Abstract: Mr. HOU was famous for offering the advice on the Hong Gou (Ditch Hong), which demarcated the borders of Chu and Han. However, his great contributions were even scarcely recorded in the History. This article closely reads the narrative of Mr. HOU in Annals of XIANG Yu, and draws on the western reception aesthetics theory of "Response-inviting Structure of Text" to raise the blanks, gaps, and negations within the text. Finally, the article interprets LIU Bang and XIANG Yu's character traits and glimpses the historical situation between Chu and Han.