The Empress Dowager

A STRUGGLING mass of humanity was crowding out of the northeast gate of the Forbidden City. Order, etiquette, ceremony, — none of these amenities of life, customary to the existence of the Son of Heaven, was apparent on this occasion. Here a stalwart Manchu was shouting for a chair, but none was to be had at any price. Eunuchs, loaded with spoils, contested the right of way with the poor creatures of the harem. “ Sauve qui peut! ” was the motto of all. The Son of Heaven, Hsien Fêng, had ordered his chair, and, without troubling about his council, had ridden off unceremoniously, leaving his courtiers, women, and eunuchs to follow as best they could. Unused to contact with the world, these poor creatures trailed in the wake of their lord and master, many of them falling by the wayside, without notice save that of a cruel taunt from some coarse eunuch.

We may turn our eyes from the rest of the Manchu women, on their toilsome journey that hot summer day of 1860, and observe one among them. Although somewhat taller than the others, she would not have attracted attention on that account. Manchu women have not adopted the Chinese fashion of compressing the feet, and this one, although burdened with a boy of five, stepped out as if she did not know what fatigue meant. There was determination in her very step. She was twenty-four or twenty-five years old, had blue-black hair and regular Tartar features, with large, bold eyes. In every movement there was a special but almost mechanical alertness as regarded her boy. It would have been impossible to state if she loved the child or not; but there would have been no difficulty in discovering that whatever passions she possessed — it was evident that she was passionate — centred in the child.

She was one of the eighty-one thirdclass wives to which the Son of Heaven is entitled, — one of eighty-one nameless toys of her lord and master. There is probably nothing but malicious invention in the story that she had been a slave girl. It is not from that class that the harem of the Emperor is filled. This might have been the case in the days of Kang-hí or Kien-lung, who were in touch with their people ; but it was next to impossible with a palace-bred weakling, like the man who was now running away from a shadow. Her motherhood — always honorable in China, especially when the child is a boy — had excited the envy, hatred, and malice of her less favored sisters. Hers had been a hard life. She had been tormented with the law of Confucius, declaring that the child she had borne was not hers, but that of the Empress, if the latter should not present the monarch with an heir. She knew that she was no more than a handmaid. “ There are three kinds of filial impiety, the gravest of which is to be without male descendants,” declares Mencius, after Confucius the greatest sage. (Who should, in such a case, make the sacrificial offerings before the tablets of the ancestors ?) Therefore, if a man has no children at the age of forty, he is expected to take another wife. The first, however, retains her original position ; and if children are born of the second, they belong by law to the first, or legal wife.

These third-class wives are usually nameless ; they may be distinguished by numbers, but after they have borne a son they are known as the mother of that boy. Wholly uneducated and illiterate, the women of the harem vegetate through their melancholy lives, and die without leaving a trace. During the two centuries since the Manchu established the dynasty, not one of all the successive occupants of the women’s apartments in the Purple Forbidden was known even by name. But this woman, stolidly plodding along the dusty and rocky ruts, would form a rude exception.

Yeh-ho, or Hot Springs, was reached in safety, and couriers informed the Son of Heaven of the arrival of the barbarians in Peking, and later of their withdrawal. This was beyond his comprehension, for it was inexplicable by precedent.

The British and French plenipotentiaries, on their part, knew nothing of Chinese conditions, and were wholly at a loss with regard to Oriental ratiocination, which few of us can follow even at this day. The act which appeared as wanton barbarism, the burning of the summer palace, was the only penalty that made an impression. The comparatively lenient conditions of peace produced a feeling of relief, but at the same time a firm belief that it was only the consciousness of impotence or inferiority which restrained the allies from demanding or taking more.

It was not only mental but also physical decadence which had overtaken the Ta Tsing dynasty. Hsien Feng, while trying to maintain the traditional superiority of the Middle Kingdom and his own supremacy over all the raonarchs in his capacity of Tien tsz’, or Son of Heaven, did not act the part of a man. To do him justice, however, it is admitted that he was facing conditions which were wholly beyond his comprehension. Prior to the war with England China was the Middle Kingdom, and might even call itself the Middle Flowery Kingdom, without much exaggeration. The potentates of the adjacent countries looked upon the Son of Heaven as upon their oldest brother, whom they had been taught to revere. The great monarch at Peking received their homage with benevolent condescension, as became his superior rank. When they sent him congratulations and presents on Hew Year’s Day, he accepted both, but gave more expensive presents in return. If they had trouble with their subjects, and appealed to him, he was ready to go to their assistance without remuneration or even reimbursement. Our sinologues translated this relationship by the word “ tributary,” because the idea has no existence in the Occident, and we have no word to express it. It is Oriental in conception, and arises from the Confucian formation of the state, in which the family, and not the individual, constitutes the unit.

