Part 16

"The Emperor," said the Princess, "was not asked for an expression of his opinion on this occasion, but when he saw that the Boxer leaders had won the day he burst into tears and left the room."

Similar meetings were held in the palace on two other occasions, when the Emperor implored that they make no attempt to fight all the foreign nations, for said he, "the foreigners are stronger than we, both in money and in arms, while their soldiers are much better drilled and equipped in every way. If we undertake this and fail as we are sure to do, it will be impossible to make peace with the foreigners and our country will be divided up amongst them." His pleadings, however, were disregarded, and after the meeting was over, he had to return to his little island, where for eight weeks he was compelled to sit listening to the rattling guns, booming cannons and bursting firecrackers, for the Boxers seemed to hope to exterminate the foreigners by noise. He must have felt from the books he had studied that it could only result in disaster to his own people.

When the allies reached Peking and the Boxers capitulated the Emperor was taken out of his prison and compelled to flee with the court.

"What do you think of your bullet-proof Boxers now?" one can imagine they hear him saying to his august aunt, as he sees her cutting off her long finger nails, dressing herself in blue cotton garments, and climbing into a common street cart as an ordinary servant. "Wouldn't it have been better to have taken my advice and that of Hsu Ching-cheng and Yuan Chang instead of having put them to death for endeavouring in their earnestness to save the country? What about your old conservative friends? Can they be depended upon as pillars of state?" Or some other "I-told-you-so" language of this kind.

From their exile in Hsian decrees continued to be issued in his name, and when affairs began to be adjusted, and the allies insisted on setting aside forever the pretentions of the anti-foreign Prince Tuan and his son, banishing the former to perpetual exile, our hopes ran high that the Emperor would be restored to his throne. But to our disappointment the framers of the Protocol contented themselves with the clause that: "Rational intercourse shall be permitted with the Emperor as in Western countries," and with the return of the court in 1902 he was still a prisoner.

Every one who has written about audiences with the Empress Dowager tells how "the Emperor was seated near, though a little below her," but they never tell why. The reason is not far to seek. The world must not know that he was a prisoner in the palace. They must see him near the throne, but they may not speak to him. The addresses of the ministers were passed to her by her kneeling statesmen, and it was they who replied. No notice was taken of the Emperor though he seemed to be in excellent health. The Empress Dowager however still relieved him of the burdens of the government, and continued to "teach him how to govern."

"I have seen the Emperor many times," Mrs. Headland tells me, "and have spent many hours in his presence, and every time we were in the palace the Emperor accompanied the Empress Dowager--not by her side but a few steps behind her. When she sat, he always remained standing a few paces in the rear, and never presumed to sit unless asked by her to do so. He was a lonely person, with his delicate, well-bred features and his simple dark robes, and in the midst of these fawning eunuchs, brilliant court ladies, and bejewelled Empress Dowager he was an inconspicuous figure. No minister of state touched forehead to floor as he spoke in hushed and trembling voice to him, no obsequious eunuchs knelt when coming into his presence; but on the contrary I have again and again seen him crowded against the wall by these cringing servants of Her Majesty.

"One day while we were in the palace a pompous eunuch had stepped before the Emperor quite obliterating him. I saw Kuang Hsu put his hands on the large man's shoulders, and quietly turn him around, that he might see before whom he stood. There were no signs of anger on his face, but rather a gentle, pathetic smile as he looked up at the big servant. I expected to see him fall upon his knees before the Emperor, but instead, he only moved a few inches to the left, and remained still in front of His Majesty. Never when in the palace have I seen a knee bend to the Emperor, except that of the foreigner when greeting him or bidding him farewell. This was the more noticeable as statesmen and eunuchs alike fell upon their knees every time they spoke to the Empress Dowager.

"The first time I saw him his great, pathetic, wistful eyes followed me for days. I could not forget them, and I determined that if I ever had opportunity I would say a few words to him letting him know that the world was resting in hope of his carrying out the great reforms he had instituted. But he was so carefully guarded and kept under such strict surveillance that I never found an opportunity to speak to him. Nor did he ever speak to the visitors, court ladies, the Empress Dowager, or attendants during all the hours we remained.

"One of the ministers told me that one day after an audience, when the Empress Dowager and the Emperor had stepped down from the dais, Her Majesty was engaged in conversation with one of his colleagues, and as the Emperor stood near by, he made some remark to him. Immediately the Empress Dowager turned from the one to whom she had been talking and made answer for the Emperor.

"On one occasion when there were but four of us in the palace, and we were all comfortably seated, the Emperor standing a few paces behind the Empress Dowager, she began discussing the Boxer movement, lamenting the loss of her long finger nails, and various good-luck gourds of which she was fond. The Emperor, probably becoming weary of a conversation in which he had no part, quietly withdrew by a side entrance to the theatre which was playing at the time. For some moments the Empress Dowager did not notice his absence, but the instant she discovered he was gone, a look of anxiety overspread her features, and she turned to the head eunuch, Li Lien-ying, and in an authoritative tone asked: 'Where is the Emperor?' There was a scurry among the eunuchs, and they were sent hither and thither to inquire. After a few moments they returned, saying that he was in the theatre. The look of anxiety passed from her face as a cloud passes from before the sun--and several of the eunuchs remained at the theatre.

"I am told that at times the Empress Dowager invites the Emperor to dine with her, and on such occasions he is forced to kneel at the table at which she is seated, eating only what she gives him. It is an honour which he does not covet, but which he dare not decline for fear of giving offense."

