Part 1

Chapter 13,531 wordsPublic domain

CHINA UNDER THE EMPRESS DOWAGER

BEING THE HISTORY OF THE LIFE AND TIMES OF TZŬ HSI

COMPILED FROM STATE PAPERS AND THE PRIVATE DIARY OF THE COMPTROLLER OF HER HOUSEHOLD

BY J. O. P. BLAND AND E. BACKHOUSE

ILLUSTRATED

PHILADELPHIA J. B. LIPPINCOTT COMPANY LONDON: WILLIAM HEINEMANN MCMX

_Printed in England_

NOTE

The thanks of the Authors are hereby gratefully expressed to Miss Katharine A. Carl, for permission to reproduce the photograph of her portrait of the Empress Dowager; to Mr. K. Ogawa, art publisher of Tokyo, for the use of his unique pictures of the Palace at Peking; to Mr. Geo. Bronson Rea, of the _Far Eastern Review_, for permission to reproduce illustrations originally published in that journal; to Messrs. Betines, of Peking, for the right to publish their views of the capital; and to the Editor of _The Times_, for his courtesy in permitting the inclusion in this volume of certain articles written for that paper.

LONDON, _September 10th, 1910_.

CONTENTS

PAGE

THE PARENTAGE AND YOUTH OF YEHONALA 1

THE FLIGHT TO JEHOL 14

III

THE TSAI YÜAN CONSPIRACY 30

THE FIRST REGENCY 51

TSENG KUO-FAN AND THE TAIPING REBELLION (1864) 64

TZŬ HSI AND THE EUNUCHS 81

VII

A QUESTION OF ETIQUETTE 110

VIII

MAJORITY AND DEATH OF THE EMPEROR T’UNG-CHIH 117

THE PROTEST AND SUICIDE OF WU K’O-TU 132

TZŬ HSI BECOMES SOLE REGENT 148

TZŬ HSI “EN RETRAITE” 161

XII

THE REFORM MOVEMENT OF 1898 178

XIII

THE HUNDRED DAYS OF REFORM 190

XIV

THE _COUP D’ÉTAT_ OF 1898 201

TZŬ HSI RESUMES THE REGENCY (1898) 211

XVI

THE GENESIS OF THE BOXER MOVEMENT 246

XVII

THE DIARY OF HIS EXCELLENCY CHING SHAN 251

XVIII

IN MEMORY OF TWO BRAVE MEN 307

XIX

SIDELIGHTS ON TZŬ HSI’S STATECRAFT 327

THE FLIGHT FROM PEKIN AND THE COURT IN EXILE 340

XXI

HOW THE BOXER LEADERS DIED 363

XXII

THE OLD BUDDHA PENITENT 375

XXIII

THE RETURN OF THE COURT TO PEKING 387

XXIV

HER MAJESTY’S NEW POLICY 417

XXV

THE VALEDICTORY MEMORIAL OF JUNG LU 436

XXVI

HER MAJESTY’S LAST DAYS 443

XXVII

TZŬ HSI’S DEATH AND BURIAL 464

XXVIII

CONCLUSION 476

APPENDIX 499

INDEX 517

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

FACING PAGE

THE “HOLY MOTHER,” HER MAJESTY TZŬ HSI _Frontispiece_

MAP OF PEKING xii, xiii

THE REGENT PRINCE CH’UN, WITH HIS TWO SONS, THE PRESENT EMPEROR (STANDING) AND PRINCE P’U CHIEH 4

THE IMPERIAL DAÏS IN THE CHIAO-TAL HALL 18

H.I.H. P’U JU, COUSIN OF THE PRESENT EMPEROR, SON OF THE BOXER PRINCE TSAI-YING, AND GRANDSON OF PRINCE KUNG 20

HER MAJESTY TZŬ HSI IN THE YEAR 1903 36

EXTERIOR OF THE CH’IEN CH’ING PALACE 54

H.M. TZŬ HSI, WITH THE CONSORT (LUNG YÜ) AND PRINCIPAL CONCUBINE (JEN FEI) OF H.M. KUANG-HSÜ, ACCOMPANIED BY COURT LADIES AND EUNUCHS 90