The only nations having intercourse with China had received whatever civilization they possessed from the Middle Kingdom. In the early days of the Ta Tsing dynasty, Europeans had, indeed, come to China, but, whether engaged in trade or in the propagation of the gospel, they had humbly obeyed the imperial decrees. Historical precedent, therefore, served to confirm Hsien Fêng’s belief in his own supremacy. He was quite willing that the barbarians should trade with his people. In theory, at least, the autocrat at Peking ruled by benevolence, and he was prepared to extend his good will to the unfortunate inhabitants of countries less favored than the Middle Kingdom, to whom its tea and other products were a necessary of life. He was not averse to receiving their ambassadors and to showing them kindness, provided they observed the traditional rules of etiquette and paid him the homage that was his due. It was this question of homage and etiquette which caused the war with Great Britain and France, and which drove Hsien Feng from his capital, a fugitive, to his palace at Yeh-ho.

Hsien Feng was urged by his brother, Prince Kung, to return to the capital. He refused. Scarcely had the court settled at the Hot Springs palace, when one of the older attendants remembered that the spell of the Fêng-shui, the spirit of air and water, whose undisturbed repose is essential to prosperity or “ luck,” was broken, because the grandfather of the Emperor, Kia King, had died at Yeh-ho. From the moment when Hsien Feng was reminded of this event a dark shadow enshrouded him and his court. He felt that he was a doomed man, and neither astrologer nor geomancer, steeped as such were in the murky waters of superstition, could bring relief. The Emperor died in the spring of the following year.

Who shall unravel the intrigues fostered by his anticipated demise ? Legal issue there was none, save a girl, and girls have no legal existence. The boy whom we have seen carried or led by his vigorous mother was the undisputed heir, and it was known that the deceased monarch had appointed a council of regency. It was also said that some leading Manchu had combined to obtain possession of the boy, and thereby proclaim themselves regents de facto. Whatever schemes and plots concentrated about the child heir were defeated by the flight of the Empress together with the mother and child.

This event marks the beginning of a government by palace intrigue, in which eunuchs took a leading part. Such government is not without precedent, although it is almost purely Oriental. These intrigues have had their day in Constantinople and Moscow, where Occidental thought struggles with Oriental conditions. It was only through the eunuchs that the mother of the heir could approach the legal wife of the dying Emperor, and come to an understanding with her; and it was only by enlisting the services of the leading eunuchs that preparations for flight could be made. Concealment was comparatively easy, since the ceremonies attending the funeral engrossed the attention of the superstitious Manchu. The two women with the boy arrived safely at Peking, and enlisted the sympathy of Prince Kung.

The mother had decided, upon making her arrangement with the real Empress Dowager, that the heir should be proclaimed by the two characters standing for " Fortunate Union,” Her ambition, at the time of her flight, went no further. But as soon as her interview with Prince Kung had shown her the way of revenge upon her enemies, she determined that she, and she alone, should be supreme in the Purple Forbidden City. A remnant of Seng Koling-sing’s braves were dispatched to Yehho, and before the conspirators could devise means of safety they were seized and beheaded. The same fate overtook the eunuchs who had incurred the hatred of the Manchu women. As to the fate of the occupants of the harem, life is held cheaply in China, and women are mere chattels at the best. The child was at once proclaimed Emperor under the title of Tung Chih, or United Rule; thus commemorating the agreement between the Empress Dowager and her former handmaid.

The arrangement was not only lawless, but it violated the highest statutes of the country; and it seems strange that the Chinese, so punctilious as to precedent, and horrified at the very idea of a woman being consulted in men’s affairs, should have submitted without a murmur. It must be remembered, however, that at this time the Yang-tsz’ provinces, the first to be informed of the usurpation, were in the throes of the Tai P’ing rebellion, and that their viceroys had all they could do to maintain their own authority. Besides, the occupation of the capital by a hostile army, and its subsequent release, had set every precedent at naught. The time was, consequently, singularly propitious ; and when the rebellion was subdued, and the country had settled down, the viceroys faced an accomplished fact, to which they submitted with the stoicism of the race. An imperial decree had imparted official significance to the hitherto nameless woman. She was given the title of Tsze Hsi An, or Mother of the Sovereign. Inasmuch as this act provoked no opposition, as it undoubtedly would have done but for the vigorous measures upon her enemies at Yeh-ho, the title was soon afterward supplemented by that of Empress of the West, to distinguish her from the Empress Dowager, who received the title of Empress of the East.

