The sitter is unnamed, just as the bottle is unsigned. Fortunately a photograph of Wang Wen-shao, Viceroy of Xili, exists in the collection of Mr. and Mrs. Neil Hunter, and is published by Emily Byrne Curtis, Reflected Glory In A Bottle, p.25, fig.33. The painting in this bottle is an exact copy of that photograph, even down to the slightly open tunic between the top two buttons, and a small visable space between the sitter's cap and trailing peacock feather, leaving us in no doubt as to the sitter's identity

For another example of the same sitter on an inside-painted bottle by Ziyizi see Hugh Moss, Victor Graham, Ka Bo Tsang, The Art of the Chinese Snuff Bottle, The J & J Collection, no. 431, p. 706

Wang Wen-shao (1830-1908) was made viceroy of Xili, a grand councilor, and concurrently a member of the Tungsli Yamen (Board of Foreign Affairs). Curtis continues, op. cit, p.26, "When Wang Wen-shao retired from public life in 1905, he was acting plenipotentiary with the right to wear a yellow riding jacket and a two-eyed peacock feather in his cap - all marks of the highest Imperial approbation"

For signed Ma Shaoxuan examples of similar type, but different sitters see Hugh M. Moss, Snuff Bottles of China, p. 239, nos. 844 and 845; and Sotheby's, Fine Chinese Snuff Bottles, New York, November 3, 1982, lots 241-145. For an unsigned example see Sotheby's, Important Chinese Snuff Bottles from the Collection of Eric Young, Part I, London, March 3, 1987, lot 143, formerly in the Bob C. Stevens Collection