FACSIMILE OF LETTER WRITTEN BY CHIEF EUNUCH LI LIEN-YING 98

INTERIOR OF THE YANG HSIN TIEN. (PALACE OF “MIND NURTURE.”) 122

INTERIOR OF THE I KUN KUNG 148

INTERIOR OF THE TAI HO TIEN 166

CIRCULAR THRONE HALL IN THE GROUNDS OF THE LAKE PALACE LOOTED BY ALLIED TROOPS IN 1900 208

PAVILION ON LAKE TO THE WEST OF FORBIDDEN CITY 208

THE “BEILEH” TSAI YING, SON OF PRINCE KUNG (CASHIERED BY TZŬ HSI FOR PRO-BOXER PROCLIVITIES), AND HIS SON 252

H.M. THE EMPRESS DOWAGER AND LADIES OF HER COURT (1903) 256

THE TA-A-KO, SON OF PRINCE TUAN, THE BOXER LEADER 280

REPRODUCTION OF PICTURE PAINTED ON SILK BY HER MAJESTY TZŬ HSI 284

FACSIMILE OF A FRAGMENT OF THE DIARY 299

DAUGHTERS OF A HIGH MANCHU OFFICIAL OF THE COURT 302

MARBLE BRIDGE IN THE GROUNDS OF THE LAKE PALACE 350

IN THE GROUNDS OF THE PALACE IN THE WESTERN PARK 350

HIS HIGHNESS PRINCE TSAI HSÜN 386

VIEW, FROM THE K’UN MING LAKE, OF THE SUMMER PALACE 452

THE EMPRESS DOWAGER, WITH THE CHIEF EUNUCH, LI LIEN-YING 454

THE SON OF HEAVEN 458

MARBLE BRIDGE OVER THE LAKE IN THE WESTERN PARK WHICH SURROUNDS THE LAKE PALACE 474

“TI WANG MIAO” OR TEMPLE TO THE MEMORY OF VIRTUOUS EMPERORS OF PREVIOUS DYNASTIES 474

PORTRAIT OF THE EMPRESS DOWAGER 482

THE IMPERIAL DAÏS IN THE CH’IEN CH’ING HALL 498

CEILING AND PILLARS OF THE TAI HO TIEN 510

INDEX TO NUMBERED MAP OF PEKING

(1) Tung Hua Men, the East Gate Glorious. This is the usual entrance to the Forbidden City for officials attending audience when the Court is there resident. (It was here that was suspended in a basket the head of the foreigner captured by the Boxers on 20th June.)

(2) Huang Chi Tien, or Throne Hall of Imperial Supremacy. In this Hall the Empress Dowager, after the return of the Court from exile, was accustomed to receive her officials in audience on the rare occasions when she lived in the Forbidden City. It was here that her remains lay for nearly a year awaiting the day of burial.

(3) Ning Shou Kung, or Palace of Peaceful Longevity. Here the Old Buddha resided during the siege; here she buried her treasure. She returned hither after the days of exile and lived in it pending the restoration of the Lake Palace, desecrated by the foreign occupation.

(4) Chien Ching Kung, or Palace of Heavenly Purity. The Hall in which China’s Emperors were accustomed to give audience to the Grand Council. After the Boxer rising, in accordance with the new ceremonial laid down by the Peace Protocol, the Diplomatic Body were received here. In this Hall the Emperor Kuang Hsü discussed and decided with K’ang Yu-wei the reform programme of 1898, and it was here that his body lay awaiting sepulture between November 1898 and February 1909.

(5) Shen Wu Men, or Gate of Divine Military Genius. Through this, the Northern gate of the City, the Old Buddha fled in the dawn of the 15th August, 1900.

(6) The Rock-garden in which Her Majesty used to walk during the days of the siege of the Legations and from which she witnessed the burning of the Hanlin Academy.

(7) Yang Hsin Tien, or Throne Hall of Mental Growth. In this Palace the Emperor T’ung-Chih resided during the whole of his reign.

(8) Hsi Hua Men, or West Gate Glorious. One of the main entrances to the Forbidden City.

(9) Tai Ho Tien, Throne Hall of Exalted Peace. Used only on occasions of High ceremony, such as the accession of a new Emperor, an Imperial birthday celebration, or the New Year ceremonies.

(10) Shou Huang Tien, or Throne Hall of Imperial Longevity. In this building the reigning sovereign unrolls on the day of the New Year the portraits of deceased Emperors, and pays sacrifice to them.

(11) Hsi Yüan Men, Western Park Gate. It is through this that the Grand Council and other high officials pass to audience when the sovereign is in residence at the Lake Palace.

(12) At this gate the Emperor was wont to await, humbly kneeling, the arrival of the Old Buddha on her way to or from the Summer Palace.

(13) The Altar of Silkworms, at which the Empress Consort must sacrifice once a year, and where the Old Buddha sacrificed on occasion.

(14) A Lama Temple where the Old Buddha frequently worshipped.

(15) Ta Hsi Tien. The Temple of the Great Western Heaven. A famous Buddhist shrine built in the reign of the Emperor Kang Hsi.

(16) The Old Catholic Church built within the Palace precincts by permission of the Emperor Kang-Hsi. It was converted by the Empress Dowager into a Museum in which was kept the collection of stuffed birds made by the missionary Père David. Eye-witnesses of the siege of the French Cathedral in 1900 have stated that the Empress and several of the ladies of the Court ascended to the roof of this building to watch the attack on the Christians; but it is not likely that they exposed themselves for any great length of time in what must have been a dangerous position.