The first ten years of her reign may be termed tentative. She was alert by nature, and had demonstrated her innate powers of intrigue. These faculties were ever on the watch. When a high Manchu approached her with broad insinuations that the Empress of the East was plotting against her, she suddenly confronted him with that less masculine woman, and discovered that he had come to her rival with a similar tale. Calling her chief eunuch, she ordered a box of gold leaf to be brought, and scornfully compelled the mischief-maker to swallow enough to stop his tongue forever.

With the palace eunuchs attached to her, — for she was extravagant in her rewards for faithful services, — she could bid defiance to any plot. The autonomy of the provinces rendered each one obedient to the viceroy appointed over it. The people do not take any part whatever in the government. So long as the taxation remains within reasonable limits, it is immaterial who holds the vermilion pencil at Peking; and the literati, who, as candidates for office, stand between the government and the people, look to the former for preferment, and are not disposed to interfere so long as the violation of Confucian law does not threaten their privileges or existence.

The administration rested chiefly in the hands of Prince Kung, known to the foreigners as Prince Regent. When, however, Tung Chih approached his majority, Tsze Hsi An began to look for support among the prominent officials of Chinese birth, and with rare intuition selected two men of very different character, Li Hung Chang and Chang Chih Tung. The former had rendered valuable services during the Tai P’ing rebellion, where he had proved an unscrupulous, crafty, and daring leader, but fond of wealth. Chang Chih Tung, on the contrary, had patriotic impulses, was opposed to the “ foreign devils,” but was honest and far-sighted. These two officials were called to Peking, where Li Hung Chang, who had kept in his own service some of the troops drilled by “ Chinese Gordon,” was appointed to the important position of viceroy of Chih-lí.

When her son was sixteen years old Tsze Hsi An selected a wife for him, and he was duly proclaimed Emperor and installed upon the Dragon Throne. The foreign ministers, accredited to Peking, now claimed the right of presenting their credentials to the sovereign in person, and, after many months of weary negotiations, were finally admitted into the hall where the ambassadors of younger nations had paid their homage and presented the offerings of their respective monarchs. Thus the ministers discovered, but too late, that by tolerating this reception they had acknowledged China’s superiority !

It is beyond doubt that Tsze Hsi An was the real ruler during the life of her son. Filial piety, the one inexorable law of China, which, in its ramification into ancestral worship, constitutes the religion, since it is the tie which binds the nation into homogeneity, holds every son in bondage during the life of his parents. Tung Chih, however, was both vicious and stubborn, and threatened his mother’s autocracy. She must have taken a dislike to him, as her actions immediately after his death indicate.

He died in the spring of 1875, from an attack of smallpox, leaving his wife pregnant. Sudden as was his death, Tsze Hsi An, now Mother of the Sovereign no longer, took instant and apparently preconcerted measures to retain her authority. The breath had scarcely left the body before messengers were on their way to summon such Manchu nobles as were well disposed toward her. She invited none possessed of independence or respect of the statutes. At the same time Li Hung Chang was ordered to hold his troops in readiness. When the council convened, she simply notified its members that she had selected Tsaitien, the three-and-a-half-year-old son of Prince Chung, as the heir to the throne. The Manchu looked aghast. What if Tung Chih’s unborn child should prove to be a son ? Tsze Hsi An asserted, impatiently but positively, that she would have no grandson. To the almost insurmountable objection that Tsai-tien was of the same generation as Tung Chili, and was therefore excluded from worshiping at his tablets, she replied that her “ husband,” the late Hsien Fêng, dead these fourteen years, had adopted the boy by “posthumous act.” This brazen suggestion stifled all opposition. The child was sent for in the dead of night, and brought to the ghostly council chamber, where all present, including his own father, prostrated themselves before him. He was proclaimed Emperor under the title of Kuang Hsu, or Illustrious Successor.

The supposed adoption by Hsien Feng restored to Tsze Hsi An her title, or as much right as she had to it while the Empress of the East was still living. But this violation of China’s most sacred law, that of ancestral worship, provoked so much opposition that Li Hung Chang’s troops were called upon to seize numerous victims for the executioner. Blood flowed freely at Peking; but it served only to prove that the country at large could be ruled from the capital by the aid of a handful of loyal viceroys, and in defiance of every law. The highhanded action of one who was in every respect a usurper caused scarcely a comment in the provinces.

