Intimate China: The Chinese as I Have Seen Them

by Mrs. Archibald Little

Part II.—The Sights of Peking.

Tibetan Buddhism.—Yellow Temple.—Confucian Temple.—Hall of the Classics.—Disgraceful Behaviour.—Observatory.—Roman Catholic Cathedral.—Street Sights.—British Embassy.—Bribes.—Shams.—Saviour of Society.—Sir Robert Hart.

The "sights" of Peking have not been on view of late years. It seems a pity, considering how many people have travelled thither hoping to see them. And yet I am not sure that it is not a relief. It seems a duty one owes oneself to go and see those one can, and the people even at those behave with an insolence and indecorum such as I am not quite sure if even seeing the sight makes up for. Anyway, the Temple of Heaven has been closed of late years—that Temple in which to this day worship is offered by the Emperor on behalf of his people, in accordance with a ritual more ancient than any other still in use. The Temple of Agriculture is closed; ditto the Clock Tower and the Bell Tower; ditto, they say, all that remains of the Summer Palace. Even the Examination Hall we could not succeed in getting into. Whilst his one great friend advised us not to attempt the Lamaserai, where the living Buddha in Peking resides, such a set of rowdies are the Lamas. They demand exorbitant sums for opening each fresh gate; they lay forcible hands upon visitors, and finally demand what they please for letting them out again. That very thrilling tale of horrors "The Swallows' Wing" is only a little heightened version of what a traveller who went in might have to undergo. We rode up to the gate, and the expression of the Lamas outside, who thought we were coming in, was enough for me. I have studied the expressions of Neapolitan priests, but they do not compare for vileness with those of these Lamas: the Lamas, too, look fierce—fierce, coarse, and insolent. They of course redouble their demands and insolence, when ladies are among the visitors. The living Buddha himself can only be approached in the guise of a tribute-bearer bringing offerings: a bottle of brandy, a pound of sugar, and a tin of Huntley & Palmer's mixed biscuits, sugared, are said to be the most acceptable. And we considered sending this information to Messrs. Huntley & Palmer for advertising purposes. But even with the biscuits and the brandy there has to be a good deal of arrangement, all of which demands time. And, after all, the living Buddha is only occasionally en statue; at other times he receives like any other Tibetan. And whether one cares to associate with Tibetans at all, except for missionary purposes, is a question. That Buddhism, which with the Chinese is so pure and humane a religion, they have transformed into something so gross, it seems their very gods are unfit to look upon; the God of Happy Marriage impossible to show to a lady, as said the Russian gentleman who had made a collection of images, Chinese, Indian, and Tibetan! Chinese images are all fit for any one to see, as their classics are fit for any one to read; Indian images are questionable; but about Tibetan there seems no question at all, and he simply asked me to advance no farther into his museum, as my husband examined them. It was impossible for me even then not to think that living surrounded by those horrible emblems of divinity, his whole drawing-room full of them, must have some effect upon the unhappy man's character. As I stood among them, an evil influence seemed to emanate from them, and the subsequent career of their unhappy collector confirms the theory; for but a few years later he was dismissed from the Chinese Customs for some crime too bad to mention, dying shortly afterwards. The collection has been bought by a German museum. Let us hope those dreadful Tibetan images are not now poisoning the minds of blue-eyed Germans.

Tibetan musical instruments for sacred purposes are made of virgins' bones (the virgins killed expressly, we were told, but I doubt this); their sacred pledge-cups, of human skulls. They prefer necklaces each bead of which is made out of a tiny portion of a human skull, thus each bone representing a human life. Their idols are represented as wearing human skins, with girdles hung with human heads. So much as this I was allowed to see in this wonderful collection of gods and praying-machines, where meekly pious or coarsely jocund Chinese images sit cheek-by-jowl with graceful, slender Indian deities, and cruel, devilish Tibetan images. After all, no nation's conception of God can be higher than the nation; but it is at least, as a rule, supposed to be as high. Judging them by their idols, it was better, I thought then, to keep out of the way of Tibetan Lamas—little thinking it was to be my good fortune in subsequent years to penetrate into Tibet itself, nor how rudely there I should find the Lamas treat me.

Even the tomb erected to the Banjin Lama at the Hoang Ssu (Yellow Temple) repelled me, in spite of intricate marble carvings, considered well worth the seeing. The workmanship was good, but the outline was simply hideous. Not even purple-blue sky, and golden sunshine, and old fir-trees, with golden-balled persimmons nestling beside them, relieved it from its native ugliness. But alongside of it was a great two-storied building in true Chinese style, that we indeed admired. It stood four-square, with a grandly massive porte-cochère, answering all the purposes of a verandah, so vast was it. We looked at the simple, graceful curves of its two stories of roofs, the upper definitely but only slightly smaller than the lower, and wished that, when it fell to our lot to own a house in China, it might be after this model. For two stories seem advisable for health, and nothing could surpass in roof-grace those grand curves, modelled, it is said, upon the upturning boughs of forest trees, though more probably upon the tent of former ages.

TOMB OVER BANJIN LAMA'S CLOTHES, BUILT AFTER TIBETAN MODEL OF MARBLE. BELL-LIKE CUPOLA AND UPPER ORNAMENTS OF GOLD. INSCRIPTIONS IN DEVANAGARI CHARACTER, SANSCRIT, AND CHINESE.

The Confucian Temple, where there are tablets to Confucius and his four great followers, may be called a satisfactory sight, and has remained open of late years. Viewed as a picnic place, it is delightful. The vast courts, with their old, old fir-trees, gave me far more pleasure even than the marble balustrades, or the ancient granite so-called drums we had gone to see. But even there the behaviour of the people was what anywhere else one would call insolent in the extreme. The importunity, sores, and dirt of the Peking gamins render them also a detestable entourage. Things reached their climax, however, at the Hall of the Classics. The open door was as usual banged to in our faces, as we came near; and we were then asked through the closed door how much we would give to get in. Then as soon as we got in, all the detestable rabble following us were let in too, much though I begged they might be kept out. I do not think I had up to that time seen anything so neglected and dilapidated as the Hall of the Classics, the building in all China which one would most expect to see kept in good order, nothing being so much esteemed in China as learning, and especially the learning of the ancients. Some workmen, with almost no clothing, were apparently employed in making it dirtier; but directly we entered they left off doing whatever it was, and devoted themselves to horse-play of the coarsest description, standing upright on their hands, pirouetting their feet over the heads of the crowd who came in with us, knocking some of them down, and rolling them in the dust. They even went so far as to sit down in their more than semi-nude condition on the same bench on which I was sitting, and as near me as possible; whilst all the while there was such a shouting and noise, it was impossible for my husband and me to speak to one another.

It is all very well to remind oneself one is in the presence of a great work, and to try and feast one's soul upon proportions and perspectives in the presence of such lewd behaviour of people of the baser sort. To put it prettily, I was distracted by a great pity for people whose chances in life seemed to have been so small; in plainer English, my temper began to rise. The porcelain arch we had come to see was certainly beautiful, a masterpiece, but not soul-satisfying. We duly noticed the elaborate eaves, protected by netting from the birds. But then came the usual question: How much would we pay to get out? They locked the door in our faces, demanding more money before they would let us out. My husband could stand no more. He was just recovering from a dangerous illness; but he took up a big beam, and smashed open the door. It fell, lintel and all, and the latter so nearly killed a child in its fall the crowd was awed. This just gave us time to get on our donkeys. Then Babel broke loose again, and the storm continued till we had ridden half an hour away, our donkey-men nearly indulging in a stand-up fight in the end, one of them brandishing at the other a very gracefully carved sceptre, that I had just picked up at a fair, to my intense delight. "A nice fellow you are," shouted one to the other. "You ate up all the biscuits, and now you don't know the road. You are worth nothing at all." So that was the way the biscuits had disappeared: the donkey-men had levied toll on our luncheons, and we had suspected the Peking gamins. As there are other porcelain arches in Peking, it might be as well for other visitors to avoid the Hall of the Classics altogether, we thought.

It is horrible to write expressing so much dissatisfaction in the presence of the far-famed masterpieces of a great empire, and the more so as we were very sorry to be leaving Peking, and should much have liked to spend a winter there, studying it all more thoroughly. But Sir Harry Parkes, when he came back to it, said it was returning to "Dirt! Dust! and Disdain!" and the only objection the passing traveller would be likely to make to this sentence is that it might contain a few more D's.

The Observatory is a delightful sight—always barring the behaviour of the custodian, the most loathsome wretch I had yet encountered. And he wanted to feel me all over; did feel all over the Legation Secretary who kindly accompanied us, finally ransacking his pockets for more money than he had thought needful to bestow upon him. The weird, writhing bronze stands of the old instruments, with their redundancy of carving, will be for ever imprinted on my brain. Both those that stand below in a neglected courtyard, and those high above the wall, standing out against the sky, commanding the great granaries and the lovely mountains of the west, with the whole city of Peking lying in between, its courtyards filled with fine trees, giving the whole the aspect of a vast park rather than a populous city—all are beautiful. These wonderful instruments were made under the instructions of the old Jesuits, who so nearly won China to Christianity (would have done so, probably, but for the jealousy of the other religious orders), and who were for years the guides and counsellors of the Chinese Emperors. As to the outside of the pavilions within the Forbidden City, all one was allowed to see of them then, the glittering yellow Imperial roofs are like my childish idea of a fairy palace. There they stand upon their hills, dotted about among the trees, so glittering and graceful, I thought I should never tire of riding past the Green Hill, across the Marble Bridge.

LOTUS POND AND DAGOBA IN EMPEROR'S GARDEN.
Lent by Mr. Willett.

The Roman Catholic Fathers, who have for centuries lived under the shadow of the Imperial Palace, were having then to turn out before the New Year, as also the Sisters of St. Vincent de Paul, with their innumerable foundling children. For it was said that the Empress herself intended to reside in the Fathers' European house. It was she who originally so objected to the high towers of the church, as destructive of Fung shui. Then she was saying she observed ever since they were built she had been particularly fortunate, and she begged that church and towers and organ might be handed to her intact, together with Père Armand David's valuable collection of birds. Fortunately, there are counterparts of these in Paris, for it was feared she might give one specimen to one favoured courtier and one to another, and thus destroy the whole value of the collection. For the shrewd Father, observing the extraordinary pride of the Chinese heart, beside their own somewhat demure-coloured birds and butterflies, had placed a collection of the most gorgeous specimens from Brazil and Java, that he might say drily, when showing Chinese officials round, "See how favoured are the other nations of the earth!" From the towers the Empress may possibly intend to look down upon the Palace garden, as no one hitherto has been allowed to do. For the Fathers were only allowed to retain their cathedral on condition that no one ever mounted the towers, from which a bird's-eye view can be obtained of nearly the whole Palace garden. The church, it was then announced, she would use as an audience hall, and, it was added, receive foreigners in it. But such great changes as this have not yet come about in Peking. No people better than Chinese understand saying they will do a thing, and yet not doing it.

But, whatever happens in it, Peking, as long as it exists, can never lose its character of a great caravanserai, in which one is always coming upon the unexpected. For instance, a Red Button's funeral, as we saw it one day, with about a hundred of the greatest ruffians, misshapen, patched, tattered or naked, hideous, yet rejoicing in being employed, each with a long red feather stuck strangely upright in the oldest-looking Jim Crow sort of felt hat, carrying a banneret or a parasol; the red chair of the official carried aloft; then afterwards paper images of his wives, etc.! Or, if not a dignitary's funeral, one comes across a bird market, every man with a well-trained, red-throated bird sitting on a stick, crooked like a magnified note of interrogation, or a hooded hawk. Then a street row—filth unutterable! Perhaps a hundred camels sitting in little rings round their baggage, and not obstructing traffic in the least; elegant curios laid out in the dust of the street for sale; three carts all at once stuck in the same rut, all their horses and mules resting, panting, after vain efforts to get them out; Manchu women, with natural feet, very long silk gowns of the most villainously tawdry hue; or mandarins in exquisitely coloured silks, with only two wheels to their carts, and those far behind it, so as to indicate their dignity, twenty gaily clad retainers trotting after them on ponies! At one moment squalor and filth, such as to make one think of St. Giles's as cleanly by comparison; at the next or at the same moment gorgeous shop-fronts, all of the finest carving, with most brilliant gilding.

But of all the sights on view in Peking, the finest sight to my mind was the British Legation—a grand old Chinese palace, at that time perfectly kept up, and gorgeous in colouring, deepest blue, pure green, golden-dragoned, and lighted up with vermilion touches. Whether one looked at the mortised beams, projecting outside as well as inside, and thus forming the most complex, highly coloured eaves, or at the decorated beams in the reception-rooms, each one a revelation of colour to a London art-decorator, the eye was alike perfectly satisfied. And at that time, owing to the exquisite taste of the then British Minister's wife, as also probably to the liberality of Sir John Walsham himself, the decorations of the Embassy thoroughly harmonised with its architecture and colouring. If Peking outside was an embarrassment of D's, the Legation was then all cleanliness, comfort, and charm.

One cannot help reflecting sadly on what an object-lesson the capital conveys to all the innumerable officials who have to travel thither, as also to the crowds of young men who go there year after year to compete for the highest honour to be obtained by competition—admission to the Hanlin College. When the distances are considered in an empire about as big as Europe, and also the difficulties of travel in a country without roads and without railways, it is the more astonishing this custom was ever started and can still be kept up. Each expectant is mulcted in a heavy sum, as bribes to the officials about the Palace. Thus the rabble of Peking live by tribute from the whole empire. And so rooted is the custom, even the gatekeeper at the British Legation would demand his toll, whilst the sums that have been paid to get into the Imperial Palace often run into six figures. And all who come to Peking know how things are administered there by bribery and corruption, and see for themselves that nothing there is cleaned, nothing ever put in order. As Sir Robert Hart himself says, but for the clouds of dust continually kept in movement by the winds, and brought in from the ever-increasingly impoverished country round, they must have been all dead men in Peking long ago. The dust serves as a great disinfectant, whilst it so permeates all clothing worn there, that no dress in which one has once gone out in Peking seems fit ever to put on again for any other purpose.

Peking is probably the only large city in the whole world where no arrangements whatever are made for sanitation or even for common decency. The result is alike startling and disgusting to the traveller. But on inquiry it becomes even worse. There were drains—sewers—in the time of the Ming Emperors, and it is now the duty of a special official to report upon their condition every year, and see that they are kept in order. But the drains are all closed up; and though a boy in peculiar clothing is let down into them each year, as it were at one end, it is another boy, though in the same peculiar clothing, who is taken out at the other end.

MOUNTAIN VILLAGE, WITH SHAM BEACON FIRES TO LEFT, FOOCHOW SEDAN-CHAIR IN FRONT.
By Mrs. Archibald Little.

China is the land of shams and middle-men, and the official from the country sees all this, and, sore with the undue lightening of his own purse, goes home, having learnt his lesson to exact bribes himself, and himself rest satisfied with shams, and report all in order, when he knows that it is not so. Far from feeling ashamed of the state the roads in his own province have got into, he remembers those of Peking, that are so much worse. Indeed, through all the country, since the incoming of the Manchu Dynasty, it has been the deliberate official intention to neglect the roads, thus making it the more difficult for the people to assemble together and revolt against their alien rulers. Probably, too, he sees the Tsung-li Yamen, the office created of late years in order to transact business with European nations. Tsung-li Yamen sounds well, but the building is a dirty, dilapidated shed, that might pass muster for a cowhouse on an English gentleman's estate, if it were cleaned and fresh painted. To the Chinese mind this building being set apart to hold interviews with the representatives of Foreign Powers sufficiently indicates in what esteem they are held by his Government, and what amount of courtesy he is intended to mete out to them.

The foreigner, on the other hand, travels away, having learnt his lesson too, if he be of a reflective mind, and that is, very briefly, that there is no hope for China under the present dynasty. The Manchus may have been a very fine people when they first entered China; but since then they have lived like gentlemen, according to the common saying, not earning their living, but as pensioners of the State, nominally ready to be called out to fight, if wanted, in time of war. They do not enter into business, they do not study, and they have lost their martial qualities and become as effeminate as Chinamen. The Chinese Empire has been decaying ever since it came into their hands; and ever since I have known China the Chinese have been saying the Manchu Dynasty has ruled its appointed number of years, and that it is now high time for what they call a Saviour of Society to appear, as so often in the past.

This Saviour of Society would probably have appeared long ago, but for the help the nations of Europe, and especially England, have given towards the centralisation of China. In the old days it is true the Viceroys were appointed from Peking; but each Viceroy ruled pretty well as he pleased in his own province, with his own exchequer, his own army, and his own navy. We found it inconvenient to deal with so heterogeneous a mass without any definite head, and threw our weight into the scale of the Chinese Empire. First we helped to crush the Taiping rebellion, which but for our intervention would probably have succeeded, and by force have made the Chinese people at least nominal Christians. Then through Sir Robert Hart the different Viceroys have been impoverished; the money that in former times would have gone to their private purses or to the administration of their provinces has been diverted to Peking. The theory was that it would be used for the good of the nation. But probably we shall some day know how much the Empress has used for her private pleasures, according to the recent indictment of her by the one great incorruptible Viceroy, Chang-chih-tung, and how much has been absorbed by Li Hung-chang, and all the army of Palace eunuchs and hangers-on.

The Chinese are a people of traders, and patient; they look on, and say mentally, "No belong my pigeon," that is, "Politics are not my business." But they dislike the Empress; they know the young Emperor has been used merely as a puppet; and as to the idea of a Chinese Empire, it is one that has never made its way into their heads. And thus it is a grave question, when in the last Chino-Japanese war all the great Yangtse was a moving procession of junks piled high with human braves, their pigtails coiled about their heads, and their black head kerchiefs giving them somewhat a piratical air, whether these men of Hunan ever meant to fight the Japanese. They would have been ready enough to fight the men of Anhui; and when the European settlement of Shanghai found itself between a regiment of either force, the position was so evidently critical, that very urgent remonstrances had to be addressed to the Chinese authorities to move away either one force or the other. But the Hunan men never fought the Japanese, and it remains a question whether they ever intended doing so.

Even the passing foreigner must feel at Peking that it is not the throbbing heart of a great country, as London is, as Paris is; but the remains of the magnificent camp of a nomad race, that has settled down, and built in stone after the fashion in which in its wanderings it used to build in wood.

CHAPTER I.
THE CHINESE EMPEROR'S MAGNIFICENCE.

The Emperor at the Temple of Heaven.—Mongol Princes wrestling.—Imperial Porcelain Manufactory.—Imperial Silk Manufactory.—Maids of Honour.—Spring Sacrifices.—Court of Feasting.—Hunting Preserves.—Strikes.—Rowdies.—Young Men to be prayed for.