(17) Tzu Kuang Ko: Throne Hall of Purple Effulgence. The building in which the Emperor is wont to receive, and entertain at a banquet, the Dalai and Panshen Lamas and certain feudatory chiefs. Before 1900, Foreign Envoys were also received here.

(18) Ching Cheng Tien, or Throne Hall of Diligent Government. Used for the audiences of the Grand Council when the Court was in residence at the Lake Palace.

(19) Li Yüan Tien: Throne Hall of Ceremonial Phœnixes. Part of the Empress Dowager’s new Palace, built for her in the early years of Kuang Hsü’s reign. Here she received birthday congratulations when resident at the Lake Palace, and here she gave her valedictory audience, just before her death.

(20) Ying Tai, or Ocean Terrace, where the Emperor Kuang Hsü was kept under close surveillance after the _coup d’état_ in 1898, and which he never left (except on one occasion when he attempted to escape) between September 1898 and March 1900. By means of a drawbridge, this Ocean Terrace was made a secure place of confinement. After the return of the Court in 1902, His Majesty lived here again, but under less restraint, and it was here that he met his death.

(21) At this point stood the high mound which Her Majesty is reported to have ascended on the night of 13th June, 1900, to watch the conflagrations in various parts of the city.

(22) The White Pagoda, built in the time of the Yüan dynasty (_circa_ 1290 A.D.), when the artificial lake was also made.

(23) Wan Shou ssŭ, the Temple of Imperial Longevity. Here the Empress was accustomed to sacrifice on her journeys to and from the Summer Palace.

(24) The residence of Ching Shan, where the Diary was written.

(25) The residence of Wen Lien, Comptroller of the Household and friend of Ching Shan.

(26) Residence of Jung Lu.

(27) Place of the Princess Imperial, the daughter of Prince Kung, whom the Empress Dowager adopted.

(28) Birthplace of the present infant Emperor, Hsüan T’ung, son of Prince Ch’un and grandson of Jung Lu. In accordance with prescribed custom, it will be converted into a shrine.

(29) Birthplace of H.M. Kuang Hsü. Half of this building has been converted into a shrine in honour of His Majesty, and the other half into a memorial temple to the first Prince Ch’un, grandfather of the present infant Emperor.

(30) Pewter Lane, where Yehonala was born.

(31) Palace of Duke Chao, younger brother of Tzŭ Hsi.

(32) Palace of Duke Kuei Hsiang, elder brother of Tzŭ Hsi and father of the present Empress Dowager.

(33) At this point was erected the scaffolding from which guns were trained on the Legations. The soldiers on duty here were quartered in the house of Ching Shan.

(34) The execution ground where were put to death the Reformers of 1898 and the Ministers who, in 1900, protested against the attack on the Legations.

(35) The residence, in 1861 of Tsai Yüan, hereditary Prince Yi, who was put to death by Tzŭ Hsi for usurping the Regency.

(36) Residence of Tuan Hua, the Co-Regent with Tsai Yüan, also allowed to commit suicide in 1861.

(37) The Imperial Clan Court, in which is the “Empty Chamber,” where the usurping Princes met their death.

(38) Residence of the “Beileh” Tsai Ying, son of Prince Kung, cashiered for complicity in the Boxer rising.

(39) The site of the Chan-Ta-ssu, a famous Lama Temple, destroyed by the French in 1900 for having been a Boxer drilling ground.

(40) Residence of the Chief Eunuch, Li Lien-ying.

(41) Now the Belgian Legation premises, but formerly the residence of the Boxer protagonist, Hsü T’ung, that fierce old Imperial Tutor whose ambition it was to have his cart covered with the skins of foreign devils.

(42) The Imperial Canal, by way of which the Old Buddha used to proceed in her State barge to the Summer Palace.

(43) The graves of the Empress Dowager’s parents. They are adorned with two marble pillars, bearing laudatory inscriptions.

(44) Here was erected the temporary railway station at which the Empress alighted on her return from exile.

(45) In the north-west corner of the enceinte of the Chien Men, a shrine at which the Empress Dowager and the Emperor sacrificed to the tutelary god of the dynasty (Kuan Yü), the patron saint of the Boxers.

(46) At this point many Christians were massacred on the night of 13th June, 1900.

(47) Palace of Prince Chuang, the Boxer leader, mentioned by Ching Shan as the place where the Christians were tried.

(48) Residence of Yüan Ch’ang, where he was arrested for denouncing the Boxers.

(49) Residence of the Grand Secretary, Wang Wen-shao.

(50) Residence of Yang Li-shan, the President of the Board of Revenue, executed by order of Prince Tuan.