Prince Chun--The Regent

Prince Chun the Regent of China gave a remarkable luncheon at the Winter Palace to-day to the foreign envoys who gathered here to attend the funeral ceremonies of the late Emperor Kuang Hsu. The repast was served in foreign style. Among the Chinese present were Prince Ching, former president of the Board of Foreign Affairs and now adviser to the Naval Department; Prince Tsai Chen, a son of Prince Ching, who was at one time president of the Board of Commerce; Prince Su, chief of the Naval Department; and Liaing Tung-yen, president of the Board of Foreign Affairs. After the entertainment the envoys expressed themselves as unusually impressed with the personality of the Regent.--Daily Press.

PRINCE CHUN--THE REGENT

The selection of Prince Chun as Regent for the Chinese empire during the minority of his son, Pu I, the new Emperor, would seem to be the wisest choice that could be made at the present time. In the first place, he is the younger brother of Kuang Hsu, the late Emperor, and was in sympathy with all the reforms the latter undertook to introduce in 1898. If Kuang Hsu had chosen his successor, having no son of his own, there is no reason why he should not have selected Pu I to occupy the throne, with Prince Chun as Regent, for there is no other prince in whom he could have reposed greater confidence of having all his reform measures carried to a successful issue; and a brother with whom he had always lived in sympathy would be more likely to continue his policy than any one else.

But, in the second place, as we may suppose, Prince Chun was selected by the Empress Dowager, whatever the edicts issued, and will thus have the confidence of the party of which she has been the leader. It is quite wrong to suppose that this is the conservative party, or even a conservative party. China has both reform and conservative parties, but, in addition to these, she has many wise men and great officials who are neither radical reformers nor ultra-conservatives. It was these men with whom the Empress Dowager allied herself after the Boxer troubles of 1900.

These men were Li Hung-chang, Chang Chih-tung, Yuan Shih-kai, Prince Ching, and others, and it is they who, in ten years, with the Empress Dowager, put into operation, in a statesmanlike way, all the reforms that Kuang Hsu, with his hot-headed young radical advisers, attempted to force upon the country in as many weeks. There is every reason to believe that Prince Chun, the present Regent, has the support of all the wiser and better element of the Reform party, as well as those great men who have been successful in tiding China over the ten most difficult years of her history, while the ultra-conservatives at this late date are too few or too weak to deserve serious consideration. We, therefore, think that the choice of Pu I as Emperor, with Prince Chun as Regent, whether by the Empress Dowager, the Emperor, or both, was, all things considered, the best selection that could have been made.

Prince Chun is the son of the Seventh Prince, the nephew of the Emperor Hsien Feng and the Empress Dowager, and grandson of the Emperor Tao Kuang. He has a fine face, clear eye, firm mouth, with a tendency to reticence. He carries himself very straight, and while below the average in height, is every inch a prince. He is dignified, intelligent, and, though not loquacious, never at a loss for a topic of conversation. He is not inclined to small talk, but when among men of his own rank, he does not hesitate to indulge in bits of humour.

This was rather amusingly illustrated at a dinner given by the late Major Conger, American minister to China. Major and Mrs. Conger introduced many innovations into the social life of Peking, and none more important than the dinners and luncheons given to the princes and high officials, and also to the princesses and ladies of the court. In 1904, I was invited to dine with Major Conger and help entertain Prince Chun, Prince Pu Lun, Prince Ching, Governor Hu, Na T'ung, and a number of other princes and officials of high rank. I sat between Prince Chun and Governor Hu. Having met them both on several former occasions, I was not a stranger to either of them, and as they were well acquainted with each other, though one was a Manchu prince and the other a Chinese official, conversation was easy and natural.

We talked, of course, in Chinese only, of the improvements and advantages that railroads bring to a country, for Governor Hu, among other things, was the superintendent of the Imperial Railways of north China. This led us to speak of the relative comforts of travel by land and by sea, for Prince Chun had gone half round the world and back. We listened to the American minister toasting the young Emperor of China, his princes, and his subjects; and then to Prince Ching toasting the young President of the United States, his officials, and his people, in a most dignified and eloquent manner. And then as the buzz of conversation went round the table again, and perhaps because of their having spoken of the YOUNG Emperor and the young President, I turned to Governor Hu, who had an unusually long, white beard which reached almost to his waist as he sat at table, and said:

"Your Excellency, what is your honourable age?"

"I was seventy years old my last birthday," he replied.

"And he is still as strong as either of us young men," said I, turning to Prince Chun.

"Oh, yes," said the Prince; "he is good for ten years yet, and by that time he can use his beard as an apron."

"It is an ill wind that blows no one good," says the proverb, and this was never more forcibly illustrated than in the case of the death of the lamented Baron von Kettler. Had it not been for this unfortunate occurrence, Prince Chun would not have been sent to Germany to convey the apologies of the Chinese government to the German Emperor, and he would thus never have had the opportunity of a trip to Europe; and the world might once more have beheld a regent on the dragon throne who had never seen anything a hundred miles from his own capital.

Prince Chun started on this journey with such a retinue as only the Chinese government can furnish. He had educated foreign physicians and interpreters, and, like the great Viceroy Li Hung-chang, he had a round fan with the Eastern hemisphere painted on one side and the Western on the other, and the route he was to travel distinctly outlined on both, with all the places he was to pass through, or to stop at on the trip, plainly marked. He was intelligent enough to observe everything of importance in the ports through which he passed, and it was interesting to hear him tell of the things he had seen, and his characterization of some of the people he had visited.

"What did Your Highness think of the relative characteristics of the Germans and the French, as you saw them?" I asked him at the same dinner.