Almost all we can know of the Emperor of China is by hearsay. He lives in his Palace inside the Forbidden City, which again is inside the Manchu City, separated from the Chinese City, where are the lovely, gilded curio shops. When he goes abroad, which he never does, except to worship at the temples, all the people are ordered to keep within-doors, and the most any outsider can do is to peep at him through the crack of a door or from behind a curtain. But as I think some details of his State may be interesting to the general reader, and indeed would well repay thinking over, I have extracted an abridged translation from a Chinese newspaper's account of the present Emperor Kwang-shü's visit to the Temple of Heaven in 1888, when, it must be remembered, he was only a boy between sixteen and seventeen. Those who do not care for the accounts of pageants can easily skip it. Those who read it will, however, learn much of Chinese usage therefrom, and will perhaps better realise how remarkable must be the character of the lad who, brought up from the age of four as the central figure in such ceremonies, yet dared to place himself at the head of the party of progress, and to introduce innovations. People in England, angry with him for being overcome, think he must be a young man of weak character. But contrast him with one of our European princes, read what he has attempted, which I hope to describe in a following chapter, and then decide which is the stronger character. Kwang-shü has always been of weak physique—not unnaturally, considering that he has never known what it is to go out into the country, and take free, healthy exercise. But probably this has been his salvation. Had he been a young man of strong physique, he could never, probably, have withstood the promptings of his own nature, together with those temptations of wine and women, by which he has been surrounded from his earliest years. That he should not have taken proper precautions for his own protection and that of his supporters is hardly wonderful, considering that from babyhood he has been treated as too august a personage even to be seen. Probably he had learnt to believe his will was law, and must be executed. It is little wonder if he now looks ill and his wife sorrowful, even if the suspicions of poison be unfounded.

SHAN CH'ING. PRINCE CH'ÜN. LI HUNG-CHANG. Son of general (Tartar). Emperor's father (Manchu). (Chinese.)

"On February 20th, 1888, the Emperor of China went in person to the Temple of Heaven to pray for the harvest, with the usual ceremonies. The day before his Majesty passed in the Hall of Abstinence, in prayer, fasting, and meditation.

"On February 19th, at the fifth drum (the fifth watch, before daylight), the T`ai Ch`ang Sze (a high bureau entrusted with the arrangement of such ceremonials) placed a Yellow Table (the Imperial colour) in the Hall of Great Harmony, the T`ai-hwo Tien. South of the Emperor's seat was placed an incense-burner, shaped like a small pavilion; and in another similar erection, east of the left-hand pillars, stood a scroll, on which a sentence of prayer was painted in the choicest caligraphy. To the west of the right-hand pillars of the building stood yet another pavilion, to contain the mounted rolls of silk, which were painted with similar inscriptions. The Masters of Rites and the Readers of Prayers stood respectfully waiting outside the gate of the Hall of Great Harmony, holding in front of them the silken scrolls in baskets and the incense in bronze censers.

"The Chief of the Ceremonial Bureau, already mentioned, called by Mr. Mayers the Court of Sacrificial Worship, accompanied by other officers of the Bureau, was waiting inside the Hall; and when the time arrived, he proceeded, with the Imperial Astronomer, to the Gate of Pure Heaven, to announce to the Emperor that it was two quarters of the Hour of the Hare (i.e. 6.30 a.m.), and his Majesty issued from the above-named gate, riding in a sedan-chair, passed through the back left gate, and thus to the Hall of Great Harmony, where his sedan-chair was deposited at the northern steps, and he entered the building and stood in front of the left pillars, facing the west.

"Four officials of the Hanlin, or Imperial Academy of Literature, were standing outside the right-hand door of the building, facing east. The Readers of Prayers now issued from the inner cabinet, holding in front of them, respectfully elevated, prayers written on scrolls of paper, and entered the middle gate of the Hall of Great Harmony, the silken scrolls and incense being borne after them into the Hall. In front of them were borne a pair of incense-burners. The Masters of Rites, ten in number, conducted them, preceding them, and mounted the central steps as far as to the Vermilion Dais. The Readers of Prayers, those who bore the prayer-scrolls, and the bearers of silken scrolls and incense, having entered the central gate of the Hall, reverently laid down their burdens one by one on the Yellow Table, and retired after three k`otows (prostrations), touching the ground with the forehead.

"The Chief of the Court of Sacrifice then opened a prayer-scroll, and the Master of Rites spread a cushion on the ground. The Emperor advanced in front of the Yellow Table, and reverentially inspected the objects lying on it, after which he performed the genuflection called 'once kneel and thrice k´otow,' and then took up his position again, standing as before. The Chief of the Court of Sacrifice rolled up the prayer-scroll again, and the cushion on which the Emperor had just knelt was removed.

"The Readers of Prayers now advanced to the Yellow Table, and made three k´otows. They respectfully took from the table and bore aloft the prayer-scrolls, the silken scrolls, and the incense, which they deposited one by one in the graceful pavilionlike stand meant to receive them. With three more k´otows, they retired.

"The mandarin in charge of the incense now carried a box full of incense to the incense-stand, placed it gently there, and withdrew.

"The bearers of the prayer-scrolls then left the edifice by the central door, the stand containing the incense preceding them, and that which contains the silken scrolls following behind. The Chief of the Court of Sacrifice, kneeling, informed the Emperor that this part of the solemn rite was over.

"His Majesty mounted his sedan-chair again, and returned to the Palace.

"The clock struck 9 a.m., and the Emperor, in dragon robe and a cap of ermine surmounted by a knob of crimson velvet, issued from the Palace gate called the Pure Heaven Gate, seated in a summer chair borne by eight men. Passing successively through the back left gate, the centre left gate, and the Gate of Great Harmony, he arrived at the Mid-day Gate, where he descended from his sedan-chair, and ascended his great jade palanquin, borne on the shoulders of thirty-two men. As he mounted, the equerries-in-waiting held a vermilion ladder or flight of steps, leading up to the palanquin, to assist him in getting in. All the bearers were dressed in outer robes of red silk and inner robes of ash-coloured linen. On their feet were fast-walking boots of the same grey material, with thin soles, the upper part round the ankles being of black fur. They wore caps of leopard-skins, dappled as if with coins of gold, with red velvet plumes, kept in position by gold filigree plates, from which floated yellow feathers down their backs. The palanquin is eight feet high, and weighs about 1 ton 16 cwt.; but the bearers walked swiftly under its weight, like lightning-flashes or shooting stars rushing across the sky, and at every five hundred yards they were relieved by a fresh set of thirty-two men.

"When the Emperor ascended the great jade palanquin, the sedan with its eight bearers still followed him. Beside the palanquin walked two of the Chief Equerries to support it.

"Ahead of this stately procession rolled the five gigantic cars, ordinarily drawn by elephants, which animals were this year absent from the fête by permission of the Emperor, to whom the danger of their suddenly getting ungovernable had been pointed out.

"Behind the Imperial palanquin were marching ten men armed with spears hung with leopards' tails, ten men with swords, and a dozen men carrying bows and arrows, all representatives of the Tartar corps of the Body-guard.

"Behind them came walking about a hundred of the highest Manchu nobility, Princes, Emirs, sons of Emirs, Dukes, Marquises, and Earls, Assistant Chamberlains (who command in turn the Palace Guard), General Officers of the Brigade of Imperial Guards, the Comptroller of the Household, and the Prince of the Imperial blood who, as President of the Clan Court, preserves the Genealogical Record or Family Roll of the Ta Tsing Dynasty, all armed either with bows and arrows or with large swords. As soon as this noble company arrived outside of the Middle Gate, they all mounted their chargers, having before that been obliged to walk on foot.

"The rear was brought up by two Assistant Chamberlains, with their suite, bearing two immense yellow dragon standards.

"Outside the Mid-day Gate were kneeling a great number of civil and military mandarins in Court dresses, who may not accompany the procession, being not of sufficiently high rank, and so pay their respects to it thus as it defiles past.

"The stone road to the Temple of Heaven, which is about two and a half miles long, although not yet mended with stones as intended, looked neat, with all its inequalities hidden under a uniform covering of yellow soil. At the mouth of every road or street, whether within the wall of Peking or outside it, which ran into the route of the procession at right angles to its course, were mat sheds, draped outside with blue cloth, serving as tents for Chinese infantry (Green Standard), who mounted guard at each corner, armed with whips, to keep order and silence amongst the people in these streets. At every five paces of the road along which the procession passed stood a guardsman of the vanguard, in full uniform, sword by his side and whip in hand. The gates and doors of every house and shop were closed, and red silk decorations hung in festoons in front of them, all along the route; and in front of every sentry station were displayed bows and arrows, swords and spears, arranged in symmetrical order, with decorative lanterns and satin hangings. The Emperor, having arrived at the left gate of the brick wall of the Temple, exchanged his great jade palanquin for a sedan-chair with eight bearers only, and, on entering the west side of the sacred path inside the Left Gate of Prayers for the Year, descended, and on foot walked up to the Chamber of Imperial Heaven, holding a stick of incense burning in his hand in the prescribed manner, after which he inspected the victims (oxen, etc.) laid out there, the sacrificial vessels of bamboo and wood, and, returning to the west side of the sacred road, got into his sedan-chair again, went out at the Gate of Prayers for the Year, and repaired to the Hall of Abstinence, to pass a season in holy contemplation in the Immeasurable Chamber.

"The duty of patrolling the Temple of Heaven, etc., devolves upon the Princes of the Blood on these occasions. But Princes descended from chiefs of the Manchu Dynasty before their conquest of China, accompanied by the Emperor's aide-de-camp, the Chief of the Eunuchs, and other officers, kept patrol outside the apartment, when the Emperor, in the Immeasurable Chamber of his Hall of Abstinence, at four o'clock in the morning, commanded supper, which was duly served by the gentlemen-in-waiting, whilst the bronze statue bearing on its head the inscription 'Abstinence' was set up, fronting his Majesty as he sat.

"The Chief of the Court of Sacrifice, already mentioned, had arranged a prayer-mat on the ground outside the Chamber of Prayers for the Year, and had set up the Tablet of Shang Ti (the Supreme God) in the interior of the Chamber, facing south, with, on the right and left, the Tablets of the Emperor's Ancestors, facing east and west respectively. A great curtain had been hung up outside the door of the Chamber.

"The Emperor, in his sacrificial vestments embroidered with the golden dragon, a Court cap of white ermine on his head, surmounted with an immense pearl set in a gold ornament representing nine dragons, and a necklace of one hundred and eight precious pearls round his neck, issued from the Hall of Abstinence at the appointed hour, riding in a summer sedan-chair borne by eight men, entered the Temple, and reached the Left Gate of Prayers for the Year through the west gate of the brick wall of the Temple. Here alighting, he walked into the Chamber of Prayers for the Year, and adored Shang Ti (Supreme Ruler) and his own august ancestors. The animal victims and the sacrificial vessels of various sorts were here already laid out in the prescribed order.

"The Reader of Prayers knelt in front of his Majesty, holding up the prayer-scroll in both hands, and reverentially recited the prayer. As it was still dark inside the building, another official of the Court of Sacrifice knelt beside him with a candle to throw a clear light on the written words of the prayer. When the prayer had been read, the Emperor knelt three times, nine times k`otowing, then rose again to his feet. The incense-bearer brought the incense, the winecup-bearer brought the cup, the silk-bearer the silk, and the official with the cushion spread it on the floor. The Master of the Ceremonies then ushered his Majesty to his place. The Emperor knelt again thrice, and k`otowed nine times, and when he rose again the musicians played three antique airs.

"The paper ingots and the offerings of food from the carcases of the animal victims were held up and presented, as prescribed by ancient forms. Officers of the Board of Ceremonies, of the Court of Sacrificial Worship, and of the Court of Imperial Entertainments, holding respectively in both hands the prayer-scroll, the silken prayer-scrolls, and the incense-case, advanced to the great incense-burner, and solemnly burned all these objects to ashes. The Chief of the Court of Sacrificial Worship then knelt, and announced to the Emperor that the ceremony was finished.

"His Majesty, ascending the summer sedan-chair, returned to his chamber in the Hall of Abstinence, to change his attire and have some repose. Then getting into his palanquin again, he was carried through the inner and the outer gates of the Temple, the State musicians performing an ancient melody. The cortège, in the same order as before, passed through the Cheng Yang Gate, and the Emperor burned incense in the Buddhist Temple and the Temple of Kwan Ti (the God of War). There Taoist priests in full attire knelt to receive him at the left of the entrance. When this ceremony was finished, the Emperor passed through the Ta Tsing Gate, the music ceasing as the bell tolled out from over the Mid-day Gate. Passing through the T`ien Ngan Gate, the Tuan Gate, the Mid-day and the T`ai Hwo Gates, and the Chien Tsing Gate, he returned to his Palace in Peking, and the procession dispersed.

"The Emperor entered the Palace, paid his respects to the aged Empress, and went to his Cabinet.

"The knowledge that our Emperor thus worships the gods and reveres his ancestors so devoutly, and prays for the people that they may be fed and clothed, well protected, and happy all over the land, must surely fill us with loyalty and admiration for his august person."

LATE VICEROY TSO TSUNG-TANG.

On March 2nd of the same year it is recorded that "the Emperor went at 2.20 p.m. in a sedan-chair to the Pavilion of Purple Light, where, seated under a yellow silken canopy, he enjoyed the sight of the Mongol Princes partaking of the banquet which had been laid out for them by his orders, including milk-wine (koumis) and milk-tea. Eight champion wrestlers then had a few bouts at this sport, the winners obtaining prizes of silk and meats and wine. The soldiers' trained horses and camels then were put through some circus tricks, and there was fencing with sword and spear. After this the visitors were entertained with Mahomedan songs by the Mahomedan camp, and with an exhibition of pole-climbing and tightrope-walking, music by a trained band, horseraces, and singing-boys, concluding with a fine display of fireworks. The Mongol Princes, rising from their places at the end, respectfully thanked his Majesty for his kindness to them, and the Emperor returned to his Palace in his chair at about a quarter to five.

"When the Mongol Princes come to Court at Peking from their country every year, they are presented by the Emperor with several hundreds of rolls of silk, and also with a sum of about £685 for travelling expenses, issued from the Board of Revenue through the Colonial Office. In case the Board of Revenue does not issue this money in time for the strangers to receive it before they start, the Colonial Office is empowered to issue it in advance, sending in an account to the Board of how it was distributed, as a mark of consideration for men from afar."

In 1891 a Chinese paper gives us a list of the china sent from the great porcelain works at King-teh-chen, near Kiukiang, for the Imperial household: "The usual supply for the year comprised 80 pieces of the finest quality and 1,204 round articles of a high-class kind. In addition to this there was a special indent for 1,414 plates, dishes, cups, and vases, to be distributed as presents on the occasion of the Emperor's birthday. The total cost amounted to £4,000; and as the yearly allowance is £1,500, there is a debit balance of £2,500, which will be deducted from the surplus remaining over from previous years."

In 1890 the Peking Gazette tells us that "Yu Hsiu, the director of the Imperial silk factories at Nanking, etc., applies for an extension of the time originally allowed him wherein to execute a special order for certain goods which the Emperor intends to distribute as presents. He states that in the eighth moon he received an order through the Office of Supernumeraries for embroidered robes, large and small rolls of satin and silk gauze, amounting in all to 4,183 pieces, to be ready for delivery in two months' time. As these are intended for presents, he naturally must devote all his time and attention thereto, and endeavour to have them ready as soon as possible; but he would point out that, of the embroidered robes, there are 210 requiring very careful fine work, and of the other articles 3,970 pieces of different patterns, forming a very large total, to complete which his machinery is inadequate. Under these circumstances, and considering that the appointed time for delivery is close at hand, he is afraid he will be unable to execute the order by the end of the tenth moon.

"The necessary funds for carrying on the work he estimates at £19,500, and he will, in concert with the Governor of the province, take measures to have this amount collected as soon as possible. He proposes, in the first instance, to raise the sum of £10,000, and at once set to work on the ceremonial robes; and some of the satin, together with the silk, he hopes to be able to deliver within the year as a first instalment. The remainder of the order he trusts will be ready by the spring. By this means he will have adequate funds to carry on the work as required, and greater care can be devoted to the finish of the various articles. As, however, he dare not do this on his own responsibility, he would ask the Imperial sanction to execute the order in the manner proposed.—Granted. Let the Yamen concerned take note."

In 1891 it is again the Peking Gazette that tells us on May 1st: "Of the one hundred and thirteen Manchu ladies presented to the Empress-Dowager to be selected as maids of honour, thirty-three were chosen and distributed about the Palace to learn their duties. Thirty were ordered to be placed on the list of expectants. The rest were sent back to their families, carrying with them gifts of much value."

Again the Peking Gazette tells us in 1891: "It is a long-standing custom of China in the spring of each year for the Emperor to perform the ceremony of offering a sacrifice to the Patron Saint of Agriculture, and for the Empress to offer a similar one to the Patron Saint of Silkworms. By these means it is intended to encourage agriculture and sericulture in the empire. The first sacrifice to the Patron Saint of Agriculture since the death of the Emperor Tung Chih was offered last spring by the present Emperor, who had not until that time taken over the reins of government. The fourth day of the third moon of the present year was appointed for offering a sacrifice to the Patron Saint of Sericulture. As her Majesty was wearing mourning for the late Prince Ch`ün, two maids of honour of the first grade were ordered to act on her behalf."

Prince Ch`ün was the father of the Emperor, a man held in high esteem; and of him the Peking Gazette says in 1891: "His innate humility and modesty made him receive such favours with ever-increasing awe and respect. He never once availed himself of the privilege which we granted him of using an apricot-yellow chair and, quoting the precedent established in the case of the Palace of Perpetual Harmony, he reverentially begged that his Palace, which had the good fortune to be the birthplace of an Emperor, should be reclaimed by the State."

In the photographs extant it may be noticed the youthful Emperor greatly resembles his father in appearance.

As giving a little further insight into the mediæval usages still observed in the Court at Peking, it may be interesting to notice that in 1891, "after the Clear-Bright Festival, the Court of Feasting, in accordance with the usual custom, presented forty different kinds of vegetables, such as cucumbers, French beans, cabbages, etc., to the Throne, for the use of the Imperial tables"; whilst the following extracts from different Chinese newspapers show some of the troubles of the Palace.

