathered the things they needed to bring, and two days later, they followed the large group to the Mulan Paddock.

Yinyou wasn’t worried about hunting. After all, he wasn’t asked to go hunting in the deep mountains and forests. The so-called hunting was actually a special person shepherding the animals into a certain area so that the Masters of each family could hunt to their heart’s content.

Mulan Paddock was guarded by special personnel, and there were many wild animals, but there were definitely not tigers, lions, or black bears. After all, the climate in the capital was not suitable for them. Even more, if these beasts kept in the Mulan Paddock slip out, how could Shennongjia [1], Baiyun Mountain [2], and Xing’an Mountain [3] survive? What’s more, the officials in charge were also afraid that the Masters would get injured. Every few days, special personnel will search around, fearing that some tiger or black bear would suddenly appear, startle the horse, hurt people, and then the thing at the top of their neck will become unstable.

Hunting a herded prey [4] was different from actual hunting, and Yinyou once doubted if the luck of those protagonists who encountered big bears and tigers in the Mulan Paddock was good or bad. It was unfortunate to encounter a beast on such safe hunting grounds. Even more, when the protagonist encountered a ferocious beast, after several setbacks, he only suffered a little flesh injury and showed great power in destroying the ferocious beast. What amazing luck this must be. Could it be that those black bears and tigers were kittens dressed in beast skins?

[4] 围 wéi means “to encircle/to surround”. 围猎 wéi liè: set up a siege to hunt. Hunt with the prey encircled. In Chinese this sentence makes more sense: “wéi liè is different from dǎliè (打猎)”. 

When they arrived at the destination, the imperial guards had already set up the tents, and the Masters only needed to bring their group of servants to the tent they had been allocated.

When Yinyou saw a certain Mongolian prince, he realized that Kangxi didn’t suddenly feel bored and wanted to hunt. He was probably showing the Mongolian prince the power of the Qing Dynasty and the capabilities of his sons. If this was placed in modern times, maybe a military exercise would be held.

Although Mongolia now belonged to the Qing Dynasty, there were still a few people who were restless, and Kangxi didn’t mind letting these people see how powerful the Manchus were.

For things like politics, Yinyou was not very savvy, so he just let the servants tidy up the tent, and went out to check the distance between his tent and the elder brothers. It was really not far, whoever lit his candles at night, Yinyou could definitely see it. 

Therefore, if any brother wanted to scheme in their tent while avoiding the ears of the guards, he could only write. But writing also needed light. Well then, writing while speaking, that was okay, but you would have to do it without anyone noticing. If you were not careful, you could be suspected of plotting, and the other brothers would only be worried that they couldn’t find your fault. It was even more impossible to hide in a tent to discuss things in broad daylight while everyone went hunting, as this would be even more suspicious.

It could be seen that discussing major issues in a tent was more difficult than two people pretending to meet by chance and exchanging a small note. Therefore, TV dramas were really unreliable. In those, it was not uncommon to see a certain brother hiding in a tent plotting with eunuchs, and throwing things around the moment he got angry. How desperate and brainless. Who would dare to do it?

In a word, some TV shows were really a scam [5].

After everyone was stationed, they rested for another night. On the second day, they prepared to hunt. 

Each brother was followed by two Masters who taught riding and shooting. One was to help keep track of the number of prey caught, and the other was to prevent accidents. Yinyou glanced at the two warriors following behind, and once again sighed in his heart, those TV dramas that let the brothers ride around in the woods by themselves, how much of a scam were you!

At the beginning of the hunt, Kangxi came out on top, and all the people around congratulated the Emperor for his grand martial arts; the second greatest was the Crown Prince, and the entourage too began to praise the prince for being young and heroic.

Only after Kangxi and the Crown Prince had hunted successfully could the other princes and ministers dare to really go hunting. For a while, the surroundings were filled with the sound of horses, and then a group of guards ran behind the princes. 

While riding, a certain minister met him and politely greeted him.

Sure enough, in TV dramas the area of hunting made no distinction between the space where rulers and ministers hunt, and the arrogant behavior of the princes was also a fraud.

Yinyou took a group of well-known guards behind him to the side and searched around. When he saw a rabbit, he drew his bow, and with a whoosh, hit the rabbit’s leg.

He nodded in satisfaction as he clamped the horse’s belly, and continued to ride in search of prey. He didn’t bother to look for the rabbit as the guards behind him were responsible for picking up the game.

After hunting some rabbits and two foxes, Yinyou wasn’t at all worried. Anyway, he didn’t want to compete with his brothers, it was enough for him to hunt some things to save some face and not embarrass himself.

Yinyou was not in a hurry, and the people behind him naturally couldn’t say anything, so a group of people was riding horses in the woods very leisurely.

“Seventh brother, did you find something good?”, Yinyou had just hunted a silver fox when he heard the eighth brother’s voice. Looking at the guards behind the eighth brother he saw that there were many things hung on their horses. If he saw correctly, there was even a pheasant.

This vigilant, fast-flying thing was also shot down by him?

Yinyou smiled and shook his head, “It seems that today’s last place will belong to me”.

The eighth brother glanced at the prey hanging on the guard’s horses behind Yinyou. They were not too many, but not too few, “Seventh brother, there is no need to underestimate yourself”.

The two exchanged words politely, and then they heard the sound of the horn, which was the signal to go back, Yinyou pulled the reins, it seemed that today’s hunting ended up like this.

The two of them didn’t ride for too long when they happened to meet Yinzhen. When Yinyou saw the deer hanging on the horse, he voiced with a hint of joy, “Fourth brother, remember to share a little bit of tonight’s venison with your little brother.”

After Yinzhen rode his horse to stand side by side with Yinyou, a faint smile arose on his face, “This is also the first time I have hunted a deer.” 

The eighth brother was one step behind the two of them on horseback. Hearing this, he seemed to admire, “Fourth brother can hunt such good prey at such a young age, today he must certainly be the best among us brothers.”

The fourth elder brother replied indifferently, “The eighth brother is overpraising, today the other brothers have also hunted a lot of prey, hunting a deer was my luck.” He needed to say these words so as not to cause trouble. This younger brother had really good schemes. The eighth brother smiled and said nothing.

Yinyou rubbed his nose and looked down at the bow in his hand: um, the workmanship was very good.

“The seventh brother came to hunt for the first time today, and the results are already pretty good.” Seeing Yinyou lowering his head, Yinzhen thought he felt that he had little prey, so he quickly comforted him, “When the fourth brother came here for the first time, he hunted much less than you.”

After finishing speaking, he patted Yinyou’s shoulder comfortingly looking like a ten out of ten good older brother.

“I see,” Yinyou nodded with a smile. “Fourth brother, tonight I will give you an extra rabbit leg, um, so then you can give me more venison, alright?”

How big can a rabbit’s legs be?

After hearing this, Yinzhen smiled helplessly, “That's all right, the fourth brother will leave some more meat for you.” Looking at the smile on the other party’s face, Yinzhen sighed again in his heart that Yinyou was still a child.

At the same time, Yinyou sighed in his heart that it was not easy to coax a child.

The eighth brother who followed the two had dim eyes, but a smile still hung on his face, looking as if he had never provoked anything before, nor was he blocked by the fourth elder brother.

It’s just that his eyes swept over Yinyou who was smiling happily and then slowly moved away, holding the rein tightly, he then slowly letting go.

Everything, as if nothing happened.