The foreign ministers were, of course, accredited to the de facto powers, and, even if they had been acquainted with the facts, would have had no cause to interfere. Li Hung Chang was promoted to the Grand Secretariat, a position hitherto reserved exclusively to a Manchu, and Tsze Hsi An was as much the sole regent or ruler as after the death of the Empress of the East in 1881. She did not attempt to interfere with the machinery of the government, except in the appointment of the viceroys and leading officials, and in appropriating a good share of the revenue to herself. It seems that, as she grew older, the desire to accumulate wealth increased, — a desire easily gratified with the opportunity afforded to her.

Ruthless in her methods, she ordered Alutch, Tung Chill’s widow, to commit suicide. After this, even the Manchu fathers, little as they value their daughters, were not anxious to furnish a bride to Kuang Hsu when he approached his majority. His adoptive mother selected one of her own nieces, and after the wedding Kuang Hsu was duly installed. Tsze Hsi An withdrew to the Eho Park palace, which had been prepared for her, but by no means released her hold upon the government. The Peking Gazette, the official organ of the administration, bears ample evidence that every decree emanating from Kuang Hsu had been previously submitted to, and approved by, the imperious woman.

She might have continued to enjoy her authority, if the uniform success of all her schemes had not caused her ambition to go beyond the bounds controlled by palace intrigue. She was sixty years old in 1894, and this birthday, the occasion of great honor in the life of the Chinese, was to be appropriately celebrated. The viceroys were notified by imperial edict, and received more privately a strong hint as to the presents that would be acceptable to “ her who must be obeyed.” It was expected that this celebration would be made remarkable by Japan’s humiliation. It is certain that Li Hung Chang was devoted to her, and acted entirely upon her orders. It is equally certain that Yuan Shi Kai, the Chinese minister-resident in Korea, was appointed by, and was a creature of, the viceroy of Chih-lí ; nor can it be denied that, beginning with the assassination of Kim-ôk-Kyun, the proJapanese Korean refugee, on the 24th of March, 1894, everything was done by the Chinese government to insult Japan. That proud nation had, indeed, ample cause for resentment, even though its alleged cause of China’s suzerainty over Korea was ridiculous, and served only to justify the war before the civilized world. Li Hung Chang could have made peace at any time before the battle of A-san. That he did not do so, well informed as he was as to Japan’s strength, goes far to prove that he was impelled by a power superior to his own; that is, by Tsze Hsi An.

When the Chinese fleet was destroyed and Port Arthur taken, the woman remembered the time of her flight, and grew frightened. Her trepidation increased a thousandfold when the capture of Wei-hai-wei left the road to Peking open to the victorious foe. Her scornful behest, “ to drive the wo-jin [pygmies] back to their lair,” had been answered by the stirring sounds of Kimigayo, the Japanese national anthem. She remembered, but too late, that the enemy, in this case, was no barbarian ignorant of Chinese law and precedent, but a deeply insulted people to whom both were an open book. She knew that she had forfeited her life many times by her crimes against the statutes, and that the flimsy pretext of her adoptive motherhood, whatever influence it might exert upon the weakling on the throne, would not save her from the anger of Japanese statesmen. Shecommanded and implored Li Hung Chang to prevent the Japanese from entering Peking, and authorized him to make peace at any price. Her fright assumed such dimensions that she actually withdrew from the government, and, intending to use the Emperor as a scapegoat, thrust the vermilion pencil into the untrained fingers of astonished Kuang Hsu.

Those fingers, weak as they were, grasped the pencil with greater firmness than Tsze Hsi An had expected. Peace was concluded upon comparatively easy terms, for Marquis Ito was unwilling to be the cause of China’s disintegration. But when Kuang Hsu scrutinized the sacrifices imposed upon China, and found how the vast empire had been shamefully defeated by its small but wiry foe, he inquired into the causes producing such abnormal results. The consequences of this inquiry were soon visible in the innovations ordered in no uncertain tone, and published in the imperial yellow Court Journal.

Tsze Hsi An had evidently relinquished her authority prematurely. It was quite clear that Kuang Hsu intended to be Emperor in deed as well as in name. He showed the relative authority of Tsze Hsi An and himself, upon the return of Li Hung Chang from the coronation ceremonies at Moscow. The statesman, upon arrival at Peking, hastened to Eho Park to pay his respects to its owner. When Kuang Hsu heard of it, he reproved him publicly as failing in homage due to the Emperor, deprived him of his yellow jacket, and kept him prostrate upon the stone floor for such a long time that the old man was made seriously ill.