In 1891 the Hupao records: "The Imperial hunting preserves are outside the Yungting Gate of Peking. The park is twelve miles in extent, and contains trees of great size, hundreds of years old. It is stocked with wild animals of varied descriptions; predominating among them is the red-deer. As for the last twenty years no hunt has been organised [poor young Emperor never allowed to go out!], the game have greatly increased in numbers. The soldiers who keep guard over the place daily poach on the preserves, and of late the inhabitants round about the place have managed somehow to get within the walls and trap the deer. The market is full of red-deer meat, which the dealers term donkey flesh or beef, to evade inquiries on the part of the police. The authorities have finally got wind of the matter, and by strict watching caught three poachers, who have been handed over to the Board of Punishments. The guards have received a severe reprimand and stringent orders to prevent further poaching."

In old days the Manchus were a great hunting race, but they seem to have lost all manliness, all the men now vegetating upon the pensions assigned them since the conquest of China. But the Empress-Dowager, whom Chang-chih-tung, the incorruptible Viceroy of Hupeh, has openly accused of intercepting and appropriating to her own uses the money voted for the army and navy, continues to enjoy herself. And again a Chinese newspaper records: "The Empress-Dowager lately paid a visit to the garden built for her by the present Emperor, and took a trip on the Kun-ming Lake in a steam-launch." Whilst the Shenpao relates: "More than twenty large firms have taken over contracts for finishing the Eho Palace gardens, which have been built by the Emperor as a place of recreation for the Empress-Dowager, after her retirement from managing the arduous affairs of State. Her Majesty prefers to visit and stay in them during the summer, and the time appointed to have the gardens in a complete state for her reception is very near. More than ten thousand workmen have been engaged to hasten the work. Of these, three thousand or more are carvers, who have caused much trouble while working in other portions of the Imperial Palace ere this. Knowing that the date for completing the gardens was near at hand, they struck for higher wages, and in this demand all the carpenters joined. They were receiving individually three meals and about eightpence per diem. They demanded half a crown a day. On their employers refusing to comply with this exorbitant request, a signal gun, previously agreed upon, was fired, and thousands of workmen, carvers, carpenters, and masons began to make threatening demonstrations. The officials on guard, finding the police unable to cope with the multitude, especially as the carpenters were armed with axes, quickly sounded the alarm, calling on the rifle brigade, Yuen-ming-yuen guards, and cavalry for assistance. These came with all speed and surrounded the strikers. The officials and the head firms now began to negotiate, and all parties were satisfied with an increase of 8d. a day for each man."

Strikes and riots, indeed, it seems of late years have not been infrequent in Peking; and this account of Tientsin workmen may well follow here, as showing what has to be contended with:

"The Tientsin workmen engaged in the manufacture of iron rice-pans are, as a rule, desperate and lawless characters. They are divided into clans, and fighting seems to be their only pastime. When a row or a fire occurs, they are the first to be on the spot, quarrelling and fighting. Laws are inadequate to restrain them. Their motto is 'Death before cowardice,' and to their credit it must be said that even under the most harrowing tortures none of them have ever been known to cry for mercy. Any one showing weakness under physical suffering is boycotted by the rest of the gang; and he being a rowdy, and knowing no better, feels abjectly humiliated thereby, and considers life but a void when burdened by the curses of his sworn brethren. The authorities take great pains in putting down such lawlessness, but their efforts so far have not resulted in much success, as will be seen from the following occurrence. Some time during last winter a quarrel broke out between the patrolmen on one side and the rice-pan workmen on the other or east side of the river. The quarrel did not at first produce a fight, but sowed the seeds of hatred and thought of vengeance on the part of the rowdies. The New Year festivities seemed to reconcile all parties; but soon mistrust and suspicion again revived, and both sides prepared for battle. Great vigilance was observed, and they slept, as it were, with swords and spears ready by their sides. Such a state of things could not continue long. About a week ago, one cold and stormy night, about twelve o'clock, a band of rowdies five hundred strong, fully equipped, marched by stealth to the quarters of the guards, who were then all out on duty. The rowdies had the whole place to themselves. They tore down the barracks, seized the arms, and destroyed all personal effects. Leaving ruin and devastation in their wake, they turned their steps homewards, but were pursued and overtaken by the guards, who gathered to the number of several hundreds. A skirmish followed, resulting in the utter rout of the rowdies. Two of them were captured and several were wounded. The guards suffered also to some extent. When the soldiers from the garrison camps came upon the scene, both parties had disappeared."

The Tientsin men throughout the empire are known as rowdies, but the rowdies of the streets of Peking (possibly originally from Tientsin) are certainly the worst.

There are only two other men, who can be compared in position with the Emperor of China. One is the Emperor of Russia, also now a young man; the other is the Dalai Lama, popularly reputed to be never allowed to live beyond a certain very youthful age. The Peking Gazette of July 5th, 1891, says: "Sheng-tai, the Resident in Tibet, reports the fact that on the fifth day of the first moon of the present year the Dalai Lama did, in accordance with immemorial usage, descend from the mountain, and, accompanied by a large body of priests, proceed to the great shrine and offer up prayers for the welfare of the nation. Memorialist furnished him with a body-guard for his protection. The Dalai Lama appears to be able to keep his men well under control, and it is satisfactory to be able to report that throughout Tibet everything is in a peaceful condition."

Considering the case of these exalted personages, we may easily indulge in the somewhat hackneyed thankfulness that our lot has placed us in some humbler sphere. But just as it often seems to me in England, the poor rich get left out by all teachers, preachers, or other apostles of glad tidings; so let us at least not pass by on the other side, like the Pharisee of old, but pause to breathe a prayer for the three young men appointed, not by themselves, Emperor of Russia, Emperor of China, and Dalai Lama of Tibet!

CHAPTER II.
THE EMPRESS, THE EMPEROR, AND THE AUDIENCE.

A Concubine no Empress.—Sudden Deaths.—Suspicions.—Prince Ch`ün.—Emperor's Education.—His Sadness.—His Features.—Foreign Ministers' Audience.—Another Audience.—Crowding of the Rabble.—Peking's Effect on Foreign Representatives.

According to Chinese usage or unwritten law, the concubine of an Emperor can never become Empress-Dowager; yet Tze Hsi, the concubine of the Emperor Hien Fêng, and mother of the late Emperor Tung Chih, has ruled over China in this capacity since 1871. For a time she nominally shared the power with Tze An, the childless widow of the Emperor Hien Fêng. In like manner for a while the youthful Kwang-shü, her step-sister's son, has been nominal Emperor. But the ease with which she resumed the reins in September, 1898, sufficiently shows that she had never really let go of them. Tze, which was also the name of the late Empress Tze An, means "parental love," whilst An means "peace." Hsi, the second name of the present Empress, means "joy," and is pronounced she. Tze Hsi is undoubtedly a remarkable woman. Besides having directed the destinies of China for twenty-seven years, without being in the least entitled to do so, she is said to be a brilliant artist, often giving away her pictures; and she also writes poetry, having even presented six hundred stanzas of her poetry to the Hanlin College. Some people suspect her of having been instrumental in causing the death of the Emperor Hien Fêng, as also of his and her son Tung Chih. She is more than suspected of having caused the death of her sister, the mother of the Emperor Kwang-shü. The two ladies had a violent altercation about the upbringing of the child, and two days after his mother died—of pent-up anger in the heart, it was announced. The beautiful Aleute, widow of her son Tung Chih, certainly died by her own hand, which is considered a very righteous act on the part of a widow; but had her mother-in-law, the Empress Tze Hsi, not thought that she might become a dangerous rival, probably Aleute would not have killed herself.

EMPEROR KWANG-SHÜ, 1875.
Lent by Society for Diffusion of Christian and General Knowledge in China.

It is of course well known that Kwang-shü was not the natural successor to Tung Chih. He was simply chosen as Emperor by his ambitious aunt because he was the very youngest person who had any claim, and she thus secured to herself a longer lease of power. Her sister was notoriously averse to it, and the little Kwang-shü was stolen by the Empress Tze Hsi from his cradle to bear the burden of an honour unto which he was not born. The child is reported to have cried. He was then four years old. His father was the poetical Prince Ch`ün, who made one great tour, and wrote a collection of poems on the novel objects he saw during his travels. An Englishman, who knew him, describes him as rather jovial than otherwise, but his portrait hardly confirms this description. He was certainly respected during his lifetime, and after his death, as before mentioned, he was extolled in the Peking Gazette for the meekness with which he had abstained from arrogating to himself high place, in spite of being the father of an Emperor. Probably, however, his life would have ended sooner if he had, and he knew it. As it was, there were suspicious circumstances about his death, as some people thought there were about that of the Marquis Tseng, a former Chinese Minister very popular in England, whilst he resided here. Dr. Dudgeon, years ago a member of the London Mission, was his medical adviser, and he himself relates how Li Hung-chang, celebrated for his abrupt speeches, accosted him with, "Well, and how much did you get for poisoning the Marquis Tseng?" "I poison the Marquis Tseng! That was very foolish of me, considering he was my best-paying patient." Then, after a pause, "But if I did, how much was it your Excellency paid me to put him out of the way?" Li Hung-chang lay back in his chair and chuckled, not offended but delighted with the retort. But although the Marquis Tseng, there is every reason to suppose, died of illness, it seems impossible to say so of Prince Kung, who opposed the policy of the Empress Tze Hsi, and died almost directly afterwards, as was again said, of pent-up anger.

The quarrel between the Empress and her sister was about the method of education of the youthful Kwang-shü. The former is openly accused of having taught him to play cards and drink wine. And the marvel is, not that Kwang-shü is a young man of weak physique, and lacking in the characteristics of a Cromwell or a Bismarck, but that he is, in spite of all, a young man with aspirations and a real wish for his country's good. During all my stay in China I have never heard one single story to his disadvantage, except that at one time people had an idea he was subject to epileptic fits, which seems not to have been true, and that ten or twelve years ago I have heard it said that at times he had ungovernable fits of rage, during which he would throw anything that came handy at the heads of those who opposed him. This may have been true—he was but a boy at the time—but the story has never been confirmed, nor were those who told it the least confident that it was true. From Chinese I have heard but one account: "The Emperor is good. But what can he do?" Of the Empress, on the other hand, there seems but one opinion—that she loves money. Sometimes people add that she has taken with ardour to gambling. But never have I heard any Chinaman suggest that she had the least care of any sort for the interests of China or the Chinese. They do not speak of her as clever. They speak of her generally in connection with Li Hung-chang, the unscrupulous; and they shake their heads over them both. According to report, she has a piercing eye. But a lady, who had been some years in the Palace embroidering, seemed surprised at hearing this, and implied that she had never noticed it.

I have heard many descriptions of the young Kwang-shü. They all agree on one point—that he looks sorrowful. "Very sorrowful?" I asked the other day of an Englishman, who had seen him just before his deposition. "Yes, very sorrowful." "Sick and sorrowful? or more sorrowful than sick?" "More sorrowful than sick." A private letter I once saw, written by a man fresh from being present at an audience, gave the impression of his being altogether overcome by the youthful Emperor's sadness, which, as far as I remember, was described as a cloud, that seemed to envelop him, and remove him from the rest of the world. This sadness seemed to be heightened by an extreme sweetness of disposition. The youthful Emperor smiled on seeing the beautifully illuminated book in which the German address of congratulation was presented, looked at it for a moment, then laid it down, and once more was so full of sorrow it was impossible to contemplate him without emotion. If my memory serves me, the writer used stronger, more high-flown expressions than I am daring to make use of. Repeating them at the time to the Secretary who had accompanied the British Minister, I asked him if the Emperor had made at all the same impression upon him. He paused a moment, looking grave; then said firmly, "Yes, I think quite the same."

Here is an extract from an account written on the occasion of the audience of the Diplomatic Corps in 1891:

"All interest, however, centred in the Emperor himself. He looks younger even than he is, not more than sixteen or seventeen. Although his features are essentially Chinese, or rather Manchu, they wear a particular air of personal distinction. Rather pale and dark, with a well-shaped forehead, long, black, arched eyebrows, large, mournful, dark eyes, a sensitive mouth, and an unusually long chin, the young Emperor, together with an air of great gentleness and intelligence, wore an expression of melancholy, due, naturally enough, to the deprivation of nearly all the pleasures of his age and to the strict life which the hard and complicated duties of his high position force him to lead. As he sat cross-legged, the table in front hid the lower part of his person. In addressing Prince Ch´ün, he spoke in Manchu rather low and rapidly, being perhaps a little nervous."

And now it may be well to give a translation of the best account I know, that of the Ost Asiatische Lloyd, of the audience of the Foreign Ministers in Peking at the celebration of the sixtieth birthday of the Empress-Dowager.

"Early in the present month the Representatives of the Treaty Powers in Peking were officially informed by Prince Kung, the new President of the Tsung-li Yamen, that the Emperor desired to receive the Foreign Ministers in audience in celebration of the sixtieth birthday of the Empress ex-Regent; and, further, that, as a special mark of good-will, the audience would be held within the precincts of the Inner Palace—i.e. in the so-called 'Forbidden City.' This audience took place on Monday, November 12th.

"The theatre of this solemn function of State was the Hall of Blooming Literature, a somewhat ancient building in the south-east quarter of the Palace, which is used for the annual Festival of Literature, held in the second month, on which occasion the Emperor receives addresses on the Classics from distinguished members of the Hanlin College. According to a Japanese work, entitled A Description of Famous Places in the Land of Tang (i.e. China), which gives an illustrated description of the ceremony, all the Presidents and Vice-Presidents of the different Ministries in Peking, as well as high office-bearers, have then to be present.

"On the present occasion the Representatives of the Foreign Powers and their suites entered by the Eastern Flowery Gate, which is the sole entrance in the east wall of the Inner Palace. The sedans were left there, and the visitors proceeded on foot through a wide walled-in courtyard, past the Palace garden, to the Hall of Manifested Benevolence, a smaller threefold building in which formerly offerings were made to the mythical Emperors and to the ancient worthies, and which was utilised on this occasion as waiting-room for the Ambassadors. These were now received by the Princes and Ministers of the Tsung-li Yamen, and thence conducted, after a short delay, through the Wen-hua pavilion. From there the Envoys and their suites were conducted to the audience chamber by two Palace officials, and then led to the throne by two Ministers of the Tsung-li Yamen. At twenty minutes before twelve o'clock the doyen of the Diplomatic Corps, the Ambassador of the United States, was presented, while the others followed in order of seniority. The remainder of the ceremony was carried out as at previous audiences. The Ambassador, followed by his suite, approached the dais with three bows, and saluted the Emperor seated thereon at the top of a flight of steps: he then spoke a few words commemorating the solemn occasion. The letter of felicitation from his sovereign was then handed in, after each respective Embassy interpreter had translated it into Chinese; it was then taken by Prince Kung or Prince Ch`ing, who stood at the Emperor's side and acted alternately with each presentation, and translated by them into Manchu. The Prince in question then laid the letter on a table covered with yellow silk before the Emperor. The monarch inclined his head as he received it, then spoke a few sentences in an audible tone to the Prince kneeling at his left, in which he expressed his delight and satisfaction. The Prince, after leaving the dais, repeated the Emperor's words in Chinese to the interpreter, who again repeated them in the language of his country to the Ambassador.

"This completed the audience: the Ambassador left the hall bowing, with the same ceremonies, and conducted as on entering. Oriental ceremonial was thus conspicuously and worthily maintained.

"The Wen-hua-tien has three entrances in its southern wall, led up to by three flights of stone steps: as long as the Ambassador was the bearer of the Imperial handwriting, he was given the most honoured way of approach, that is, the great central staircase and the centre door, which otherwise are only made use of by the Emperor in person; the exits were made through the side door on the left.

"The proceedings were characterised by a distinct majesty of demeanour. As mentioned above, the Emperor was seated on a raised dais at a table hung with yellow silk; behind him were the customary paraphernalia—the screen and the peacock fan; at his right stood two Princes of the Imperial House; at his left the Prince of Ke Chin and Prince Kung or Prince Ch`ing. In the hall itself two lines of guards carrying swords were formed up, behind which stood eunuchs and Palace officers. The most interesting feature in the whole ceremony was of course the person of the youthful monarch, clad in a sable robe and wearing the hat of State. His unusually large brilliant black eyes gave a wonderfully sympathetic aspect to his mild, almost childish countenance, increased, if anything, by the pallor due to a recent fever.

"Upon leaving the hall of audience, a strikingly picturesque scene disclosed itself. On either side (i.e. east and west, from the open staircase leading south) were displayed the long rows of the Palace gardens in form of a hollow bow. In front and rear swarms of officials were moving about, clad in long robes, with the square, many-coloured emblems of their respective ranks embroidered on them behind and before; with all their air of business no haste or hurry could be perceived. Everything was being done in the solemn and majestic manner characteristic of the Chinese official style. Turning to the right, one noticed, at the extreme edge of the wide court, the high wall covered with glazed yellow tiles which encloses the long row of the central halls of the Palace, and again to the south of these the threefold Tso-yi-men, or 'Left Gate of Righteousness,' and beyond that, but towering far above it, the mighty construction of the Tai-ho Hall, which by its architectural features is the most conspicuous building in the whole Imperial City. As in everything Chinese, the effect was produced not so much by the execution of the details as by the vastness of the proportions and the majesty of the surroundings.

"The Wen-hua-tien itself is an old building, sixty or more feet in width and of almost the same depth, which had been arranged as well as might be for the occasion. The entrance was adorned with silken hangings and rosettes, and pillars had been erected on the stone staircases adorned with dragons, with yellow silk wound round them; the centre steps and the floor were carpeted. It cannot, however, be denied that the Wen-hua-tien is not comparable either with the Cheng-kuang-tien or the Tze-kuang-ko, the two halls in which the former audiences were held, either in size or in its internal arrangements. On the other hand, we cannot sufficiently congratulate ourselves on the fact of the Chinese Court having at last resolved to open the door of the 'Inner Palace' to the Foreign Representatives. These doors have been so long and anxiously guarded, that it was a hard matter for the Court to give way in the weary discussions over the audience question—how hard may be inferred from the number of years it has taken to bring about this final solution."

PRINCE KUNG.
By Mr. J. Thomson.

An account of another audience, given at the time in the Chinese Times, since defunct, but then published at Tientsin, the nearest Treaty Port to Peking, gives a few details that are perhaps the more interesting from their contrast with the very careful account above quoted, obviously written by a gentleman connected with Diplomacy:

"When the procession reached the North Gate, leading into the garden near the Marble Bridge, the Ministers and others left their chairs and proceeded on foot to a kind of small pavilion, where a collation was served, and where the party waited an hour surrounded by mandarins and a crowd of roughs—chair-coolies (not those of the Legations, who had been left outside), workmen, gardeners, porters, and coolies—who peered in at the windows, and even allowed themselves to make digital examination of the uniforms and decorations of the Ministers. After a lapse of an hour the party were conducted into three tents erected at the foot of the steps of the Tze-kuang-ko, where, divided into three groups—Ministers, attachés, and interpreters—they remained half an hour. Then the Emperor arrived, and M. Von Brandt was the first to enter the presence, where he remained exactly five minutes, all ceremonies included. He was followed by the other Ministers in turn, the audience occupying barely five minutes for each. Then the suites of the Ministers entered, in three ranks. Three salvoes were given on entrance and three on retiring, backwards.

