In 1049, Fang Zhongyan (989-1052), already 61 years old, assumed office as the prefect of Hangzhou, after serving as the prefect of Dengzhou (in Henan province) for more than three years. Standing in front of the tomb of Lin Bu on the Solitary Hill at the northwestern corner of West Lake, Fan would reminisce about his two visits to Lin Bu years ago.

Born in the year 967, Lin Bu, also known as Lin Hejing, had already been dead for some 21 years by then. Lin, one of the most famous poets in Northern Song, spent much of his later life in solitude near West Lake—he is also one of the most famed hermits not only in the Northern Song, but throughout Chinese history. Single his entire life, he was particularly fond of planting plum trees and raising cranes, leading to the humorous phrase that he "took plum trees as his wives and cranes as his sons".

The first time that Fan called on Lin was in the spring of 1026, when, serving as the magistrate of Xinghua county in neighboring Jiangsu, Fan was on a trip to Zhejiang with his friends. In one of his poems, Fan wrote: "By the gate, the chancellor on the hill lives. He looks at the raucous travelers undisturbed.…Say not those who admired you are far and few between, I for one will happily follow your footsteps with wine cups in my hand."

"Chancellor on the hill" is in fact a reference to Tao Hongjing (456-536), a recluse like Lin who lived on Maoshan Mountain in Jiangsu during the Southern Liang Dynasty (502-557). While not an official with any title, Tao was frequently sought for advice by Emperor Wu of Liang (464-549), the founder of the Southern Liang. Similar to Tao, Lin Bu was also consulted regularly on matters of national significance. Hence the epithet "chancellor on the hill". Indeed, before living as a recluse on the Solitary Hill, Lin travelled widely around Jiangsu and Zhejiang, making friends and establishing an extensive network of connections. Since Lin was still regularly visited by scholar-officials even during his hermit days, he had a good grasp of the latest political developments.

A few days after this visit, Fan went again to Lin's place with his friends. Unfortunately, they were thwarted by sudden torrential rains. An unhappy Fan Zhongyan wrote in another poem: "Inviting my friends to call on Mr. Lin, I didn't expect heavy winds and rains…. When the sun shines on the lake and the hill, I will seek out the legend amid the green trees."

Evidently, Fan longed to spend more time with Lin, and was far from contented with only one visit. True to his words, two years later, during the autumn of 1028, Fan paid Lin another visit at the Solitary Hill. At the time, Fan had already been promoted, and was in charge of collating books and documents at the imperial library. After the visit, Lin penned a poem specially for Fan, comparing his talents to Sima Xiangru (c. 179-118 BC), a Western Han (202 BC-9 AD) poet who was highly regarded by the Emperor Wu of Han (156-87 BC).

Why was Fan so keen to meet Lin? As Fan was deeply involved in Song politics, he was apparently not there for idle chitchat. And why was Lin, a hermit, willing to embrace Fan so enthusiastically? In spite of the age difference—Lin was over 20 years older than Fan, they hit it off swingingly from the very beginning. The most important reason, I believe, is they cared deeply about the country, that is, "Be the first to bear the world's hardship, and the last to enjoy its comfort," as Fan's most widely known saying goes. For Lin, he was a hermit more in the physical sense, reluctant to be bound by official positions, but ready to contribute his share at any time if it could help improve the country.