Court Life in China: The Capital, Its Officials and People

by Isaac Taylor Headland

"I did then but I do not now. Indeed we all did. My grandmother came to me and positively forbade me to keep the slave in her home. After she had gone the girl came and knelt at my feet and begged me to save her! How could I send her out to death when she had been so kind and faithful to me? I finally decided upon a plan to save her. I determined to flee with her to the home of an uncle who lived in a town a hundred miles or more from Peking, where I hoped the Boxers were less powerful than they were at the capital.

"This uncle was the lieutenant-governor of the province and had always been very fond of me, and I knew if I could reach him I should win his sympathy and his aid. But how was this to be done? All travellers were suspected, searched and examined. For two women to be travelling alone, when the country was in such a state of unrest, could not but bring upon themselves suspicion, and should we be searched, the cross upon the forehead would surely be found, and we would be condemned to the cruel tortures in which the Boxers were said to delight.

"After much thought and planning the only possible method seemed to be to flee as beggars. You know women beggars are found upon the roads at all times and they excite little suspicion. Then in the hot summer it is not uncommon for them to wrap their head and forehead in a piece of cloth to protect them from the fierce rays of the sun. In this way I hoped to conceal the cross from observation in case we came into the presence of the Boxers. We confided our plans to a couple of the women servants whom we could trust, and asked them to procure proper outfits for us. They did so, and oh! what dirty old rags they were. The servants wept as they took off and folded up my silk garments and clad me in this beggar's garb."

"But your skin is so soft and fair, not at all like the skin of a woman exposed to the sun; and your black, shiny hair is not at all rusty and dirty like the hair of a beggar woman. I should think these facts would have caused your detection," I urged.

"That was easily remedied. We stained our faces, necks, hands and arms, and we took down our hair and literally rolled it in dust which the servants brought from the street. Oh! but it was nasty! such an odour! It was only the saving of the life of that faithful slave that could have induced me to do it. I had to take off my little slippers and wrap my feet in dirty rags such as beggars wear. We could take but a little copper cash with us. To be seen with silver or gold would have at once brought suspicion upon us, while bank-notes were useless in those days.

"In the early morning, before any one was astir we were let out of a back gate. It was the first time I had ever walked on the street. I had always been accustomed to going in my closed cart with outriders and servants. I shrank from staring eyes, and thought every glance was suspicious. My slave was more timid than I and so I must take the initiative. I had been accustomed to seeing street beggars from behind the screened windows of my cart ever since I was a child and so I knew how I ought to act, but at first it was difficult indeed. Soon, however, we learned to play our part, though it seems now like a hideous dream. We kept on towards the great gate through which we passed out of the city on to the highway which led to our destination.

"The first time we met a Boxer procession my knees knocked together in my fear of detection but they passed by without giving us a glance. We met them often after this, and before we finished our journey I learned to doubt their claim to detect Christians by the sign of the cross.

"We ate at the roadside booths, slept often in a gateway or by the side of a wall under the open sky, and after several days' wandering, we reached the yamen of my uncle. But we dare not enter and reveal our identity, lest we implicate them, for we found the Boxers strong everywhere, and even the officials feared their prowess. We hung about the yamen begging in such a way as not to arouse suspicion, until an old servant who had been in the family for many years, and whom I knew well, came upon the street. I followed him begging until we were out of earshot of others, and then told him in a singsong, whining tone, such as beggars use, who I was and why I was there, and asked him to let my uncle know, and said that if they would open the small gate in the evening we would be near and could enter unobserved.

"At first he could not believe it was I, for by this time we indeed looked like veritable beggars, but he was finally convinced and promised to tell my uncle. After nightfall he opened the gate and led us in by a back passage to my aunt's apartments where she and my uncle were waiting for me. They both burst into tears as they beheld my plight. Two old serving women, who had been many years in the family, helped us to change our clothes and gave us a bath and food. My feet had suffered the most. They were swollen and ulcerated and the dirty rags and dust adhering to the sores had left them in a wretched condition. It took many baths before we were clean, and weeks before my feet were healed.

"We remained with my uncle until the close of the Boxer trouble, and until my grandfather's return from Hsian where he had gone with the Empress Dowager and the court, and then I came back to Peking."