"The audience itself was conducted as follows: M. Von Brandt, the German Minister, delivered a very short speech in English, which M. Popoff, Russian, translated into Chinese; Prince Ch`ing repeated it, kneeling, in Manchu, at the foot of the throne. The Emperor said a few prepared words in reply, which were translated in the reverse order, and the Ministers retired. The Emperor was at a distance of seven or eight yards from the Europeans, raised on a dais with a table in front of him. Behind him stood the Pao-wang and the Ko-wang; at the foot of the dais Prince Ch`ing; and on either side soldiers with side arms. The hall was not a large one; the Europeans were placed near the centre, between two pillars. The rabble crowded up the steps of the Tze-kuang-ko, and no order was kept."

This crowding of the rabble is eminently Chinese, as also that no steps were taken to save the Representatives of the various countries of Europe from the impertinent and dirty hands of workmen and coolies. It is extraordinary to think of European diplomatists submitting to it. Of course they would not have done so, but for the mutual jealousies among themselves. It is this that always gives China her advantage. It is also remarkable that Herr von Brandt should have spoken in English, a fact ignored in German newspapers, although it must have been prearranged, and doubtless after much consideration. But the fact that all this assemblage of Ministers Plenipotentiary with attendant secretaries allowed a Chinese rabble thus to insult them in their official capacity will perhaps make intelligible in England, why our hearts often grow hot within us, while sojourning in China, and our cheeks sometimes burn with shame for our country, which we know to be so strong, and which allows itself at times to be so humiliated by a nation, that naturally becomes more arrogant, seeing itself allowed thus to act. I do not know who the writer of the following poem is; but he expresses my feelings with more calm and dignity than I could myself; therefore I hope he will not be displeased by my quoting it.

THE GREAT WALL.
By Mr. Stratford Dugdale.

"SIC TRANSIT."

March 6th, 1897.

I.

'Tis said it was the spirit of the land

That grew upon them—they were mostly men

Of birth and culture, whom their native states

Had chosen to send forth, ambassadors!

From many a favoured shore where truth and light

Had made their home, where peaceful arts had shed

Their brightest rays; from fields of classic song

Whose softening accents ring from age to age,

They came to far Cathay—a little band

Prepared to bear the torch of progress on

And carry it throughout that heathen land.

'Twas with the noblest purpose they had left

Such shores as none could leave without regret,

Where every passing day can stir the pulse

With throbs unknown to Oriental sloth:

So all their peers had bade them speed and give

Fair promise of the deeds that they should do;

How, like their forbears, they should help to clear

A way through ignorance and vicious pride

To harmony—and better thus the world.

II.

But to each one it fell (we know not how;

'Tis said it was the spirit of that land)

That soon his pristine ardour died away;

It seemed almost as if the mouldering walls

Of that Peking, which typifies decay,

Shut out all purpose, shutting in the man—

As if each roof, in that foul street, where lodge

The envoys of proud states, had thrown the shade

Of apathy on those, who dwelt below,

To rob them of their power and their will.

It was as though o'er all the city's gates all hope

Of fruitful work left those, who entered there;

It was a piteous thing to see the ebb

Of energy and zeal, to mark the growth

Of passive rust on minds, that once were keen.

As pebbles taken from the running brook

Lose all their brightness 'neath th' insidious moss,

So, 'neath the flagstaffs of the greatest powers,

In men (who loved these flags for all they told

Of chivalry and honour, right and truth)

Grew up a tolerance of ways Chinese,

A certain toying with the flight of Time,

With jugglery of words, and willingness

To let things right themselves; then later still

It seemed as if the mind of petty trade,

Haggling and bargains (which be as the breath

Of China's nostrils), crept into their souls,

So that, forgetting all their nobler aims,

Each sought to introduce cheap cloth and iron nails.

III.

'Twas to this weak, ignoble end they lost

Their unity, competing one and all,

While Chinese "diplomats" were still and smiled,

And China's monarch held them all to be

Barbarians, unfit to see his face.

'Twas pitiful to see the highest aims

Give way before base purposes of greed,

To watch the little path, that had been won

By sturdy valour of the foremost few,

Grow thick and tangled by the many weeds

Of late diplomacy: to see the loss

Of early treaties in these latter days.

IV.

Like sparrows that have found a blinded hawk,

Grew insolent apace, and year by year

Respect and wholesome fear gave way to scorn.

The common herd, not slow to ape the moods

Of those above them, met with sullen looks,

Hustlings, and jeers the strangers in their midst;

Then, as it seemed, the passive spirit grew

With every insult, words gave place to deeds,

Till fire and plunder were the common lot

Of unprotected merchants and their wares.

And still their leaders slept; at times it seemed

(When some new outrage made the country ring)

As if the spell must break and wrath be roused

With strength to crush all China at a blow.

But well the wily Mongol played his game

With honeyed speech and temporising gifts:

And ever came the necessary sop—

Some contract, loan, monopoly, or pact—

At sight of which all wrongs were laid aside,

And men who had "full powers" used them not,

Forgetting the traditions of their race.

And thus things went from bad to worse, while men

Sat sadly wondering what the end would be,

And at their parlous state, of which no cause

They knew, except the spirit of the land.

But of those latter days, and what befell

Leaders and led, not mine to-day to tell.

Q.

INCENSE-BURNER.

CHAPTER III.
SOLIDARITY, CO-OPERATION, AND IMPERIAL FEDERATION.

Everybody Guaranteed by Somebody Else.—Buying back Office.—Family Responsibilities.—Guilds.—All Employés Partners.—Antiquity of Chinese Reforms.—To each Province so many Posts.—Laotze's Protest against Unnecessary Laws.—Experiment in Socialism.—College of Censors.—Tribunal of History.—Ideal in Theory.

Possibly that state of society in which the individual is the unit is a more advanced form of civilisation; but it is impossible to understand China unless it be first realised that the individual life is nothing there, and that the family is the unit; and yet further, that no one stands alone in China, as is so painfully the case in England, but that every one is responsible for some one else, guaranteed by some one else. And here, to those who wish to read a really exact, circumstantial account of the Chinese and their ways, let me recommend John Chinaman, by the Rev. George Cockburn, quite the best book I have read on the subject, and one that deserves a wider circulation than it has attained, being written in terse, epigrammatic English, with a flavour of Tacitus about it. Alas! the writer is no more,—a silent, reserved, black-browed Scotchman, with a fervour of missionary zeal glowing under a most impassive exterior. The riot, in which all our own worldly goods in China were destroyed, wrecked for ever the nervous system of his strong, handsome, brave young wife. And what with that and the details of daily life, all laid upon the shoulders of a man by nature a student and a visionary, he left China, and soon after passed away beyond the veil, where, if we share the Chinese belief, let us trust his spirit is gladdened by words of appreciation of the one little volume in which he embodied the fruits of years of work and thought in China, dying, as far as I remember, almost as it appeared. The wreckage of missionary lives and hopes is one of the tragedies of European life in China, and one which a little more understanding and sympathy on the part of missionary boards at home might often, it would seem, avert.

But to return to the Chinese. If you engage a servant, he is secured by some one to a certain amount, and all you have to do is to ascertain whether the security is in a position to pay should the other decamp with your property, also whether a higher value is likely to be at his disposition. If yours is a well-arranged household, this head man engages the other servants and secures them, reprimanding and discharging them at his pleasure. He, of course, gets a certain amount of the wages you think you are paying them. This, in China, the land of it, is called a "squeeze." But it seems perfectly legitimate, as indeed all squeezes seem legitimate from the Chinese point of view, only sometimes carried to excess. It is the same in business. It is not quite the same in official positions, because there the Viceroy of a province pays so much to get his post, and so do the lesser officials under him. The theory in China is that superior men will always act as such, whatever their pay may be. Therefore a Chinese Viceroy of to-day receives theoretically the living wage of centuries ago. Practically he receives squeezes from every one with whom he is brought in contact, and has paid so much down to acquire the post that unless he holds it for a term of years he is out of pocket. The post of Taotai, or Governor of Shanghai, is one of the most lucrative in China. Tsai, who has made friends with all of us Europeans as no Taotai ever did before—dining out and giving dinner parties, and even balls—Tsai is known to have paid so much to obtain the post as would represent all he could hope to get in every way during two years of office: about £20,000. He was dismissed from his post November, 1898; but possibly may be able to bribe heavily enough to get it back. Li Hung-chang and his two particular dependants of former days, the late Viceroy of Szechuan, degraded because of the anti-foreign riots there, and Shêng, Chief of Telegraphs and Railways, etc., etc., have all done this again and again. When English people were laughing over Li's yellow jacket and peacock feather being taken from him, certain eunuchs of the Palace were growing rich over the process of getting them back again. The eunuch in the closest confidence of the Empress is always said to charge about £1,000 for an interview, and till lately none could be obtained but through him. When a man has enormous wealth, and is degraded, every one naturally feels it is a pity nothing should be got out of him, and he equally naturally is willing to pay much in order to be reinstated in a position to make more. Until the officials of China are properly paid, it is unreasonable to expect them to be honest. And yet some are so even now: not only Chang-chih-tung, the incorruptible Viceroy of Hupeh and Hunan, who, it may be noticed, is constantly being invited to Peking, but—never goes. But others in subordinate positions are pointed out by Chinese: "That is one of the good old school of Chinamen. He takes no bribes, and is the terror of the other officials."

In family life Chinese solidarity has its inconveniences, but it altogether prevents that painful spectacle to which people seem to have hardened their hearts in England, of sending their aged relatives to the workhouse instead of carefully tending them at home as the Chinese do, or of one brother or sister surrounded by every luxury, another haunted by the horror of creditors and with barely the necessaries of life. If you are to help your brother, you must, of course, claim a certain amount of authority over his way of life. In China the father does so; and when he dies, the elder brother sees after and orders his younger brother about; and the younger brother, as a rule, submits. In each of those large and beautiful homesteads in which Chinese live in the country, adding only an additional graceful roof-curve, another courtyard, as more sons bring home more young women to be wives in name, but in reality to be the servants-of-all-work of their mothers, and the mothers of their children—in each of these harmonious agglomerations of courtyards, it is the eldest man who directs the family councils. Thus, when a man dies, the deciding voice is for his eldest brother, not for his eldest son; than which probably no custom could tend more to conservatism, for there never comes a time when the voice of youth makes itself heard with authority.

Not only are all the members of a family thus knit together by mutual responsibilities, but families are again thus knit. It is the village elders who are responsible if any crime is committed in the district. It is they who have to discover and bring back stolen articles; it is they who have to quiet disturbances and settle disputes about boundaries. The principle of local self-government has in the course of centuries been perfected in China, where all that Mr. Ruskin aims at appears to have been attained centuries ago: village industries, local self-government, no railways, no machinery, hand labour, and each village, as far as possible each self-sufficing family, growing its own silk or cotton, weaving at home its own cloth, eating its own rice and beans, and Indian corn and pork. Schools are established by little collections of families, or tutors engaged, as the case may be. In either case the teacher is poorly paid, but meets with a respect altogether out of proportion to his salary. It is all very ideal; but the result is not perfect, human nature being what it is. In many ways, however, it appears a much happier system than our English system, and perhaps in consequence the people of China appear very contented. As a rule in the country each family tills its own bit of ground, and—where opium has not spread its poisonous influence—has held the same for centuries. The family tree is well known, and Chinese will tell you quietly "We are Cantonese," or "We are from Hunan," and only careful inquiry will elicit that their branch of the family came thence some three centuries ago.

COUNTRY HOUSE IN YANGTSE GORGES.
By Mrs. Archibald Little.

In the towns the guilds represent family life on a larger scale. A man comes from Kiangsi, let us say, to Chungking, over a thousand miles away, and having probably spent months on the journey. He has brought no letters of introduction, but he straightway goes to the guild-house of his province, with its particularly beautiful green-tiled pagoda overlooking the river, a pale-pink lantern hanging from the upturned end of each delightful roof-curve, and there, making due reverence, he relates how he is So-and-so, the son of So-and-so, and straightway every one there knows all about him, and can easily ascertain if his story be correct. Here are friends found for him at once, a free employment agency, if that is what he is after, or a bureau of information about the various businesses of the city, their solvency and the like. Here is a lovely club-house, where he can dine or be dined, have private and confidential conversations in retired nooks, or sit with all the men of his province sipping tea and eating cakes, while a play is performed before them by their own special troupe of actors, who act after the manner of their province. I do not know who first started the legend that Chinese plays last for days, if not weeks. But it is not true, any more than that green tea is rendered green by being fired in copper pans and is poison to the nerves. Tea is green by nature, though it may be rendered black by fermentation, and is always fired in iron pans; and weak green tea as drunk in China is like balm to the nerves compared to Indian tannin-strong decoctions. In like manner Chinese plays are really short, though they make up in noise for what they lack in length.

KIANGSI GUILD-HOUSE IN CHUNGKING.
By Mrs. Archibald Little.

If occasion needed, the guild would see after the newcomers funeral, even give him free burial if the worst came to the worst. And though we reckon the Chinese people such an irreligious race, and the guild-houses are naturally only frequented by men, chiefly by merchants (for the Chinese are a nation of traders), yet in every guild-house there is a temple. And before every great banquet part of the ceremony of marshalling the guests to their seats (and a very stately ceremony it is) is pouring a libation of wine before an altar in the banqueting-hall, before which also each guest bows in turn as he passes to the place assigned him.

But probably the custom that has the greatest effect upon Chinese life is that, just as twelve centuries ago they introduced competitive examinations, to which we have now in our nineteenth century of Christianity turned as to a sheet-anchor, so centuries ago the Chinese resorted to the principle of co-operation. In a Chinese business, be it large or be it small, pretty well every man in the business has his share; so that you are sometimes astonished when a merchant introduces to you as his partners a set of young men, who in England would be junior clerks. Even the coolie wrappering the tea-boxes says "We are doing well this year," and works with a will through the night, knowing he too will have his portion in the increased business this increased work signifies. The way, indeed, in which Chinese work through the night is most remarkable. Men will row a boat day and night for four or five days, knowing that the sum of money gained will thus be quicker earned, and only pausing one at a time to take a whiff at a pipe or to eat. They will press wool all through the night to oblige their employer without a murmur, if only given free meals whilst doing this additional work. The truth is, the habit of industry has been so engendered in Chinese as to be second nature, their whole system tending to encourage it, whilst ours, with our free poor-houses and licensed public-houses, tends rather in the other direction; our Trades Unions seem trying all they can to further diminish the incentives to good work on the part of skilled workmen by denying them any higher wage than that obtained by the incompetent. Co-operation after the Chinese model will, it is to be hoped, eventually put this right again. There is so much we might learn from the Chinese; but we have never followed the system we press upon Oriental nations, of sending out clever young students to other countries to see what they can learn that would be advantageous among our own people. In some ways China would serve as a warning. But a civilisation, that reached its acme while William the Norman was conquering England, and that yet survives intact, must surely have many a lesson to teach.

Besides all this mutual support and responsibility, Chinese customs are such that, as people often say somewhat sadly, you cannot alter one without altering all. The people here referred to are not the twenty-years-in-China-and-not-speak-a-word-of-the-language men, but Europeans who have tried to study the Chinese sympathetically. As it is, if you were to alter their houses and make them less draughty and damp, then all their clothing must be altered. That is again the case if you try to encourage them to play cricket—for which there is no sufficient level space in the west of China—or take part in other sports. But if you were to attempt to alter their clothing before you had rebuilt their houses, they would all be dying of dysentery or fever. In like manner, if you attempted to dragoon the Chinese into greater cleanliness, or into taking certain sanitary precautions, you would require a police force, which does not exist. But how to obtain that until you have got this self-respecting, self-governing people to see any advantage in being dragooned?

The solidarity of the Chinese race is one of the reasons it has lasted so long upon the earth, and its civilisation remained the same. It is twenty-one centuries since the Emperor Tze Hoang-ti said "Good government is impossible under a multiplicity of masters," and did away with the feudal system. It is twelve centuries since the Chinese found out what Burns only taught us the other day, that "A man's a man for a' that," and, giving up the idea of rank, began to fill posts by competitive examinations. Another of their most remarkable methods we shall probably copy whenever we begin seriously to consider Imperial Federation. They never send any man to be an official in his own province. Thus we should have Canadian officials in places of trust here or in Australia, and Australians in England or Canada. And to each province in China so many Government posts, civil and military, are assigned. If England had followed this method, there might be the United States of England now instead of America, for no system is better calculated to knit closely together the outlying regions of a great empire, than that in accordance with which every official in turn has to be examined as to his qualifications for office at the capital, and to return there to pay his respects to his sovereign before entering upon each new office.

The contemplation of China is discouraging: to think it got so far so long ago, and yet has got no farther! The Emperor Hoang-ti, who lived 200 B.C., may be supposed to have foreseen the deadening effect that government by literary men has upon a nation, for he burnt all their books except those that treat of practical arts. He was even as advanced as Mr Auberon Herbert, and warned rulers against the multiplication of unnecessary laws. Laotze, China's greatest sage, although too spiritually-minded a man to have gained such a following as was afterwards obtained by Confucius, again insists that the spiritual weapons of this world cannot be formed by laws and regulations: "Prohibitory enactments, and too constant intermeddling in political and social matters, merely produce the evils they are intended to avert. The ruler is above all things to practise wu-wei, or inaction."

The Chinese, it seems, experimented in socialism eight centuries ago. The Emperor Chin-tsung II., at a very early age, and led thereto by Wu-gan-chi, the compiler of a vast encyclopædia, conceived the idea that "the State should take the entire management of commerce, industry, and agriculture into its own hands, with the view of succouring the working classes and preventing their being ground to the dust by the rich." To quote again from W. D. Babington's Fallacies of Race Theories: "The poor were to be exempt from taxation, land was to be assigned to them, and seed-corn provided. Every one was to have a sufficiency; there were to be no poor and no over-rich. The literati in vain resisted the innovations, the fallacy of which they demonstrated from their standpoint. The specious arguments of the would-be reformer convinced the young Emperor and gained the favour of the people. Wu-gan-chi triumphed. The vast province of Shensi was chosen as the theatre for the display of the great social experiment that was to regenerate mankind. The result was failure, complete and disastrous. The people, neither driven by want nor incited by the hope of gain, ceased to labour; and the province was soon in a fair way to become a desert." Mencius, Confucius' greatest follower, taught that "the people are the most important element in the country, and the ruler is the least." Mencius openly said that if a ruler did not rule for his people's good it was a duty to resist his authority and depose him.

