To honor the expeditions of Zheng He, a text was engraved on a stone tablet in 1432, part of which said:

The Emperor has ordered us, Cheng Ho . . . to make manifest the transforming power of the Imperial virtue and to treat distant people with kindness . . . We have seven times received the commission of, ambassadors [and have visited] altogether more than thirty countries large and small. We have traversed immerse water spaces and have beheld huge waves like mountains rising sky-high, and we have set eyes on. barbarian regions far way hidden in a blue transparency of light vapors, while our sails loftily unfurled like clouds day and night continued their course, traversing those savage waves as if we were treading a public thoroughfare. . . . We have received the high favor of a gracious commission of our sacred Lord, to carry to the distant...