I’m still picking odds and ends from the refuse
heaps at cold nights north of the Great Wall. How can I return to my native land
in such a state without making good？

未得衣錦安還鄉? 朔北寒夜猶拾荒。

But it is a comfort to travel to my home village
in my dream. And moreover, my aged mother is healthy as before keeping me company.

夢逰故里聊自慰，老娘健在伴身旁。

The seaman
Struck by the bitter sand in the wind,
I felt a pain in the face.
It’s unforgettable
Just like father’s scolding
And mother’s weeping.

He suffered a great deal except early in
life but won respect after death. He devoted himself to poetry composition even
when he had become an unmatched master.

生前困頓身後名，嘔心瀝血妙手成。I wonder if anyone of you gilded
scholars would dare to challenge his dominating position.

試問蕓蕓鍍金客，誰敢與之較重輕。

What we should most prize is to keep our
true selves rather than seek external vanity. Above all, a gentleman must
cultivate his moral character and perfect it throughout his life. It has become
harder and harder to find a person with a pure heart nowadays except in some
remote poor areas, where the people are less harmed by modern
civilization. Currently, our domestic education and schooling have been
depriving the younger generations of their real selves and turning them into exam
machines. I wonder whether the parents are satisfied or disappointed with their
children who have been admitted to some famous universities but know nothing of
gratitude. A one-armed baby was once judged normal in the antenatal
examination. The hospital concerned is willing to pay ¥210,000 for the misjudgement. 产检正常却生下独臂婴儿，涉事医院：检查漏肢，愿赔21万

FAST is the abbreviation of the Five-hundred-meter Aperture Spherical Telescope. Located at a large karst pit in Guizhou Province, it is an important scientific infrastructure of the State. The project of extensive eyesight mainly consists of the active reflection surface, the feed source supporting system, the measuring and controlling system, the receiver, the terminal device and the observation point, etc.

It was fortunate for Chang to face the cave
murals all day long.对于常书鸿来说，朝夕面对石室宝藏，便是人生最大的幸运。But for Chen, who had been looking forward to the
modern western cultural atmosphere, the grotto life in the Gobi Desert was
unbearable.但对于一直向往西方现代文化氛围的陈芝秀来说，戈壁石室的生活是难以忍受的，She felt sad and embarrassed to change out of
the close-fitting
dress into the baggy old sheepskin coat.

最简单的一个变化——脱下合身的旗袍，穿上宽大臃肿的老羊皮大衣，就让她既伤心又难堪。Their conjugal relation took a dramatic turn
when she was convinced Chang would settle in Dunhuang permanently and a Mr Zhao tried to alienate her from her husband.

当她确切地知道常书鸿决心永远地留在敦煌，而“第三者”赵某又从中挑动时，夫妻关系便出现了戏剧性的转折。

The past ideals of fame and position have
lost their attractions to me. I never envy other people’s possession of wealth,
beauties and power any more. I’ m satisfied with my circumstances at present. The only hope I have
is to live healthily until a peaceful and natural death. I witnessed the death
of father and wife one after another, both suffering long from illness on their
deathbeds and needing a full‐time attending. Now it’s mother’s turn. She should be thinking lucky
to be tended carefully without lacking anything necessary. But she has been
almost always nursing some rage and complaining endlessly regardless of my
persuasion. I wish I won’t be so irritable and annoying as mother at the last stage of my
life. I long to be able to take care of myself by then because son can be
hardly reliable.

Some say movement can prolong
life. As the saying goes, life depends on movement. Only taking more exercise, can
the body of the old undergo a normal process of metabolism. Then his organism
tends to be healthier, with better absorption of nutrients and slower ageing. But
others air another opinion, the old will live longer by resting quietly to
recuperate. The body of the old is quite different from that of the young. Compared
with the organs of the young, those of the old have quite waned. Rash sports
will do more harm than good to the old. They had better set worries aside and
rest and lead a slow pace of life for longevity.

It was said that both Li Bai and the
emperors of the Tang dynasty were descendants of Li Guang, a famous general
frightening the Huns in the Han dynasty. During the Sui dynasty his ancestor
moved to the Western Regions for committing a crime. Later another of his
forefathers sneaked into the west of Ba, i.e. the present Chuang. At the age of
forty-two,
he was summoned to the capital by Emperor Xuanzong and appointed as member of
the Imperial Academy. But he was not satisfied with his job to entertain the
emperor and the Imperial Concubine Yang by writing poems. Soon he resigned the
post and left with the cash gift bestowed by the emperor.

The strong wind howled all day long. By the evening it was still blowing hard and noisy. It almost died away up to ten o’clock pm. All the students were warned against staying or walking under the eaves of the schoolhouses for a few tiles from the roof of the south house had crashed to the ground. On my way back cycling under the violently shaking poplars, I was fearful of some probable falling broken twigs from above.
It was a warm melting day. The half-made skating rink became a pool. The uneven ground leaves two-thirds of the lower part submerged while one-third of the higher section only wet.