China under the Empress Dowager

by J. O. P. Bland; Sir E. Backhouse

At the Court’s halting place at Pa-Ko shih, close to the Great Wall, a Memorial came in from Prince Seng Ko Lin Ch’in, stating that small scouting parties of the barbarian troops had been seen in the neighbourhood of Peking, but that as yet there had been no general bombardment. A Rescript was issued as follows:—

“Inasmuch as it would appear that the pertinacity of these barbarians will only increase with opposition, it seems desirable to come to terms with them as soon as possible. With reference to the French barbarian Gros’s petition to be permitted to discuss matters with Prince Kung in person, at Peking, we command the Prince to receive him. But should the bandits attempt to approach the city in force, Prince Seng should take them in the rear and cut off their retreat. If by any chance, however, Peking should be already taken, let the Mongol regiments be sent up to the Great Wall for the protection of our person.”

After a leisurely journey, the Court reached Jehol on the 18th. On the 20th, the opinion of the advisers of the Emperor seemed to be in favour of continuing the war at all costs. A Decree was issued, referring to the fact that the foreign troops had dared to encamp near the Summer Palace, and forbidding Prince Kung to spare the lives of any captured barbarians upon any pretext whatsoever. To this Prince Kung replied stating that the prisoners had already been released and that the Anting gate had been surrendered to the foreigners. Prince Kung, in fact, was statesman enough to realise that the only chance for China lay in submission; he therefore ignored the Imperial Decrees. Before long the Emperor was persuaded to allow negotiations to be resumed, and on the 15th of the 9th Moon he confirmed the Treaty, which had been signed in Peking, in the following Edict:—

“Prince Kung, duly appointed by us to be Plenipotentiary, concluded, on the 11th and 12th days of this Moon, Treaties of Peace with the British and the French. Hereafter amity is to exist between our nations in perpetuity, and the various conditions of the Treaty are to be strictly observed by all.”

III
THE TSAI YÜAN CONSPIRACY

It was originally intended that the Emperor Hsien-Feng should return from Jehol to Peking in the spring of 1861, and a Decree was issued to that effect. In January, however, his illness had become so serious that travelling was out of the question, and this Decree was rescinded.

At Jehol, removed from the direct influence of his brothers, and enfeebled by sickness, the Emperor had gradually fallen under the domination of the Prince Yi (Tsai Yüan) with whom were associated, as Grand Councillors, the Prince Tuan Hua and the Imperial Clansman Su Shun. These three, recognising that the Emperor’s end was near and that a Regency would be necessary, determined on securing the power for themselves. Prince Yi was nominally the leader of this conspiracy, but its instigator and leading spirit was Su Shun. Tuan Hua, whose family title was Prince Cheng, was the head of one of the eight princely Manchu families, descended in the direct line from Nurhachu’s brother. Su Shun was foster-brother to this Prince. In his youth he was a conspicuous figure in the capital, famous for his Mohawk tendencies, a wild blade, addicted to hawking and riotous living. He had originally been recommended to the notice of the Emperor by the two Princes and soon won his way into the dissolute monarch’s confidence and goodwill. From a junior post in the Board of Revenue, he rose rapidly, becoming eventually an Assistant Grand Secretary, in which capacity he attained an unenviable reputation for avarice and cruelty. He had made himself hated and feared by persuading the Emperor to order the decapitation of his chief, the Grand Secretary Po Chun,[4] on the pretext that he had shown favouritism as Chief Examiner for the Metropolitan Degree,—the real reason being that he had offended the two Princes by his uncompromising honesty and blunt speech. It was at this period that he first came into conflict with the young Yehonala, who, dreading the man’s growing influence with the Emperor, endeavoured to counteract it, and at the same time to save the life of the Grand Secretary; she failed in the attempt, and Su Shun’s position became the stronger for her failure. All those who opposed him were speedily banished or degraded. The Court was terrified, especially when it was realised that Yehonala was out of favour, and Su Shun took care to give them real and frequent cause for alarm. At his instance, all the Secretaries of the Board of Revenue were cashiered on a charge of making illicit profits by cornering the cash market. The charge was possibly well-founded, since such proceedings are part of a Metropolitan official’s recognised means of subsistence, but coming from the notoriously corrupt Su Shun, it was purely vindictive, as was shown by his subsequent action; for upon this charge he obtained the arrest of over a hundred notables and rich merchants whom he kept in custody of no gentle kind until they had ransomed themselves with enormous sums. Thus was founded the great fortune which enabled him to conspire with the Princes Yi and Cheng[5] for the supreme power, and which led him eventually to his ruin. To this day, many of his millions lie in the Palace vaults, to which they were carried after his impeachment and death—millions carefully hoarded by Tzŭ Hsi and buried during the Court’s flight and exile in 1900.

It was chiefly because of the advice of Su Shun that the Emperor fled his capital at the approach of the Allies, in spite of the urgent appeals of Yehonala and the Grand Council. By his advice also most of the high officials and Metropolitan Ministers were prevented from accompanying the Court, by which means the conspirators were able to exercise steadily increasing influence over the Emperor, and to prevent other advice reaching him. It was only the supreme courage and intelligent grasp of the situation shown by Yehonala, that frustrated the conspiracy at its most critical moment. Immediately after the death of the Emperor, and while the plotters were still undecided as to their final plans, she sent an urgent message secretly to Prince Kung which brought him with all speed to Jehol, where, by the help of Jung Lu and other loyal servants, she put into execution the bold plan which defeated the conspiracy and placed her at the head of China’s government. On the day when, the game hopelessly lost, the usurping Regents found themselves in Yehonala’s hands and heard her order their summary trial by the Court of the Imperial Clan, Su Shun turned to his colleagues and bitterly reproached them. “Had you but taken my advice and slain this woman,” he said, “we should not have been in this plight to-day.”