Whilst other nations have vaguely asked Quis custodiet custodes? the Chinese invented the College of Censors and the Tribunal of History, both selected from their most distinguished scholars. It is the duty of Censors to remonstrate with the Emperor when necessary, as well as to report to the College, or to the Emperor himself, any breach of propriety in courts of justice or elsewhere. They have no especial office but to notice the doings of other officials. The Tribunal of History is busy recording the events of each Emperor's reign; but no Emperor has ever seen what is written about him, nor is any history published till the dynasty of which it treats is at an end. Chinese history is full of examples of the courage and adherence to truth with which the members of this tribunal have been inspired.

It is all so beautiful in description, one sighs in thinking it over. But it must be remembered that it was yet more beautiful, startlingly beautiful, at the period of the world's history when it was all originated, and that to this day the Chinese peasant enjoys a degree of liberty and immunity from Government interference unknown on the Continent of Europe. There is no passport system; he can travel where he pleases; he can form and join any kind of association; his Press was free till the Empress Tze Hsi, probably inspired by Russian influence, issued her edict against it in 1898; his right of public meeting and free speech are still unquestioned. Public readers and trained orators travel about the country instructing the people. The system of appealing to the people by placarding the walls has been very far developed in China. There is there complete liberty of conscience. And at the same time, as all people who know China will testify, the moral conscience of the people is so educated that an appeal to it never falls flat, as it often would in England. Try to stop two men fighting, saying it is wrong to fight, and you will hear no one say in China, "Oh, let them fight it out!" Appeal to the teaching of Confucius, and every Chinaman will treat you with respect, and at least try to appear guided by it. How far in Europe would this be the case with a citation from the Bible?

The system of education, the crippling of the women by footbinding, and consequent enfeebling of the race, together with the subsequent resort to opium-smoking, are the three apparent evil influences that spoil what otherwise seems so ideal a system of civilisation. Possibly we should add to this, that the system of Confucius—China's great teacher—is merely a system of ethics, and that thus for generations the cultured portion of the nation has tried to do without a religion, although falling back upon Taoism and Buddhism to meet the needs of the human heart. That any civilisation should have lasted so long without a living religion is surprising. But Buddhism has evidently had an enormous influence upon China, though its temples are crumbling now, its priests rarely knowing even its first elements. The good that it could do for China it has done. And now another influence is needed.

DOWNWARD-BOUND CARGO-BOAT.
By Mrs. Archibald Little.

BRIDGE AT SOOCHOW.

CHAPTER IV.
BEGINNINGS OF REFORM.

Reform Club.—Chinese Ladies' Public Dinner.—High School for Girls.—Chinese Lady Doctors insisting on Religious Liberty.—Reformers' Dinner.—The Emperor at the Head of the Reform Party.—Revising Examination Papers.—Unaware of Coming Danger.—Russian Minister's Reported Advice.

On February 12th, 1896, a newspaper correspondent wrote from Peking: "The Reform Club established a few months ago, which gave such promise of good things to come, and which has been referred to frequently in the public prints in China, has burst. It has been denounced by one of the Censors, and the Society has collapsed at once. The Club has been searched, the members, some fifty or more Hanlin scholars, have absconded, and the printers have been imprisoned. Such is the end, for the present at least, of what promised to be the awakening of China. It was initiated and supported largely at least by three well-known foreigners, two of them well-known missionaries, and it met with much support and encouragement from all classes. Its little Gazette was latterly enlarged and its name changed. One or more translators were engaged to translate the best articles from the English newspapers and magazines, of which some two dozen or more were ordered for the Club. The members contributed liberally, we understand, towards its expenses; and if ever there was hope of new life being instilled into the old dry bones of China, it was certainly confidently looked for from this young, healthy, and vigorous Society. It has been conducted, we believe, with great ability; differences among the leaders have cropped up, but after discussions the affairs of the Club have each time been placed on a more secure and lasting basis. Foreign dinners at a native hotel have been part of the programme; and this element is not to be despised by any means. The Chinese transact nearly all their important business at the tea-shops and restaurants, and certainly a good dinner and a glass of champagne help wonderfully to smooth matters. We regret exceedingly the decease of the Reform Club."

People in general laughed about it a little. There had before been the short statement: "A Censor has impeached the new Hanlin Reform Club, and it has been closed by Imperial rescript."

Thomas Huxley once wrote that "with wisdom and uprightness even a small nation might make its way worthily; no sight in the world is more saddening and revolting than is offered by men sunk in ignorance of everything except what other men have written, and seemingly devoid of moral belief and guidance, yet with their sense of literary beauty so keen and their power of expression so cultivated that they mistake their own caterwauling for the music of the spheres."

It was in this strain Europeans in the East meditated. But on returning to China in the autumn of 1897, I found in Shanghai evidences of progress and reform on all sides. A Chinese newspaper, generally spoken of in English as Chinese Progress, was being issued regularly, and newspapers edited by friends of its editor were coming out in Hunan and even in far-away Szechuan. The Chinese "Do-not-bind-feet" Society of Canton had opened an office in one of the principal streets of Shanghai, and was memorialising Viceroys, as also the Superintendents of Northern and Southern trade. Directly on arrival I received an invitation to a public dinner in the name of ten Chinese ladies, of whom I had never heard before. It was to be in the large dining-hall in a Chinese garden in the Bubbling Well Road, the fashionable drive of Shanghai, and by degrees I found all my most intimate friends were invited. We agreed with one another to go, though wondering a good deal what the real meaning of the invitation was, and why we were selected. The hall is a very large one, sometimes used for big balls, with rooms opening off it on either side; and after the English ladies had laid aside their wraps in a room to the right—one or two Chinese gentlemen, who had evidently been superintending the arrangement of the dinner, encouraging them to do so—we asked where our Chinese hostesses were. They were already assembled in the rooms opening off the hall to the left, and I still remember the expression of intense anxiety on the Chinese gentlemen's faces as they saw us leave them and advance to join their womenkind, none of whom spoke any English, nor knew anything of English ways and manners. At first the Chinese ladies did not exactly receive us; but when we began to go round and bow to each lady in turn, after the Chinese fashion, one after another stood up and smilingly greeted us. Then those of us who could talked Chinese, and one or two of the Chinese ladies began to move about, exhibiting the ground-plan of a proposed school for the higher education of Chinese young ladies. And thus gradually we began to understand what it was all about. But on that occasion it was the English ladies who were frivolous, the Chinese who were serious. For they were so elaborately dressed, so covered with ornaments, English ladies were always breaking off and saying, "Oh, do allow me to admire that bracelet!" or "What lovely embroidery!" whilst the Chinese ladies very earnestly pointed at their ground-plan, and looked interrogations. It gradually came out that it was the Manager of the Telegraph Company and his friends who were bent upon starting this school; that this being a new departure they thought it well for the ladies interested to confer with the ladies of other nations accustomed to education; and that, considering who was likely to be helpful, they had asked a few missionary ladies, and all the officers and committee of the T`ien Tsu Hui ("Natural Feet Society"), thinking that the foreign ladies, who had started that, must be interested in helping Chinese women.

Presently we were summoned to dinner by an intimation, "Chinese ladies to the left, foreign ladies to the right!" "Because of the fire," was added sotto voce, for Chinese, in their often triple furs, have naturally a horror of fires; but we refused to be thus summarily separated, as we sat down about two hundred women to a dinner served in the foreign style, with champagne, etc., and were rather alarmed to find our hostesses allowing their little children to drink as freely of champagne as of their own light Chinese wines.

MR. KING, MANAGER OF THE CHINESE TELEGRAPH COMPANY AND FOUNDER OF HIGH SCHOOLS FOR GIRLS.

That dinner was the beginning of an interchange of civilities between foreign and Chinese ladies such as had never occurred before. The daughter of Kang, commonly called the Modern Sage, after the title given to Confucius, was naturally one of these ladies. She wore Manchu dress, which puzzled us, as she is Cantonese. Her father had never allowed her feet to be bound, and she had herself written an article against binding, which had appeared in a Chinese newspaper; thus she, like several other Chinese ladies, considered the dress of the Manchus, who never bind feet, the most convenient. The relations of Mr. Liang, editor of Chinese Progress, were also present. At the subsequent meetings some of the Chinese ladies pleaded earnestly that Europeans should take shares in the school. They did not want their money, they said, but feared that unless there were European shareholders their Government might seize all the funds. The European ladies, however, could never quite satisfy themselves as to the various guarantees necessary. There were, indeed, many difficulties about starting this new school, as may be seen by the following letter, written by two Chinese lady doctors, who had been asked in the first instance to undertake its management. They had been educated in America, where they had passed all the necessary examinations very brilliantly; and it was the idea of the lustre they had thus conferred upon their own nation in a foreign land, that had first led a wealthy ship-owner, running steamers on the Poyang Lake, to conceive the idea of a school for girls. It had been warmly taken up by the late tutor of the ladies of the Imperial Household, who had been dismissed from his post because of his radical notions, and was thus free to devote himself to advancing education generally. The Manager of the Telegraph Company then became the leader, and the prospectus of the school was published in the North China Herald, with the names of the two Chinese lady doctors as its managers. On which they wrote the following letter to the editor, which, as I afterwards ascertained, was bonâ fide written by themselves, not at foreign instigation. They even refused to accept any corrections, saying if they wrote it at all it must be their own letter. It is so striking as the composition of Chinese women, that I am sure I shall be pardoned for giving it in extenso.

"Sir,—In your issue of December 24th appeared a translation of the prospectus of a school in Shanghai for Chinese girls; and since our names were given to the public as would-be teachers, we hope you will permit a word of much-needed explanation. If you, Mr. Editor, give such welcome to this sign of progress as is expressed in your editorial, then much more should those of our own people, who may be prepared to appreciate its possibilities. Yet the joy might not be without alloy.

"Several months ago the prospectus was brought to us as yet in an unfinished state, and parts of the first and last clauses referring to the establishment of Confucianism did not appear. Had these been there, we should not have allowed our names to go down as teachers. In making this statement, we realise that we only escape the charge of 'narrow-mindness' by the fact that we decidedly are not foreigners. We love our native China too much to fail to realise the truth in your admission 'that a slavish adherence to Confucianism alone has done far too much to limit and confine the Chinese mind for centuries,' and it is because we are not hopeful of the result 'when reverence for Confucianism is to be combined with the study of Western languages and sciences' that we cannot lend ourselves to the project as it seems to be drifting. It was with the express understanding that there should be entire religious liberty, that we consented to take up this work, and religious liberty would admit all who found moral and spiritual support in Confucianism to avail themselves of it. The tablets, that Confucianism cherished, might be set up by its supporters near the school, but not in the grounds: as might Christian churches be opened, if friends were found to build them. Such a course would conserve liberty of conscience.

"Now, according to the prospectus published in that very excellent Chinese journal The Progress, twice a year sacrifices are to be made in this school to posthumous tablets of Confucius and such worthy patrons of the school as may be honoured by a place in its pantheon. Had the statement been made that twice a year days would be set apart as memorial days to these distinguished personages, upon which occasions their lives should be reviewed to us in a manner to inspire young girls by their examples, no one would join more heartily in paying honour to their memory than ourselves. But the idea of sacrifice to human beings seems too blind in the light of this nineteenth century for any participation on our part. We have seen other countries, and learned of the sages of other lands; and although it may be only because of prejudice, yet we can truly say that we honour none as we do our own Confucius. But honour to the best of human beings is not unmixed blessing when it creates an idol and holds the eyes of the devotees down to earth. We do not think it the sentiment that will make the education of women successful or even safe. The educational institutions for women during the time of the Three Dynasties were not of the excellent things that Confucius sought to reestablish. Had he done so, how could he have uttered such words as these?—'Of all people girls and servants are the most difficult to behave to. If you are familiar to them, they lose their humility. If you maintain your reserve, they are discontented' (see Legge's Classics). Alas that we have no record that the Master ever turned his attention to a remedy for such a sad state of affairs!

"One there was who never spoke in disparaging tone to or of women. Only His sustaining counsel could give us courage to start out upon the pathway, slippery as it must needs be in the present stage of China's civilisation, along which educated women must needs pick their way. We do not feel that we should be doing our country-women best service in starting them out with only a Confucian outfit.

"This prospectus is, no doubt, intended to be a working-plan that will carry the co-operation of the largest number. We realise it is easier to see its inconsistencies than to unite opposing factions. Doubtless it embraces a truly progressive element in the land which has compromised under the proposed cult. The articles at first brought to us contained two sections aimed against concubinage and girl-slavery. When we reflect upon these destroyers that have fixed upon the vitals of Chinese home life, and then read the substitution of the words referring to Shanghai girls, 'especially in the Settlements,' Mencius' words recur to us (see Legge's Classics): 'Here is a man whose fourth finger is bent and cannot be stretched out straight.... If there be any one who can make it straight, he will not think the way from Tsin to Ts`oo far to go.... When a man's finger is not like that of other people, he knows he feels dissatisfied; but if his mind differs, he feels no dissatisfaction. This is called "Ignorance of the relative importance of things!"' We fear the day of our Chinese deliverance is not quite at hand.

"The Spirit that can mould the hearts of men has been abroad and wrought in the hearts of many, or they would not so ardently desire something progressive; but we regret to see it quenched even in a reviving flood of Confucianism. Let us intreat you, friends of China's progress, to lend your influence to the leaders of our people, that they strive not to bottle the new wine (spirit) of progress in old bottles, 'else the bottles break, and the wine runneth out, and the bottles perish.'

"Mary Stone, of Hupeh,
"Ida Kahn, of Kiangsi.

"Kiukiang, December 27th, 1897."

Somehow, however, all difficulties were surmounted, and in June, 1898, I had the pleasure of writing the following account of the first high school for girls opened in China:

"Turning off to the left from the long green avenue but a few minutes before arriving at the Arsenal, the visitor comes upon the pretty conglomeration of buildings in which the much-talked-of Chinese young ladies' school has now actually been opened. There are the usual Chinese courtyards, with somewhat more than the usual fantastic Chinese decoration, ornamental tiles making open screens rather than walls, through which the wind can blow freely, yet at the same time giving a feeling of privacy; as also writhing dragons and birds and beasts. It is quite Chinese, and very pretty and æsthetic. But the windows are foreign, and there is no house in the European settlement more airy, nor perhaps so clean.

"But the matter of interest is not the building, nor the furniture, but the teachers and the taught. There they stood, the sixteen young girls, who are the first promise of the regeneration of China; and judged as young girls they certainly promised remarkably well. It is natural to suppose that several of them are the children of parents of more than ordinary enlightenment. But whether they are or not, they certainly looked it. Their manners were naturally very superior to those of the girls one is accustomed to see in Chinese schools. They were readier to laugh and see a joke. But if some of those girls do not decidedly distinguish themselves in the years to come, it will be the fault of their instructors, or I am no physiognomist. They were busy with reading-books, and the teacher, a nice quiet-looking Chinese woman, had not the least idea of showing them off, so it was hard to test them. She said she could not say yet herself which were the brightest girls. Several had natural feet, and most of the others were eager to state they had "let out" their feet. None were the least smartly dressed, but several had very well-dressed hair, and were very neatly shod. One girl had the Manchu shoe without that objectionable heel in the middle, that must make walking on it like walking upon stilts.

"The bedrooms were all upstairs, four girls in a room, and nothing could have looked cleaner and neater than the arrangements: white mosquito curtains round the bed, a box under each for the girl's clothes, a stool for her to sit upon; one shining wardrobe amongst the four; a washstand with rail at the back on which to hang towels, and a looking-glass in the centre. The teachers had rooms to themselves. The teacher of sewing was upstairs, with only too exquisitely fine work all ready to spoil the poor girls' eyes and exercise their patience. There was another lady, who has been teaching drawing in the Imperial Palace, painting for the Empress there. Whether she is only on a visit to recover her health, or is now teaching drawing in this school—they have a drawing mistress—I did not quite make out. But she is the sort of woman whom one seems to know, by her clever, thoughtful, extremely observant face, before ever speaking to her; and when I found she was from Yunnan, we sat and chatted about 'Mount Omi and Beyond' in quite a friendly way. One of Miss Heygood's Chinese pupils is to come in on Monday and begin teaching English, as they think a Chinese teacher will do for a beginning. Probably she will understand Chinese difficulties better than any of us could. But it is a question whether her pronunciation can be quite satisfactory.

"A good deal of the furniture was foreign, and it seemed to be all foreign in the long reception-room, to be eventually used as a class-room, where on Wednesday, June 1st, a large company of foreign ladies sat down to a most excellent Chinese dinner, with knives and forks for those who wanted, and champagne served freely. The two previous days gentlemen had been received, and June 2nd was to be exclusively for Chinese ladies. One of the daughters of Mr. King, Manager of the Telegraphs, presided at one end of the table at which I was, and his daughter-in-law sat at the other end. There was another table in an adjoining room. Mrs. Shen Tun-ho and Mrs. King Lien-shan had cards printed in English with 'Chinese Girl School Committee' in the corner. Mrs. Mei Shen-in had on hers, 'Native Director of Chinese Female School.'

"It is difficult for ladies to decide what guarantee is obtainable that any money they may contribute will be well used, and not diverted from the purpose for which it is intended. But if some of the active business men of Shanghai can make the necessary inquiries on these heads, certainly what was to be seen on June 1st sufficiently spoke for the great energy and care displayed by the Ladies' Committee, and Mr. King, who is understood to be the prime mover in the matter. Every detail seemed to have been well seen after. Even baths and a bath-room are provided. Each girl is only to pay six shillings a month; and this being so, it is not to be wondered at that already another house is being secured, and there are promises of sufficient girl pupils already to fill it. There is also talk of opening another girls' school."

And now in 1899 I hear that already a third school for girls has been started by Mr. King, whose energy in the matter is the more to be admired when it is considered that he is so deaf all communication with him has to be carried on in writing. But, alas for China! Mr. Timothy Richard, the inspiring secretary of the Society for the Diffusion of Christian and General Knowledge, has had to take over the schools and put in a European manager, to save them from the Empress Tze Hsi's grasping fingers.

WÊN TING-SHIH, THE REFORMER, LATE TUTOR TO THE LADIES OF THE IMPERIAL HOUSEHOLD.
Lent by Rev. Gilbert Reid.

