It was now that I realised the full significance of the jade tablet sent to me by the hands of the student of Chinese literature. The nearer I penetrated to my august client, the more awe this symbol seemed to excite, till the attendants who guarded the antechamber actually fell on their knees at the sight of it, and refused to rise till I had replaced it in its silken veils.
Impressed, in spite of myself, by this ceremonial homage to a mere token, I felt a real sentiment of awe as I stood at last in the presence of the being whom countless millions of men worship as divine.
Slight, dark-haired, and ivory-pale, the Emperor-maker received me seated in a simple chair of bamboo. I was not required to perform the kowtow, my audience being a strictly private one. I learned afterwards, moreover, that a hurried decree of the Board of Rites had raised my grandfather to the rank of a marquis, in order to qualify me for a personal interview with her Majesty.
The conversation was carried on in French, through an interpreter, himself of such high rank that he could not have spoken to me directly but for the recent ennobling of my ancestry.
‘Her Imperial Majesty has deigned to express a hope that you are not fatigued by your journey.’
‘It is impossible to be conscious of fatigue in her Majesty’s presence,’ I returned with a deep bow.
By the slight smile that parted the thin, terrible lips of the Empress, I acquired the certainty that her Majesty perfectly understood everything that was being said.
No doubt the interpreter was equally aware of this circumstance, for he assumed an expression of courtly dismay.
‘I dare not let the Mother of the Emperor know that you have presumed to offer her a compliment,’ he said rebukingly. ‘I will tell her Majesty that you await her Imperial commands.’
After a short interchange in Chinese, he turned to me again.