Tuesday, 19 January

Fourteenth day of the twelth lunar month

Wang Xueting (Wang Shijie,王世杰)[1] invited me to a farewell lunch at No.2. Zhonghua Road (Canzhenghui), and showed us his collection of old paintings.

In his collection, the one of the court ladies by the Ming dynasty painter Shen Zhou was the best. The beauties which the Tang painters painted were a little bit fat, as they were influenced by Yang Guifei. The colouring and the clothing outlines were really good, and the hand positions were particularly outstanding.

At 6.30, Deputy Field Marshal Bai Chongxi invited me to a farewell dinner at his house. (No.8 Lizhiju) After the meal I went to the dinner and movie show at the Soviet Embassy. As I was late, I was punished with three glasses of red wine. After downing these I developed a bad headache. But I still kept my promise to go to the gathering initiated by Chan Chak (陳策) and others that we met at Deng Junyi’s place. Chen, Xu and Guo and others were already there. I returned to the hotel at midnight. I could not sleep well. There is nothing much I can do with wine.

[1] Wang Shijie (1891-1981) had studied at the LSE and Paris University. He was a diplomat.