But a few days after the ladies' dinner—a very merry one—we were invited by three Chinese gentlemen to meet the Mr. Wên before mentioned as late tutor to the ladies of the Imperial Household. There were only four other Europeans, and a little party of Chinese men, all members of the Reform party. It is perhaps as well not to give their names, two of that little company being at this moment under sentence of death themselves, together with all their relations. When last heard of they were hiding, but some of their relations had been seized. The dinner was a very sad one. They had evidently invited Europeans as a drowning man catches at a straw, to see if they could devise anything to save the Chinese people. But to each suggestion made they said it was impossible. There was nothing—nothing to be done at Peking. Corruption prevailed over everything there. There was nothing—nothing to be done with the various Viceroys. There was nothing to be done by an appeal to the people. The only thing was to go on writing and writing, translating from foreign languages, and thus gradually educating the people in what might be useful to them. The memory of that dinner cannot easily pass from those present. Some of us walked away together too sad for words, and all that evening a great cloud of depression rested over us. For we felt we had witnessed despair; and when a Chinaman, usually so impassive, gives way, it makes the more impression.

But then happened the astonishing, as always occurs in China; and when next heard of, the Emperor of China himself, the youthful Kwang-shü, was at the head of the Progress party. All that has been told of Kwang-shü has always been very interesting and pleasing. Chinese people all speak well of him, and say he wishes for his country's good. But then they shrug their shoulders, for they have always maintained he has no power. At one time he was said to be studying English, at another reading Shakespeare in translation. On the occasion of the Empress Tze Hsi's sixtieth birthday all Christian women in China were invited to subscribe for a handsome copy of the New Testament, which was eventually presented to her in a silver casket beautifully chased with a fine relief of bamboo-trees. The Chinese version was specially revised for this presentation, in which Christian Chinese women took the greatest interest. No sooner had the book been presented than the Emperor sent an eunuch round to ask for a copy of the same volume. There was not as yet any copy of quite the same version, and the one sent was in the course of a few hours returned with several comments, understood to be in the Emperors own handwriting, pointing out the differences, and asking that the same version might be sent to him. He at the same time applied for copies of the other books prepared by Europeans for the instruction of Chinese.

In 1894 he took one of those sudden steps that a little recall some actions of the German Emperor, and signified his intention to look over each essay and poem himself, and place the competitors at the Peking examination according to their excellence. It may be imagined what was the astonishment and consternation of the examining board of high Ministers of State, who had just examined them, and marked out the standing of each man according to their own inclinations. There were two hundred and eight competitors, and it took the Emperor three whole days to look over the papers. At the end of that time the list was turned nearly upside-down, for three men placed amongst the last by the examining board were now marked out by the Emperor as among the six entitled to the highest honours. Amongst the competitors was the lately returned Minister to the United States, Spain, and Peru. He had a brevet button of the second rank; and having lately received the post of Senior Deputy Supervisor of Instruction to the Heir Apparent, he had to present himself as a competitor—notwithstanding his years and previous services abroad. In the list of the examining board he stood amongst the first thirty, and was recommended to a higher post of honour. In the Emperor's list he was placed in the third class; and in the decree classifying the essayists, in which the Emperor stated definitely that he had done so after himself looking over each paper, this ex-Minister was ordered to take off his brevet second-rank button, being degraded from the post of Deputy Supervisor to that of Junior Secretary of the Supervisorate. There were many other changes made of the same nature.

Naturally such an action did not tend to establish the youthful Emperor in the good graces of the more corrupt of his counsellors. But it showed energy and initiative, uncommon in Chinamen, also a desire to do his duty and right wrongs. It is certainly unfortunate for himself that he did not from the outset set to work to make to himself friends of the mammon of unrighteousness. But brought up from his earliest years as an Emperor, it is not unnatural that he should have expected all people to bow down before his will as soon as he asserted it. And it is a little unreasonable to expect from a young man, palace born and bred, who never even once had taken a country walk or ride, or enjoyed liberty of any kind, the character of a Bismarck or a Napoleon. That his advisers were equally unaware of the dangers awaiting him is shown by their having taken no precautions even to save themselves. It was indeed Kwang-shü who advised Kang to fly from Peking, not Kang who advised Kwang-shü to be careful. And that the plot that dethroned the young Emperor was kept carefully secret is also shown by the British Minister, a man of experience, and who has travelled about the world, and is of course amply provided with all the necessary means for obtaining information, being actually absent from Peking at the time, which naturally he never would have been had he known the crisis was imminent. The German and American Ministers were also absent, and, more remarkable still, Sir Robert Hart, Inspector-General of Chinese Imperial Customs. The moment was indeed probably chosen in consequence by the Empress.

Surrounded by temptations—his aunt and adopted mother is openly accused of having tried to teach him to take delight in cards and wine, and it is one of her duties both to select a wife for him and to surround him with concubines—the young man seems to show rather the disposition of an anchorite. All testimonies agree that he is not of a vigorous physique: indeed, bred and nurtured as he has been, how could he be? In health, as in many other ways, he always recalls to me our own Prince Leopold, the late Duke of Albany.

It is greatly to be regretted that when that very amiable, gentle-looking young man, now Czar of Russia, was in China, he and the young Emperor of China did not meet. Both apparently have aspirations, both are weighted by a weight of empire no one man can sustain single-handed, both surrounded by powerful, unscrupulous men, who will not hesitate to wield their well-intentioned and apparently sincere nominal rulers to their own advantage, as also possibly to the destruction of those nominal sovereigns.

There is a curious tale told that a late Russian Minister at Peking acquired a great influence over the Chinese Emperor by speaking to him after this style: "There are but few countries now that are regulated in accordance with the principles of decorum. In England and Germany it is true there are emperors, but in England it is six-tenths the people's will and only four-tenths the sovereign's. In Germany it is rather better: there it is six-tenths the Emperor and four-tenths the people. As to France and America—dreadful—dreadful! Only China and Russia are properly constituted countries, where the Emperor governs and the people obey, according to the will of Heaven. What friends, then, ought not these two countries to be, and how terrible for Russia it would be if China were to fall, for then she would stand alone, the one properly constituted empire in the world! Equally, how dreadful it would be for China if Russia were to fall away! As for us, we cannot feel easy about China. We remember that after all your Imperial Majesty's is an alien dynasty, governing over a people of another race, the Chinese, and your capital is so near the frontier you could easily be pushed over the border. Your Imperial Majesty should really take precautions to establish yourself more safely. Now, all positions of high honour are in the hands of Chinese, who might easily band together and depose the reigning dynasty. As each high position falls vacant, Chinese should be replaced by Manchus; then alone would you be safely established on the throne of your ancestors, and Russia could feel safe, knowing China to be so."

Thus and much more. Such conversations can be easily overheard and repeated by the crowds of attendants always present at interviews in China. It was repeated to me in June, 1898. I did not know if correctly or not. I do not know now. But for the last year high post after high post has been conferred upon Manchus, than which no policy could be more unwise, for it is calculated to exasperate the Chinese; nor have the Manchus, who have long ago lost their manliness, living as pensioners of the Court, any longer the capacity for government.

CHAPTER V.
THE COUP D'ÉTAT.

Kang Yü-wei.—China Mail's Interview.—Beheading of Reformers.—Relatives sentenced to Death.—Kang's Indictment of Empress.—Empress's Reprisals.—Emperor's Attempt at Escape.—Cantonese Gratitude to Great Britain.—List of Emperor's Attempted Reforms.—Men now in Power.—Lord Salisbury's Policy in China.

In considering the recent bolt from the blue, as it seemed to the outside world, at Peking, it is necessary to say a few words more about the Reform leaders. Kang Yü-wei, commonly called the Modern Sage, is a Cantonese. He has brought out a new edition of the ancient Classics, which he contends have been so glossed over by numbers of commentators as to have lost their original significance. In especial he says the personality of God was originally clearly stated in them, that it is the commentators who have hidden this, and that only by a return to the belief in a living God can China once more take her proper place among the nations. He also insists upon the brotherhood of man. Missionaries, who know him, dwell upon his learning and enthusiasm. The only British Consul I have heard speak of him, dwelt rather upon his want of practicality, and described him as a visionary of about forty and impracticable. He saw him, however, at the most agitating moment of his career, during his flight from Peking. When it is considered that he is a man of not large means, who has no official post, who must have devoted his time mainly to study to have passed the examinations he has and revised the Classics, and that at this comparatively early age he is the undoubted leader of the army of youthful literati of China, a man in whom those I have spoken with seem to have unbounded confidence, it is clear that this account of him must be a little overdrawn. Probably he is not a practical man. But that he has evidently an extraordinary gift for winning and guiding adherents cannot be denied. A representative of the China Mail describes him as "an intelligent-looking Chinese of medium height, but not of unusually striking appearance. For a native who does not speak any Western language, Kang has imbibed a wonderful amount of ideas" [this is only a rather amusing instance of European superciliousness], and the impression he left upon his interviewer was that he has a firmer grasp of the situation than the majority of his compatriots. It may be considered that some of his views are those of a visionary, but there can be no doubt of his earnestness; and it must be borne in mind that there never yet was a reformer in any country whose views were not at first believed to be outside the range of practical politics. For those who are interested in the present crisis in China, it is better to give the China Mail's interview with Kang Yü-wei, to be followed by his own open letter to the papers.

"Before proceeding with the interview, Kang wished to thank the British people for the kind protection they had afforded him, and for the interest the English people were taking in the advancement of the political and social status of China and the emancipation of the Emperor. He also wished to explain that the reason why he had not consented to an interview before was that he was very much distressed upon learning that his brother had been decapitated and that the Emperor was reported to be murdered. The excitement and anxiety of the past fortnight had unnerved him, and he was disinclined to see any one or to discuss the events which had led up to his flight from Peking.

"After this preliminary statement, Kang Yü-wei proceeded with his story.

"'You all know,' he said, 'that the Empress-Dowager is not educated, that she is very conservative, that she has been very reluctant to give the Emperor any real power in managing the affairs of the empire. In the year 1887 it was decided to set aside thirty million taels for the creation of a navy. After the battleships Tingyuen, Weiyuen, Chihyuen, Chênyuen, and Kingyuen had been ordered, and after providing for their payment, the Empress-Dowager appropriated the balance of the money for the repair of the Eho Park Gardens. Later on, when it was decided to set aside or raise thirty million taels for the construction of railways, she misappropriated a large portion of the money. The first intention had been to construct the railway to Moukden, but it was never carried farther than Shanhai-kuan, the remainder of the money being used for the decoration of the Imperial Gardens. Every sensible man knows that railways and a navy are essential for the well-being of a country. But in spite of the advice of one or two of her counsellors the Empress-Dowager refused to carry on these schemes, and thought only of her personal gratification. She has been steadily opposed to the introduction of Western civilisation. She has never seen many outside people—only a few eunuchs in the Palace and a few Ministers of State who have access to her.'

"'Through whom does she conduct the affairs of State?'

"'Before the Japanese War Li Hung-chang was the man she had most confidence in. After the war Li Hung-chang was discarded, and she seemed to repose most confidence in Prince Kung and Jung Lu. As a rule, however, she retains absolute control in her own hands. There is a sham eunuch in the Palace, who has practically more power than any of the Ministers. Li Luen-yên is the sham eunuch's name. He is a native of Chihli. Nothing could be done without first bribing him. All the Viceroys have got their official positions through bribing this man, who is immensely wealthy. Li Hung-chang is not to be compared with him. Before she handed over the reins of government to the Emperor, a year or two ago, the Empress-Dowager used to see many Ministers, but since then she has only seen eunuchs and officials belonging to the inner department. I have seen her myself. She is of medium height and commanding presence, rather imperious in manner. She has a dark, sallow complexion, long almond eyes, high nose, is fairly intelligent-looking, and has expressive eyes.'

"In answer to a query, 'Who inspired the new policy at Peking?' Kang replied: 'About two years ago two officials, Chang Lin and Wang Ming-luan, sent a memorial to the Emperor advising him to take the power into his own hands, stating that the Empress-Dowager was only the concubine of his uncle, the Emperor Hien Fêng; therefore according to Chinese law she could not be recognised as the proper Empress-Dowager. The result of this memorial was that the two officials were dismissed for ever. They were Vice-Presidents of Boards, one being a Manchu and the other a Soochow man. The Emperor recognises that the Empress-Dowager is not his real mother. Since the Emperor began to display an interest in affairs of State, the Empress-Dowager has been scheming his deposition. She used to play cards with him, and gave him intoxicating drinks, in order to prevent him from attending to State affairs. For the greater part of the last two years the Emperor has been practically a figure-head against his own wishes. After the occupation of Kiaochou by the Germans, the Emperor was very furious, and said to the Empress-Dowager, "Unless I have the power, I will not take my seat as Emperor; I will abdicate." The result was that the Empress-Dowager gave in to him to a certain extent, telling him that he could do as he liked; but although she said this with her lips her heart was different.'

"'How do you know this?' asked the interviewer. 'Did you hear it yourself?'"

"Kang's reply was: 'No, I heard it from other officials.'

"'Who recommended you to the notice of the Emperor?'

"'I was recommended to the Emperor by Kao Hsi-tsêng, one of the Censors, a native of Hupeh. Then Wêng Tung-ho, the Emperor's tutor, who is supposed to be one of the most conservative officials in China, but is not actually so, devoted some attention to me, and Li Tuan-fên, President of the Board of Rites. These officials wished to introduce me to the Emperor, to give me some responsible office, and to put me beside the Emperor as his adviser. The Emperor ordered me to hold a conference with the Ministers of the Tsung-li Yamen. On January 3rd last the conference took place. All the members of the Yamen were present; I was received with all respect as their guest. The conference lasted about three hours.

"'I had to say that everything in China must be reformed and follow Western civilisation.'

"'How were your suggestions received?'

"'They did not say openly. I could see that the majority of them were against reform. The Viceroy Jung Lu made the remark, "Why should we change the manners and customs of our ancestors?" To this I replied: "Our ancestors never had a Tsung-li Yamen [Board to deal with foreigners and foreign affairs]. Is not this a change?" The first thing I suggested was that China should have a properly constituted judicial system—that a foreigner should be engaged to work conjointly with myself and some others to revise the laws and the Government administrative departments. That I hold to be the most important change. This must be the basis on which all other changes and reforms must rest. The construction of railways, the creation of a navy, the revision of the educational system, every other reform will follow; but unless we can change the laws and administration all other changes will be next to useless. Unfortunately, the Emperor has been pushing on the other reforms before preparing the way for them. That has contributed to bring about the present crisis.

"'The following morning Prince Kung and Wêng Tung-ho reported the conference to the Emperor. Prince Kung was against me, although I have heard it said that he admired my abilities, and thought me clever and able. But he said of me: "He is talking nonsense; he speaks about changing the ways of our ancestors!" Wêng Tung-ho gave my proposals his support.

"'The outcome of the conference was that I was ordered by the Emperor to submit my proposals to him in the form of a memorial. The gist of my memorial was as follows. I told the Emperor that all the customs and ways and manners of his ancestors must be renewed. Nothing could be usefully followed so far as Chinese history was concerned. I advised the Emperor to follow in the footsteps of Japan, or in the footsteps of Peter the Great. As a preliminary step I advised the Emperor to command all his Ministers of State and all the high officials in Peking to go before the places where they worshipped the gods, and also to the Ancestral Halls, there to make an oath that they were determined to introduce reforms. My second suggestion was to have the laws and administration revised; my third, that he should open a Communication or Despatch Department, through which any one would be able to memorialise the Throne. To illustrate what I considered lacking in the Chinese system, I pointed out to the Emperor that the Ministers of the Grand Council were the tongue, the Viceroys and Governors of Provinces the hands and feet, the Censors the eyes, and the Emperor the brain. I said: "You have no heart, no motive power, no proper law, no means of finding out the desires and opinions of your people. The responsibility is too widely diffused; you cannot carry things through effectively. When you want to know anything, you refer to your Ministers and Viceroys, who represent the tongue and feet; but these are not thinking organs—they can only act upon orders given them." I advised the Emperor to select young, intelligent men, well imbued with Western ideas, to assist in the regeneration of the empire, irrespective of their position, whether they were lowly born or of high degree; that they should confer with the Emperor every day and discuss the measures for reform, first devoting their energies to a revision of the laws and administration. The old officials must be dispensed with. I advised him to appoint twelve new Departments:—(1) Law Department; (2) Treasury; (3) Education (engaging foreign teachers); (4) Legislative Department; (5) Agriculture; (6) Commercial Department; (7) Mechanical Department; (8) Railway Department; (9) Postal; (10) Mining; (11) Army; (12) Navy,—all the twelve Departments to be modelled on Western lines, and foreigners to be engaged to advise and assist. Throughout the provinces, in every two prefectures, I suggested the establishment of a sort of Legislative Council, whose chief duty would be to give effect to the instructions of the twelve Departments, to police the country, to introduce sanitary measures, to construct roads, to induce the people to cultivate the land under modern methods, and to spread commerce. Each of these Councils should have a President, appointed by the Emperor himself, irrespective of birth, degree, or position; and each President should have the liberty to memorialise the Emperor direct, in the same manner as Viceroys and Governors of the Provinces, to whom he was not to be subject. In effect these Presidents were to have the same social rank as the Viceroys. The President was also to have the power to recommend a man to go to each district to co-operate with the gentry and merchant classes in giving effect to the new reforms. My memorial also showed how funds were to be raised. I pointed out the enormous loss of revenue that occurred yearly. Taking the magistracy of Nanhai (which is my native district), I informed the Emperor that the total revenue derived from that district was $240,000 per year, but the actual amount going into the Imperial Purse was only something over $20,000. I recommended a complete change of the system, under which the whole of the revenues of the country would go into the Imperial Purse. Comparing China with India, and adducing from the experience of India the financial resources of China, I told the Emperor that from ordinary taxes the sum of four hundred million taels could be raised annually, and if the likin were abolished and a tariff properly adjusted, banknotes issued, stamp duty established, and other financial reforms adopted, at least another three hundred million taels could be raised, making in all seven hundred million taels. With this money in hand it would be an easy thing to get a navy to protect our coast and to establish naval colleges for the training of officers. State railways could also be constructed and other necessary reforms effected.

"'I was told that the Emperor was highly pleased, and said that he had never seen a better memorial nor such a good system as I proposed. He recommended the memorial to the consideration of the Tsung-li Yamen for report. Prince Kung, Jung Lu, and Hsü Ying-kuei were against it; but the Emperor pressed for a reply, which was never given in detail. All the Ministers would report was that the memorial was so sweeping, that it practically meant the abolition of the present great Ministers, and therefore they did not like to report upon it themselves. You will have seen in the newspapers that the Emperor had already adopted many of the recommendations contained in my memorial.

