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[[underlined]] APPENDIX [[strikethrough]] A. [[/strikethrough]] ^[[ II. ]] [[/underlined]] 24. paratively late date. [[superscript]] (64) [[/superscript]] During the 6th century B.C., the surviving Chinese records tell us, the people of Wu acquired from Ch'u the use of the chariot and the bow in war; a likely enough statement in itself, and one, moreover, quite in accord with what is apparent on other grounds also---that advances in material culture were gradually disseminating themselves downward along the valley of the great river. As stated in our discussion of the rise of Ch'u, [[strikethrough]] (pp. 13 [[underlined]] sq. [[/underlined]] ) [[/strikethrough]] during much of the 6th century B.C. Wu was involved in wars with that state; though it was in the course of a struggle with Yueh that King Ho [[strikethrough]] Liu [[/strikethrough]] ^[[Lu]] received the wound which caused his death. His son and successor, King Fu Ch'ai 夫差 (494-473 B.C.), engaged in needless contests with certain of the northern Chinese states. During them, in 484 B.C. he constructed the earliest portion of the Grand Canal---that part of it linking the Yangtze and the Huai Rivers; his object being to enable his fleets of warboats to reach northern China without having to face the hazardous voyage up the coast. [[superscript]] (65) [[/superscript]] In these ill-advised wars, King Fu Ch'ai used up much of the best material in his armies. Hence when his next neighbor and most dangerous rival, Kou Chien 勾踐, king of Yueh, attacked him, he was unable to make any effective resistance. After a long siege, in 473 B.C. his capital fell and Fu Ch'ai himself was taken prisoner. Refusing his conqueror's offer of clemency, he committed suicide, and the territory of Wu was an- ------------------------------ (64) For example, ivory (lit. "elephants' teeth") is named among the products of the ancient district of Yang 揚, that one of the famous "Nine Chou" in which Wu was situated. ------------------------------ (65) This undertaking was one of vastly greater magnitude than the almost exactly contemporaneous construction of a canal across the isthmus at Mount Athos [[strikethrough]] , [[/strikethrough]] by Xerxes, as a preliminary to his invasion of Greece. ------------------------------ nexed by Yueh.
