Red Earth Hollow

　　    Located 6 kilometers southeast of Zhengguo Town and southwest of Liwa Village, Red Earth Hollow is the burial site of Liu Taifuren, Yuan Shikai’s mother who held the first-rank noble title. According to the *Xiangcheng County Annals - Geographic Maps*, on the sixteenth day of the first month of winter in the twenty-eighth year of the Guangxu reign (December 16, 1902), Yuan Shikai, then the Governor-General of Zhili and Vice Tutor to the Heir Apparent, personally escorted his mother’s coffin for reburial here. The cemetery covered several acres, with rows of emerald cypresses and an imposing atmosphere. To the north stood the Yuan family ancestral hall, guarded by a military camp. The main gate of the cemetery faced east, flanked by 3-meter-tall stone lions that howled in the wind, earning them the nickname “Wind-Howling Tigers.” On either side of the lions were stone flagpoles. Inside the gate was a stone memorial archway inscribed with the words “Exemplary in Child-Rearing.” On both sides of the archway stood numerous stone stelae, including the *Epitaph for Lady Liu, Mother of Yuan* by Zhang Zhidong, Governor-General of Lianghu and native of Nanpi; the *Stele Inscription for Lady Liu* by Yuan Baochun; and the *Epitaph for Lady Liu, Mother of Yuan* by Shen Yunpei, Vice Minister from Anhui. Most of these texts were eulogistic in nature. On the day of the burial, thousands of spectators arrived by carriage, gathering continuously along the way. The cemetery no longer exists today, leaving only a cluster of tombs at the confluence of Renmin Gully and the Gu River.