"'I also sent to the Emperor two books written by myself, one entitled The Reform of Japan and the other The Reform of Russia by Peter the Great. Subsequently I sent another memorial, advising the Emperor to be determined and not to dally with the proposals for reform.

"'To this memorial the Emperor replied with an Edict. On June 16th I was granted an audience with the Emperor. It lasted for two hours. I was received at 5 a.m. in the Jênshow Throne-hall. Port Arthur and Talienwan had just been taken over by Russia, and the Emperor wore an anxious, careworn expression. The Emperor was thin, but apparently in good health. He has a straight nose, round forehead, pleasant eyes, is clean-shaven, and has a pale complexion. He is of medium height. His hands are long and thin. He looked very intelligent, and had a kindly expression, altogether uncommon amongst the Manchus or even amongst the Chinese. He wore the usual official dress, but instead of the large square of embroidery on the breast worn by the high officials the embroidery in his case was round, encircling a dragon, and there were two smaller embroideries on his shoulders. He wore the usual official cap. He was led in by eunuchs, and took his seat on a dais on a large yellow cushion, with his feet folded beneath him. He sent his attendants away, and we were left alone; but all the time we were conversing his eyes were watching the windows, as if to see that no one was eavesdropping. There was a long table in front of him with two large candlesticks. I knelt at one of the corners of the table, and not on the cushions in front of the table which are reserved for the high officials. I remained kneeling during the whole of the audience. We conversed in the Mandarin dialect.

"'The Emperor said to me: "Your books are very useful and very instructive."

"'I practically repeated what I said in my memorial about the weakness of China being owing to the lack of progress.

"'The Emperor said: "Yes, all these Conservative Ministers have ruined me."

"'I said to him, "China is very weak now, but it is not yet too late to amend." I gave him the example of France after the Franco-Prussian War. In that case the indemnity was much greater than China has paid to Japan. The territory lost was greater, because France had lost two provinces and China had only lost one (Formosa). I asked him how it was that France had been able to recuperate so rapidly, whereas China had done practically nothing during the three years since the close of the war.

"'The Emperor listened very attentively, and asked me to give the reason.

"'I replied that the reason was that M. Thiers issued proclamations to the people of France advising the abolition of corrupt methods and asking their co-operation for the rehabilitation of the country, at once instituting reforms which would enable the country to recover the ground it had lost. The outcome was that the whole population of France was as one man working for one single object. Hence its quick recovery. In China, however, we have still the old Conservative Ministers, who put every obstruction in the way of reform; and I told the Emperor that that was the main reason why the country was now in its present sad condition, worse off than it was three years ago, at the close of the China-Japan War.

"'I asked him to look at the difficulties Japan had to overcome before she could reform on modern lines. There the military or feudal party had more power than our present Conservative Ministers, but the Mikado adopted the proper course by selecting young and intelligent men, junior officials, some of whom he set to work out the reforms in the country, whilst others went abroad to learn foreign methods, and returned to make Japan the powerful country which it is to-day. I repeated to him what Peter the Great did to make Russia powerful, saying, "You, the Emperor, I would ask you to remove yourself from the seclusion in which you live. Come boldly forward and employ young and intelligent officials. Follow in the footsteps of the three rulers of whom I have spoken to you, and you will find that the reforms will be more easily carried out than you at present imagine. In case China is unable to produce a sufficient number of intelligent men to give effect to the reforms you initiate, I strongly advocate the employment of foreigners, particularly Englishmen and Americans."

HEAD EUNUCH OF THE EMPRESS-DOWAGER.
Lent by Rev. Gilbert Reid.

KIAOCHOU, SEIZED BY GERMANY.

"'I said to him: "You must cut your coat according to your cloth,' and advised him to approach the matter carefully and deliberately. To illustrate what I meant, I pointed out that if he wished to build a palace he must obtain plans, then buy the bricks to build the palace according to design. "You may be told that China has reformed during the last few years. In my opinion nothing has been reformed. China has simply done what I have advised you not to do. She has been buying bricks to build a house before deciding on the plan or design; she is attempting to make a big coat out of an insufficient quantity of cloth." I told the Emperor: "Your present Government is just like a building with a leaky roof; the joists are rotten and have been eaten by white ants. It is absolutely dangerous to remain longer in the building. Not only must you take off the roof, but you must take down the whole building, and even raze the foundation. How could you expect your present old Ministers to reform? They have never had any Western education. They have never studied anything thoroughly about Western civilisation, and they could not study now if you asked them. They have no energy left. To instruct them to carry out reforms is like asking your cook to become your tailor, your tailor to become your cook, or your barber to become your chair-coolie and your chair-coolie to shave you. The result of that would be that you would not get a good coat, you would get nothing good to eat, your head would be hacked. Your Majesty is careful to select a proper tailor, a proper cook, a proper barber, and a proper chair-coolie. But in the administration of your empire, which is far more important, you do not take so much care as in your own personal affairs."

"'To this the Emperor replied: "I am very sorry; I have practically no power to remove any high Ministers. The Empress-Dowager wants to reserve this power in her own hands.'

"'I said: "If your Majesty has no power to remove Ministers, what you can do is to employ young and intelligent officials about you. That would be a step better than nothing."

"'The Emperor said: "I know it perfectly well that all the Ministers have paid no proper attention to Western ideas and do not care to study the progress of the world."

"'I said to the Emperor: "Perhaps it is their wish to get a knowledge of Western ideas, but they have too much to do under the present system, and they are much too old. Their energy is gone. Even if they are willing they cannot do it. The chief education of China in the study of the Classics is useless, and the first thing the Emperor must do is to abolish these examinations and establish a system of education on the lines of Western countries." I asked the Emperor: "Can you do away with this kind of examination?"

"'The Emperor said: "I have realised that whatever is learned in Western countries is useful, but whatever is learned in China is practically useless, and I will carry out your recommendations"; which he did. I advised the Emperor to send his own relations to travel in foreign countries in order to learn from them, and that he might be surrounded by men who had experience of the world. In conclusion, I said: "There are many other things I should like to say, but I can memorialise you from time to time." I advised him strongly to cement his relations with foreign countries.

"'The Emperor replied that the foreign countries nowadays were not like the insignificant states of former times. They appeared to be highly civilised countries, and it was a pity his own Ministers did not realise that as he did. A good deal of the trouble seemed to arise from their failure to recognise this fact.

"'In December last I had advised his Majesty to form an alliance with Great Britain. Before parting I said to him: "You have given decorations to Li Hung-chang and Chang Yin-huan. That is a Western act. Why do not you put in your Edicts that you intend to introduce Western customs?"

"'The Emperor only smiled.

"'From June until I left Peking, I have sent many memorials to the Emperor, but have never had another audience. I was allowed to memorialise him direct. This is the first time in the present dynasty that an individual in my position has been allowed to memorialise the Throne direct.'

"In answer to a question, Kang stated that Chang Yin-huan was not associated with him in the proposed reforms. He was pleased with the programme of the Reformers, but he did not take any active part in promoting the reforms. All the men arrested were junior officials in the various secretariats in Peking, all interested in reform.

"Asked when the first symptoms of trouble appeared, Kang stated that the signs of opposition were raised when the Emperor issued his Edict dismissing two Presidents and four Vice-Presidents. One of these Presidents is a relative of the Empress-Dowager—Huai Ta-pu, President of the Board of Rites. On the following day Li Hung-chang and Ching Hsin were removed from the Tsung-li Yamen. These dismissed officials went in a body and knelt before the Empress-Dowager and asked for her assistance, saying that if she allowed the Emperor to go on in this way the whole of the old officials would soon be dismissed. Then these officials went to Tientsin and saw Jung Lu, who may be said to be the best friend of the Empress-Dowager. Rumours got about that the Emperor intended to dispose of the Empress-Dowager, and she then determined that Jung Lu should take the first step. That was on or about September 14th or 15th. On September 17th an open Edict was issued by the Emperor, asking why Kang Yü-wei was still in Peking and did not proceed to Shanghai at once to attend to the establishment of the official organ. 'That was a hint to me to go away. An Edict of this sort is generally issued to a Viceroy or a Chief General, and not to men of my rank. The morning I saw this Edict I was highly astonished. On that evening a special private message was sent to me by the Emperor. The message was sent in writing. Part of it appeared in the China Mail last night. I happened to be out, and did not receive the message till the morning of September 18th.

"'On the morning of the 18th I received two special messages from the Emperor, one dated September 16th and the other September 17th. The first one read:

"'"We know that the empire is in very troublous times. Unless we adopt Western methods it is impossible to save our empire; unless we remove the old-fashioned Conservative Ministers and put in their stead young and intelligent men, possessed of a knowledge of Western affairs, it is impossible to carry out the reforms we had intended. But the Empress-Dowager does not agree with me: I have repeatedly advised her Majesty, but she becomes enraged. Now I am afraid I shall not be able to protect my throne. You are hereby commanded to consult your colleagues and see what assistance you can give to save me. I am very anxious and distressed. I am anxiously waiting for your assistance. Respect this."

"'The second message was as follows: "I have commanded you to superintend the establishment of the official organ. It is strongly against my wish. I have very great sorrow in my heart, which cannot be described with pen and ink. You must proceed at once outside (abroad), and devise means to save me without a moment's delay. I am deeply affected with your loyalty and faithfulness. Please take great care of your health and body. I hope that before long you will be able to assist me again in reorganising my empire, and to put everything upon a proper basis. This is my earnest wish."

"'After I received these letters, I had a meeting with my colleagues as to the best thing to be done. I saw Mr. Timothy Richard, the English missionary, and asked him to see the British Minister at once. Unfortunately Sir Claude Macdonald was at Pehtaiho. Then I sent to the American Legation, but was told that the American Minister had gone to the Western Hills. If Sir Claude Macdonald had been at the British Legation, I believe measures could have been devised to avoid this crisis.

"'In the city everything was quiet. There was no sign of an impending crisis. Nobody anticipated trouble; nobody was in fear of his life. On the 19th I heard from my friends that the position was getting more serious. Up to this time I had remained in my quarters in the Canton Club. At four o'clock on the morning of the 20th I left the city, passing through the gates, leaving all my baggage behind in the care of my brother. I retained a compartment in the railway carriage, and travelled direct to Tangku by rail. At Tientsin I boarded the Indo-China steamer Lienshing and asked for a cabin. When the people on board saw I had so little baggage they said: "You must go and get a ticket at the office before we can allow you to come on board." I went back to Tientsin again and went into an hotel—not an hotel of my own countrymen, but the hotel of another province. I had been advised to shave my moustache off and to change my dress, but I left myself to fate. I stayed overnight at Tientsin, and early in the morning went on board the Chungking. I had to go as an ordinary Chinese passenger, because I was afraid if I asked for a cabin I should again be refused a passage on account of the absence of baggage. Mr. Timothy Richard offered me an asylum at his house, but as I had received instructions from the Emperor to proceed abroad I thought it best to leave the capital. I got no letter from the British Legation; I had no communication with the British Legation. The steamer called at Chefoo, where nothing unusual happened. When I arrived at Woosung, the British Consul was kind enough to offer me a place of safety on board H.M.S. Esk. I believe Mr. Richard must have gone to the Legation at Peking, and that instructions were given to the British Consul to be on the look-out for me. I was surprised at this, but I am very grateful to Messrs. Brenan and Bourne (British Consuls) and to the captain of the ship for the kindness they showed to me during my stay at Woosung.'

"'What do you intend to do?'

"'The Emperor has instructed me to go abroad and procure assistance for him. My intention is to approach England in the first instance. England is well known to be the most just nation in the world. England has twice saved Turkey, once at the sacrifice of twenty thousand men and a large sum of money, and I think England will come to the assistance of the Emperor of China now. While I was in Shanghai, I requested the British Consul to wire to the Foreign Office at home asking for this assistance to his Majesty. Personally, I think it is to England's interest to take this opportunity to support the Emperor and the party of progress, for by so doing they will be helping the people of China as well, and the people of China will consider England as their best and truest friend. If England does not take steps now, I am afraid that when the Siberian Railway is finished Russian influence will predominate throughout the whole of China. If England succeeds in replacing the Emperor on the throne, I have no hesitation in saying that the Emperor and the Reform leaders will not forget her kindness. When I left Peking, the Emperor was still in good health.'

"Before leaving Kang was asked if he had anything further to add to the interview—anything he had forgotten.

"He replied: 'I should like it to be stated that when I saw the Emperor I said I did not go to Peking for money or position. I simply went there to try to do my best to save the four hundred millions of China. I told him I would not take any high position until I had been instrumental in carrying through the proposals for reform I had made to him; then I would accept anything his Majesty was pleased to give me. Had he given me position then, it would simply have created jealousy among the old Ministers; besides, I did not feel that I had done anything to warrant such elevation. The Emperor was good enough to send me two thousand taels as a special reward—a thing, I believe, which has never been done in the history of the present dynasty.'

"The interview concluded with a request on the part of Kang to urge the English people to take steps for the protection of the relatives of Liang, who had been arrested by the officials in the district of Canton. These relatives, we understand, consist of his foster-mother, aunt, uncle, brother, and his nephew and two others."

BRITISH AND CHINESE FLAGS, JUNE 15TH, 1898: TOWN OF WEI-HAI-WEI IN DISTANCE.
By Mr. Stratford Dugdale.

This interview was on October 7th. It was on September 22nd that Kang's six colleagues had been summarily beheaded in Peking. Three were members of the Hanlin College, the highest body in China—namely, Lin Hsio, Yang, and Lin Kuang-ti. One was a Censor—Yang. The others were Kang's younger brother, and Tan Tze-tung, son of the ex-Governor of Hupeh. It is Tan who went to his death saying, "They may kill my body, but my spirit will live in the lives of others," and again, "My country will yet be freed from the tyrants that now enthral her in their grasp of ignorance and corruption."

A newspaper correspondent wrote from Hupeh: "Nothing but sympathy is felt for poor old Tan, our ex-Governor, the father of Tan Tze-tung, who was beheaded in Peking. It is said that for a long time the news of his son's death was kept from him, and was finally told him by our Viceroy, Chang-chih-tung himself, when the latter went on board his ship to bid him farewell on his departure from Wuchang." And again, a few days later: "Our late Governor, H.E. Tan, is reported dead. The native story is that he took the execution of his son at Peking and his own degradation so much to heart, that he committed suicide on his way home."

It is related that none of the victims conducted themselves otherwise than as heroes, excepting only the Censor, who was so utterly astounded at the fate befalling him as to plead with his executioners. He had never known Kang, said he had taken part in no plot, and wept bitterly as he was hurried through the streets. It is related also that all were given decent burial with the exception of Kang's own young brother, whose body no man dared touch.

Kang Yü-wei's ancestral home is in the small village of Fangchun, right opposite the walls of Canton City, and separated from it by the Pearl River. Late on the night of September 23rd the quiet village was all excitement at the sudden disappearance of all the members of Kang's clan, leaving no trace of their whereabouts. Explanations came, however, the next morning, when a force of runners from the district magistrate made their appearance in the village, and, surrounding the old Kang homestead, began searching for the inmates. Only four persons were found in the place, consisting of farm-hands, and these were taken across the river into the city by the runners for want of more important prisoners.

Kang's uncle, who kept a large grain shop in Canton, had a narrow escape from arrest, the warning to get away arriving only a few minutes before the police made their appearance, while his employés also got away in the nick of time. The premises were then sealed up, as also was the ancestral hall of the Kang clan in their native village of Fangchun. A flourishing school established by Kang in the old city temple of Canton was also sealed by the local authorities, but fortunately for the twenty-odd scholars there they received warning and escaped before the yamen runners made their appearance.

Mr. Liang, the editor of Chinese Progress, was warned by Kang in time to fly himself, but four of his relatives had been captured. It was under the agitation of all these events that Kang Yü-wei wrote the following letter, which only one Chinese newspaper had the courage to publish. Perhaps, considering what has followed, it is kinder to suppress its name.

AN OPEN LETTER FROM KANG YÜ-WEI.

"Respected Seniors,—

"The overpowering calamity which fell from Heaven on the fatal 5th day of the 8th moon (20th September), bringing such unexpected and fearful changes over the empire by the usurpation of the Imperial power by the antitype of those vile and licentious ancient Empresses Lü and Wu, followed by the deposition and imprisonment of our true Sovereign, causing thereby heaven and earth to change places and obliterating the lights of the sun and moon from his Majesty's loyal subjects, have, I know, filled with universal indignation the hearts of the people.

"Our youthful Emperor's intelligence and enthusiasm made him bend his energies to inaugurate new measures of reform for the country, to be put into practice in due time one after the other, and all who owed his Majesty loyalty and allegiance learning this raised our hands to our heads with pleasure and danced with joy. The False One [or Usurper] attempted to introduce avarice and licentiousness into the Palace, in order to tempt our Sovereign to destruction; but his Majesty spurned them with scorn, and these evils were unable to defile the Palace atmosphere. Then one or two traitors of the Conservative element, finding their objects prevented, threw themselves prostrate around the Usurper and besought her to resume the reins of power. (Note.—Owing to the cashiering of Huai Ta-pu, President of the Board of Rites, and his colleagues, Huai and Jung Lu were at the bottom of the whole plot.) The False One then, contrary to all rights of heaven and earth, seized the reins of power and issued a forged edict calling for physicians for his Majesty, thereby foreshadowing that the Emperor would be poisoned. To-day, therefore, we know not whether his Majesty be alive or dead. This indeed is that which makes gods and men indignant and feel that heaven and earth will never pardon nor allow such to triumph long.

"This Usurper, when she came into power in former years, poisoned the Eastern Empress-Consort of Hien Fêng; she murdered with poisoned wine the Empress of Tung Chih; and by her acts made the late Emperor Hien Fêng die of spleen and indignation. And now she has dared to depose and imprison our true Sovereign. Her crime is great and extreme in its wickedness. There has never been a worse deed. Although the writer, your humble servant, and Lin, Yang, Tan, and Liu [four of the six martyrs] all received his Majesty's commands in his last extremity, we, alas! have not the power and strength of Hsü Chin-yi [who restored the Emperor Tsung-chung to the throne after deposing the Empress Wu Tsêh-tien of the T`ang Dynasty], but can only emulate the example of Shên Pao-sü in weeping. [This was a minister of Ts`u (Hunan), who over two thousand years ago went weeping to beseech the powerful King of Chin (Shensi) to avenge the deposition of his master the King of Ts`u, and by his importunity succeeded in carrying his point.]