The reforms inaugurated under the new rdgime demanded a vast supply of money, and threatened the revenues of Tsze Hsi An as well as the perquisites of courtiers and offieials. Worse than this, the influence of Sir Robert Hart was increasing rapidly, and unpleasant inquiries as to the disbursement of large amounts of specie might take place at any time. To crown the danger threatening Chinese officialdom, Tsze Hsi An was rapidly losing whatever influence she still possessed, and even she might be called to account for past misdeeds.

The coup d’état of the 21st of August, 1898, excites less wonder than the fact that it was so long in maturing. Tsze Hsi An needed all her previous experience in palace intrigue to spin the web with due secrecy, since a single traitor among that host of eunuchs would have been fatal to her. That there was such danger was proved at the last moment, when Kuang Hsu was warned. It was too late ! As he was trying to escape to the British Legation, he was seized by one of the head eunuchs, and unceremoniously carried back and placed under arrest. Tsze Hsi An reentered the Purple Forbidden City, and openly resumed her authority.

It would be profitless and beyond the scope of this article to consider what the ministers of the great powers might or should have done. Moderate but firm interference at that time could, beyond doubt, have solved the problem of China’s rejuvenation. The nations most interested in this desirable object were represented by men to whom China was a closed book. Neither Mr. Conger nor Sir Claude Macdonald could be expected to master the art of diplomacy, or to acquire a correct knowledge of China by intuition. Tsze Hsi An, silently recognized, satisfied the frightened officials by her wholesale abrogation of the decrees issued by the ex-Emperor, and thereby gained their approbation. She was seated more firmly on the throne than ever.

But one difficulty confronted her. She had never dealt directly with the barbarians ; and of the two men who had saved her this trouble, Prince Kung was dead, and Li Hung Chang, who had experience in carrying out her orders, absolutely declined the responsibility. In this connection, her long training in palace intrigue proved of no avail ; and among her creatures of the Tsung-liyamên there was not one competent to take the lead.

What increased the difficulty was that two powers, at least, could read between the lines, and knew that she had no shadow of right for her high - handed proceedings. Russia and Japan knew China well, and either could at any time render her position untenable. That neither of them did so was, as she well knew, not on her account, but from motives of policy. Russia’s information was held over her head like the sword of Damocles, until its presence drove her almost mad. Japan, on the contrary, in its desire to preserve China’s integrity as a guarantee for its own independence, was disposed to be more friendly. At last she decided to trust Japan ; but when about to negotiate an offensive-defensive treaty, M. de Giers interfered by declaring that “ such a treaty would be considered as an unfriendly act by his government.”

Thus, at the beginning of the year 1900, Tsze Hsi An was harassed upon every side. All her experience in the evasion of danger pointed toward the shedding of blood as the only certain means of success. It seems as if she had adopted as motto the gory platform of Robespierre : “ II n’y a que les morts qui ne reviennent pas.” That was the only solution which she was able to discover, and she seized upon it with avidity. Her experience was not broad enough to forecast the result, while her superstition, ignorance, and hope led her to accept the supposed invulnerability of the Boxers as an established fact. When that illusion vanished, and the allies appeared at T’ung Chow, fourteen miles from Peking, she fled, taking with her sixty-nine carts filled with the most valuable wealth, and poor Kuang Hsu, who was to serve as a hostage for her own safety and immunity.

Strong as she is physically, and mentally as regards determination, it is scarcely to be expected that this woman, now sixty-six years old, will long survive the incredible hardships of a journey of more than six hundred miles. Yet the same danger besets Kuang Hsu, whose health has been at no time good. The question is whether her death will in any way alter the circumstances or affect China’s future. But from her life the lesson may be learned that no law, however sacred it may be, is considered inviolable in the Middle Kingdom, and that, aided by loyal viceroys, the regeneration of China may be initiated and directed from Peking, without any serious opposition, so long as local interests and traditions are not ruthlessly sacrificed. While with nations of the Occident reforms usually begin among the people, the recent history of Japan is ample proof that the reverse is the case in the Orient. That history also demonstrates the feasibility of gradually infusing new life and aims of life by influencing the literati who stand between the throne and the people, and exert no little pressure upon both. Their number, small if compared with the dense population, renders such regeneracy possible. A gradual change in the programme of the triennial examinations, and a liberal revision of the salary list, together with the abolition of the fee system, should limit the attempts at reform during at least one decade. By watching the effect thus produced, further measures tending in the same direction might be inaugurated. But if, looking toward the wealth concealed within China’s soil, violent means are adopted either to reach those treasures or to introduce reforms having in view the same end, the whole of China may be roused to a war compared to which the late Boxer movement was mere child’s play.

R. Van Bergen.