1842
Sketch of the Lafe of Confucius
413
a third alliance with Chingtsát, a daughter of the family of Yen, who becaine the mother of the philosopher. Other accounts make him to have been an illegitimate child of these two persons.
His birth took
place in the 21st year of the reign of king Ling of the Chau dynasty, B. c. 549–550, the same year in which Cyrus became sovereign of the Medes and Persians. His mother named him Kiú, from the name of the mountain Kiúní, where she had prayed for a child, and his mar- riage style was Chungní, meaning the second son Ní, Ní referring also to this mountain. Subsequent veneration for the sage has added the accounts of many marvels which happened upon his birth, such as heavenly music being heard in the air; two dragons winding over the roof; five old men appearing at the door, who after consulting together, suddenly vanished; and a unicorn or kilin bringing a tablet iu his mouth to his mother in one of her trips to the mountain. At his birth, five characters were seen on his breast which declared him to be “the maker of a rule for settling the world." His face showed in miniature the five mountains and four great rivers of China; his hands hung below his knees, and his stature was nine cubits and five tentbs, and whatever may have been the measure of a Chinese cubit at that period, every body called him the tall man.
Confucius lost his father when he was three years old, and during his youth he was poor and unknown; but his gravity and attention to his studies drew the observation of his townsmen. He passed for a young man of remarkable wisdom, already equaling the learned men of the country in his knowledge of the manners of ancient times. At the age of seventeen, he was appoined to act as a clerk in the de- partment of grain, which was then as now paid into government as a tax in kind. His careful management of the affairs committed to him raised his reputation, and caused him to be appointed shortly after in his nineteenth year to the general supervision of the fields and parks, and to oversee the breeding of the cattle of government. At this time he married a daughter of Kí Kwán, and on the birth of his only son two years after, lord Cháu, governor of Lú, sent him two carps as a congratulatory present, whereupon Confucius named the boy Lí, or Carp, and styled him Piyü, or Uncle-fish, in compliment to his friend. In his twenty-fourth year he lost his motner, whom he buried in the same grave with his father, and then according to an- cient usage resigned his office to mourn for her three years. It seems that this custom had fallen into desuctude during the distracted state of the country, and Confucius endeavored to imitate the example of the ancient kings Yán and Shua, whom he took for his patterns