"I, therefore, now send you copies of his Majesty's two secret edicts to me, and crave your assistance in publishing them to the whole world either in the Chinese or foreign newspapers. This will, I earnestly trust, bring strong arms to our Sovereign's rescue. His Majesty has always accepted the fiat of his ancestors in recognising the mother who bore him as his own mother, and not an Imperial concubine as his mother. The False One in relation to the Emperor Tung Chih was the latter's mother; but as regards his Majesty Kwang-shü, our Sovereign, she is but a former Emperor's concubine-relict [Hien Fêng's]. According to the tenets of the Spring and Autumn Records (written by Confucius), although Queen Wên Chiang was the mother of King Chuang of Lu, yet that did not save her from being imprisoned by her own son on account of her licentious conduct; much more in the present case, then, should punishment be administered to one who was but merely a Palace concubine. What right had this woman to depose our bright and sagacious Emperor? If this could be clearly set forth in the Chinese and foreign newspapers and be published to the world, I verily believe that from Peking to Yunnan and the sixteen ancient divisions of China some hero must surely arise to avenge our Sovereign. With my humble compliments,

"(Signed) Kang Yü-wei."

FERRY AT ICHANG.
By Mrs. Archibald Little.

It is hardly necessary to comment upon the extreme pathos of the letters of this young man of twenty-seven, for twenty-three years nominal Emperor of China, but now, at the first attempt to take the power into his own hands, summarily deposed. It is believed that it was his attempt to summon soldiery to his aid that led to the Empress's coup d'état. Some say the Reform party were advising that the Empress-Dowager should be asked to retire to a palace in the country.

"The following is the list of the proposed 'Council of Ten' who were to have assembled daily in the Maoching Throne-hall to advise the Emperor on reform measures, as given by the Sinwênpao:

"1. Li Tuan-fên (President of the Board of Rites to be President of the Council).

"2. Hsü Chih-ching (Senior Reader of the Hanlin Academy, and at the time of his disgrace acting Vice-President of the Board of Rites).

"3. Kang Yü-wei (Junior Secretary of the Board of Works and a Secretary of the Tsung-li Yamen).

"4. Yang Shen-hsiu (Censor of the Kiangnan Circuit).

"5. Sung Peh-lu (Censor of the Shantung Circuit).

"6. Hsü Jên-chu (Literary Chancellor of Hunan).

"7. Chang Yuan-chi (Hanlin Compiler).

"8. Liang Chi-chao (M.A., ex-editor of Chinese Progress).

"9. Kang Kuang-jên (M.A., and younger brother of Kang Yü-wei).

"10. Hsü Jên-ching (Hanlin Bachelor, son of Hsü Chih-ching and brother of Hsü Jên-chu).

"With reference to the punishments meted out to the above-noted ten: (1) Li Tuan-fên was cashiered and banished to Kashgaria for ever; (2) Hsü Chih-ching, imprisoned in the dungeons of the Board of Punishments for life; (3) Kang Yü-wei, proscribed and ordered to be sliced to pieces at moment of capture; his family to suffer death, together with his uncles, aunts, and cousins, and their ancestral graves to be razed; (4) Vang Shen-hsiu, one of the Martyred Six; (5) Sung Peh-lu, disappeared the day he was cashiered and dismissed for ever—September 23rd—but is reported to have been captured afterwards while travelling overland for the South; (6) Hsü Jên-chu, cashiered and dismissed for ever; (7) Chang Yuan-chi, a man of great wealth, also cashiered and dismissed for ever; (8) Liang Chi-chao, proscribed and now a refugee in Japan; (9) Kang Kuang-jên, one of the Martyred Six; and (10) Hsü Jên-ching, also cashiered and dismissed for ever. As for Li and Hsü, the first and second of the list given above, their place would also have been by the side of the Martyred Six on the fatal evening of the 28th ultimo, had they not been aged men, high in rank.

"It is reported from reliable sources at Peking that on the day of the Empress-Dowager's coup d'état (September 22nd) no less than fourteen eunuchs who were the Emperor's own personal attendants, and on whose devotion he was in the habit of relying, were ordered to execution by the Empress-Dowager. The reason given why this sanguinary deed has not become widely known is that the executions took place in the courtyard of the chief eunuch's office, inside the Palace grounds, where refractory and rebellious eunuchs are always attended to, unknown to the outside world."

It is not surprising that, according to the Peking correspondent of the Sinwênpao, in October, 1898, a great fear of some impending disaster seemed to have fallen over the capital, and numbers of houses had the words "Speak not of State Affairs" written on slips of red paper posted over the lintels of each household; the idea being that something must have very recently happened in the Palace at Eho Park, which the powers that be desired to keep secret from the world for the time being.

The railway had been crowded the past week with officials from the provinces returning to their homes. They were afraid to remain where every word they uttered was liable to be considered treason. When they reached their homes, we may expect their reports to their friends and adherents would not increase their loyalty to the Manchu Dynasty.

And yet, in spite of all this, people are surprised that the young man of twenty-seven, without funds, without an army, did not assert himself more. The silence of Kwang-shü is perhaps the noblest action of a much-enduring life.

There was a pathetic story current in Peking that he contrived once to escape from his prison in the island at the Southern Lakes, Eho Park, where he had been confined by the Empress-Dowager since the coup d'état; but that when he got to the Park gates, the Imperial guards, all creatures of the Empress-Dowager, shut the great gates in his face. A crowd of eunuchs, who dared not offer his person any violence or attempt to use force in preventing his walking to the Park gates, followed him in a body, and upon the gates being closed they all knelt in front of the Emperor beseeching him with tears to have mercy on them and not attempt to escape, for it would mean the death of all of them as well as of the guardsmen at the gates were he to do so. The guardsmen also k`otowed and joined in the general prayer, while on the other hand they sent one of their number to apprise the Empress-Dowager of the matter. The Emperor finally took pity on his suppliant subjects, and quietly returned to his prison.

To Europeans this may seem too strange to be true; to those who know China it is so Chinese as to seem probable. That an Emperor should be moved by the tears of his subjects is what Chinese would expect.

It must be remembered that Kang escaped through the intervention of British Consuls, by the protection of a British man-of-war, and was lodged for safety in the gaol at Hongkong at first. Thence he proceeded to Japan, where other Chinese reformers had preceded him, under Japanese protection. The North China Herald of October 3rd, 1898, publishes the following tribute of gratitude from the fellow-provincials of Kang Yü-wei to the Consuls, Admiral, and people of the "Great Empire of Great Britain," for saving Kang from the clutches of the opponents of reform, purporting to represent the sentiments of the Shanghai Cantonese:—The contents of the post envelope were (1) a red card with the words, "Presented with bowed heads by the people of Kwangtung (Canton) Province"; (2) another red card bearing the words, "The people of Kwangtung Province reverentially beg to present their united thanks to the people of the great, unequalled Empire of Great Britain for this proof of loyalty, kindness, majesty, courage, and love of strict justice"; and (3) a sheet of letter paper containing the words, "We, the people of Kwangtung Province, crave permission to express our deep gratitude to their Excellencies the Consuls and the Admiral of the Great Empire of Great Britain for their great kindness to us.

"Reverentially presented by the people of Kwangtung Province.

"We further beg the editor of the North China Daily News to give publicity to the above in its valuable columns, and hope personally to give thanks therefor."

Since then, on October 31st, 1898, the following memorial was presented to the British Consul-General, Mr. Brenan. He could not, as an official, receive it, but the pathetic document cannot but be read with interest.

"Sir,—The avarice and extortions of the mandarins of China and their underlings were the cause of the Emperor's estrangement from his people; and it was this estrangement that has led to his present weakness and their distress.

"Recognising the need for reform, the Emperor in his wisdom and good judgment began, during the fifth moon of the present year, to issue edicts, having for their object the complete renovation of the Empire. The main subjects dealt with were as follows:

"1. The substitution of men of modern ideas and learning for old and useless officials.

"2. The establishment of colleges and technical schools for the advancement of scientific knowledge, after the most approved methods of Western nations.

"3. Conferring the right to memorialise the Throne direct upon all officials throughout the empire, without distinction of rank.

"4. The abrogation of the classical essay system of examinations for degrees and offices.

"The above edicts caused much rejoicing among the people, who recognised in them a great power for the immediate uplifting of the empire, and its future prosperity.

"We, your memorialists, are firmly convinced that if the reforms embodied in the Imperial Edicts could have been put into operation for twenty or thirty years, great and beneficial changes would have been brought about, which would have resulted in the entire change of the customs of the land, and establishment of better relations with the West. Thus we could have looked forward confidently to the inauguration of an era of universal peace.

"But now, through the machinations of evil men and the short-sighted policy of the Empress-Dowager, our Emperor has been imprisoned, the lives of many faithful officers have been ruthlessly taken, and all the Imperial Edicts calling for reform have been revoked. All educational societies have been interdicted, and the native newspapers have been suppressed. Moreover, the lives of all those favourable to reform are in the gravest danger.

"We, your memorialists, being loyal Chinese subjects, regard with great indignation such unwarrantable action on the part of the Empress-Dowager; but we have no power to rectify this unhappy state of affairs.

"Therefore we pray you, sir, according to that equity which is recognised among all nations, to pity China in her distress, by sending a cablegram to the Government, urging your people to assist us by restoring the Emperor to his rightful throne, and by filling the offices of State with faithful and enlightened men.

"Thus will the renovation of China be due to the favour of your Sovereign Ruler, and to you, sir, who forwarded the memorial.

"P.S.—Chinese officialdom is at present divided into two classes, the old and new—Conservatives and Reformers. The former have placed their reliance on Russia to help them, in return for which Russia will gain enlarged territory. The Reformers look to Great Britain and the United States for help, knowing that the policy of these two nations is to keep the Chinese Empire intact. Should the reactionists triumph in their present schemes, there is no power that will prevent the division of China among all the nations of the earth. The Reformers have no power. They can only weep at their country's distress, while they present this memorial asking for your honourable country's assistance. The first thing to be done is to liberate the Emperor and to restore him to power, and to remove the Empress-Dowager. A proclamation from the Emperor calling his people to his protection would be loyally responded to by all his faithful subjects throughout the land.

"A joint memorial from the scholars—literati—of China.

"24th Year of H.M. Kwang-shü,
"9th moon, 17th day.
"(October 31st, 1898)."

APPROACH TO MING EMPEROR'S TOMB, NANKING.

An attempt has been made to show that the Reform party, with the young Emperor Kwang-shü at their head, brought on themselves all that has happened by urging foolish reforms, and moving too fast. A slight summary of the Emperor's decrees will show that all he had done was for China's good.

June 13th, 1898.—The Emperor issued a decree commanding the establishment of a University at Peking, and also ordered Kang Yü-wei to appear at a special audience.

June 15th.—He dismissed his tutor, Wêng Tung-ho, and announced his intention of sending some of the Imperial Clansmen and Princes to travel abroad and learn.

June 20th.—He ordered the Tsung-li Yamen to report on the necessity of encouraging art, science, and modern agriculture. It was ordered that the construction of the Lu-han railway should be expedited.

June 23rd.—The classical essays were abolished as a necessary part of examinations.

June 27th.—The Ministers and Princes were ordered to report on the proposal to adopt Western arms and drill for all the Tartar troops.

July 4th.—The establishment of agricultural schools in the provinces to teach the farmers improved methods of agriculture was commanded; and on the same day the liberal-minded Sun Chia-nai was appointed President of the Peking University.

July 5th.—The Emperor ordered the introduction of patent and copyright laws.

July 6th.—The Board of War and the Tsung-li Yamen were ordered to report on the proposed reform of military examinations.

July 7th.—Special rewards were promised to inventors and authors.

July 14th.—Officials were ordered to do all in their power to encourage trade and assist merchants.

July 29th.—On the recommendation of Li Tuan-fên, since banished to Kashgaria by the Empress Tze Hsi, the establishment of educational boards was ordered in every city throughout the empire.

August 2nd.—The Bureau of Mines and Railways was established.

August 9th.—Journalists were encouraged to write on political subjects for the enlightenment of the authorities.

August 10th.—Jung Lu and Lin Kun-yi were directed to consult on the establishment of naval academies and training-ships.

August 22nd.—It was ordered that schools should be established in connection with Chinese Legations abroad, for the benefit of the sons of Chinese settled in foreign countries.

August 24th.—Ministers and Provincial Authorities were urged to assist the Emperor in his work of reform.

August 28th.—The Viceroys Lin Kun-yi and Chang-chih-tung were ordered to establish commercial bureaux for the encouragement of trade in Shanghai and Hankow.

September 1st.—Six minor and useless boards in Peking were abolished.

September 7th.—Li Hung-chang and Ching Hsin were dismissed from the Tsung-li Yamen, and the issue of chao-hsin bonds was stopped, because the provincial authorities had used them to squeeze the people.

September 8th.—The governorships of Hupeh, Kwangtung, and Yunnan were abolished as a useless expense.

September 11th.—The establishment of schools of instruction in the preparation of tea and silk was approved.

September 12th.—The Tsung-li Yamen and Board of War were ordered to report on the suggestion that the Imperial Courier posts should be abolished in favour of the Imperial Customs post; and the establishment of newspapers was encouraged.

September 13th.—The general right to memorialise the Throne by closed memorials was granted; and on the same date Manchus who had no taste for civil or military office were allowed to take up trades or professions.

September 14th.—The two Presidents and four Vice-Presidents of the Board of Rites were dismissed for disobeying the Emperor's order that memorials should be sent to him unopened, whatever their source.

September 15th.—The system of budgets as in Western countries was approved.

It will be at once evident that the Emperor and his party had raised up many powerful enemies, and should—had they been wise—have secured the assistance of the army in the first instance. It was when they attempted to secure troops that the end came. It is also evident that several of the reforms were what every one would agree are absolutely necessary for China; and although they may have made too many at once, the exact rate at which reforms can be successfully carried has never been calculated. Nor is there any evidence even yet that they were going too fast for the country. They would always have moved too fast for the officials whose offices they abolished. At the same time there is a certain sort of doctrinaire flavour about this multiplicity of schools started at once, and encouragement given to newspaper writers.

Since then the Empress-Dowager has in her own name gone rather further in the opposite direction—and raised up a yet larger number of enemies—forbidding the establishment of societies of any sort, and ordering the officials to arrest the members and punish them according to their responsibilities. The chiefs are to be executed summarily, and the less responsible banished into perpetual exile. This affects the Patriotic Association, as also the new societies that were formed for the engaging of teachers and purchase of scientific books after the Emperor's decree doing away with the five-chapter essay, and ordering that mathematics should be an essential subject in examination. The Empress has also suppressed all newspapers, and summarily sentenced their editors to death. She has also ordered that no further steps should be taken to drill or arm the soldiery according to Western methods, but that they should revert to bows and arrows, and to the contests in running and lifting heavy weights of ancient usage. The Emperor had signified his intention of presiding at the next military examinations, which were to have been in target-shooting with modern weapons of precision. The Empress has now announced that, instead of this, not even the candidates need present themselves at Court. And all the promising schemes for opening lower and middle schools of Western learning are nipped in the bud—those for girls, as before mentioned, in Shanghai, having for safety been put under foreign management.

The most powerful man in China for the moment seems to be Jung Lu, a Manchu who has spent most of his life in military offices at Peking, but was at one time general in Shensi, and as Viceroy of Chihli—the office so long held by Li Hung-chang—was much liked by foreigners at Tientsin. He is reported, however, not to have slept for two nights with anxiety as to what the British fleet was doing at Pehtaiho just before the coup d'état; and if that is the case, he is not a man of that iron stuff that his mistress will long be able to lean upon. The real power behind the Throne, according to Kang, is a sham eunuch, Li Luen-yên, the man whom every one who wants an audience has for years past had to bribe heavily. Li Hung-chang, the Empress's firm adherent during all her long tenure of power, is beginning to be known in England. Of Shêng, once his creature, but who managed during Li's absence in Europe to attain such lucrative posts as to look down upon his former patron, the following story is told. His health never being very good, Shêng had been accustomed to get leave of absence from Tientsin in winter, and go to enjoy himself in his native city of Soochow, the Paris of China, and with also a much softer climate. During the Japanese War it was felt impossible to give a man in such high place leave of absence. But he was dispensed from regular official work, and allowed therefore to close the public offices under his control. This was done, and they were reopened by him as gambling-houses, where every man of business in Tientsin must lose his money if he hoped to put through a job or a contract under the corrupt administration of Shêng. It may be remembered the British Government demanded the latter's head a few years ago; but, as in the case of Chou Han, who disseminated the vile anti-Christian publications from Hunan, their demands were put off by being told he was either not to be found, or mad, or something or other. It is men like this that must corrupt any nation in which they hold high power. It is men like this who are always ready to receive high bribes from foreign powers. The countries that wish to see China decadent, feeble, torn by internal divisions, and under their control, have a direct interest in supporting the late Dowager, now usurping Empress, Tze Hsi, and the men who rally round her.

But those who do not wish to appropriate Chinese territory, but rather that both the Chinese and themselves should enjoy tranquillity, so as to develop each their own territories to their highest capacity, must wish to see in power men like Chang-chih-tung, the one Viceroy never even accused of peculation, and who never visits Peking, and other men of high aims and upright conduct—making mistakes possibly, but at least trying their best to elevate and guide the most peace-loving and law abiding people that ever existed. The Chinese may, as Lord Wolseley has predicted, make good soldiers some day. But from time immemorial they have despised war. And as in our men-of-war I have heard that in battles in old days mattresses would be hung over the ships' sides to protect them, so we might do worse than interpose between fiery, mysterious India and the other nations of Asia the impenetrable, apparently yielding, but never really yielding, big feather-bed of vigorous, healthy China, relieved from her corrupt and disastrous Mandarin system, with her men's minds freed from the cramping influence of a too ancient system of education, and her women set upon their feet so as to be once more able to bear noble sons. With all the nations of the West contending who is to have its bones to pick, it is necessary that some nation or nations should in the first instance stand by China. But once let some great Western nation make it plain to the world that he who attacks China attacks her, and there will be no attack. And let China's feet but once be set firmly in the ways of progress, and there will be no going back.

I conclude with the words of the man whom I believe to be the wisest statesman of the day, although to my mind he too often lacks the decision to act in accordance with his own judgment. Lord Salisbury in June, 1898, said: "If I am asked what our policy in China is, my answer is very simple. It is to maintain the Chinese Empire, to prevent it from falling into ruins, to invite it into paths of reform, and to give it every assistance which we are able to give it, to perfect its defence or to increase its commercial prosperity. By so doing we shall be aiding its cause and our own." Excepting through the Victoria College, years ago established in Hongkong, where and when, may I ask, has the British Government acted on this policy laid down by the Prime Minister with the strongest following of any Minister of modern times?

Printed by Hazell, Watson, & Viney, Ld., London and Aylesbury.

Books Connected with China
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A MARRIAGE IN CHINA.

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MY DIARY IN A CHINESE FARM.

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