A handbook describing, in the usual way, the path from appointment at the capital to installation in a new position, but written for prefects, rather than magistrates—the work was first titled Zhifu xuzhi (see previous entry). The 84 entries are distributed among four sections: procedure at the capital (在京, 24 entries), setting off on one’s journey (起程, 7 entries), reaching the provincial capital (到省, 23 entries), and assuming one’s post (蒞任, 30 entries). The 1897 ed. has an additional 8 entries dated from that year. There is a mulu at the beginning of each juan. The author was appointed prefect of Xunzhou 潯州 (Guangxi) in 1880, after having spent twenty years in the metropolitan administration. He acknowledges in his postface that he was completely bewildered by the new assignment and would have been lost without the advice of his friends and relatives, which he decided to note down so that it would not fall into oblivion. Most entries are short, but very clear. The emphasis is on practical and social advice. For example, j. 1 has extensive lists of clothes and shoes to take, as well as books, which are especially important when one goes to a wilderness like Guangxi; and as is stressed in Li Zonggeng’s pref. (Li served under Yanchang as a magistrate), questions of etiquette and relations with one’s superiors and colleagues (禮節儀文) are discussed in great detail. In sum, the subject of what the same pref. calls “truly a precious mirror for good two-thousand-shi officials” (真良二千石之寶鑑) is how to negotiate the “official path” (仕途), rather than government itself.