(51) Residence of Duke Lan, the Boxer leader. At present occupied by Prince Pu Chün, the deposed Heir to the Throne and a most notorious reprobate.

(52) Tzŭ Ning Kung, or Palace of Maternal Tranquillity, where the Empress Dowager Tzŭ An resided during most of the years of the Co-Regency.

(53) Chang Ch’un Kung, or Palace of Perpetual Spring, where Tzŭ Hsi resided during the reign of T’ung-Chih.

(54) Residence of the actors engaged for Palace performances.

(55) The Nei Wu Fu, or Imperial Household Department Offices.

(56) The Taoist Temple (Ta Kao Tien), where the Emperor prays for rain or snow.

(57), (58) In these two Palaces resided the chief Imperial concubines. After Tzŭ Hsi’s resumption of the Regency in 1898, Kuang Hsü and His Consort occupied small apartments at the back of her Palace, on the brief visits of the Court to the Forbidden City.

(59) Chung Ho Tien, or Throne Hall of Permanent Harmony. Here H.M. Kuang Hsü was arrested in September 1898 and taken away to confinement in the “Ocean Terrace.”

THE PARENTAGE AND YOUTH OF YEHONALA

The family of Yehonala, one of the oldest of the Manchu clans, traces its descent in direct line to Prince Yangkunu, whose daughter married (in 1588) Nurhachu, the real founder of Manchu rule in China and the first direct ancestor of the Ta Ching Emperors. Yangkunu was killed at Mukden in 1583, in one of his raids upon the territories which still owed allegiance to the degenerate Chinese sovereign Wan Li. His clan lived and flourished in that region, near the Corean border, which is dominated by the Long White Mountain, the true cradle of the Manchu stock. He and his people seem to have acquired the arts of war, and much lust of conquest, by constantly harassing the rich lands on their ever-shifting borders, those rich lands which to-day seem to be about to pass under the yoke of new invaders. Yangkunu’s daughter assumed the title of Empress by right of her husband’s conquests, and her son it was who eventually wrested the whole of Manchuria from the Ming Dynasty and reigned under the name of Tien-Ts’ung.

Into this clan, in November 1835, was born Yehonala, whose life was destined to influence countless millions of human beings, Yehonala, who was to be thrice Regent of China and its autocratic ruler for over half a century. Her father, whose name was Hui Cheng, held hereditary rank as Captain in one of the Eight Banner Corps. Considering the advantages of his birth, he was generally accounted unsuccessful by his contemporaries; at the time of his death he had held no higher post than that of an Intendant of Circuit, or Taotai. Holding this rank in the province of Anhui, he died when his daughter was but three years of age. His widow and family were well cared for by a kinsman named Muyanga, father of her who subsequently became Empress Consort of Hsien-Feng and Co-Regent with Yehonala. From him the children received every advantage of education.

Many unfounded and ridiculous stories have been circulated in recent years attributing to the Empress Dowager humble, and sometimes disgraceful, antecedents. Many of these are nothing more than the fruit of Yellow Journalism, seeking sensational material of the kind which appeals to the iconoclastic instincts of its readers. Others, however, undoubtedly owe their origin to the envy, hatred and malice of Palace intrigues, to the initiative of the Iron-capped Princes and other high officials of the elder branch of the Imperial family, many of whom were addicted to besmirching the family and character of Tzŭ Hsi in order to inflict “loss of face” on the Yehonala clan. In this way, and because mud thrown from above usually sticks, their malicious stories were freely circulated, and often believed, in Peking and in the South: witness the writings of K’ang Yu-wei and his contemporaries.[1]

To cite an instance. One of these mythical stories used to be told, with every appearance of good faith, by Prince Tun, the fifth son of the Emperor Tao-Kuang. This Prince cherished a grudge against Tzŭ Hsi because of his disappointed ambitions: adopted himself out of the direct line of succession, he had nevertheless hoped, in 1875, that his son would have been chosen Emperor. The story, as he used to tell it, was that when the Empress’s mother had been left a widow with a large family (including the future ruler of China) they lived in the most abject poverty at the prefectural city of Ningkuo, where her husband had held office and died. Having no funds to pay for her return to Peking, she would have been reduced to beggary had it not been that, by a lucky accident, a sum of money intended for another traveller was delivered on board of her boat at a city on the way, and that the traveller, on learning of the mistake and being moved to pity at the sight of the family’s destitution, insisted on her keeping the money. Twenty-five years later, when Tzŭ Hsi had become the all-powerful Regent, this official appeared for audience at Peking, when, remembering the benefits received at his hands, the Empress raised him from his knees and expressed her gratitude for his kindness. The story is prettier than many which emanate from the same source, and original, too, in the idea of a Manchu official dying at his provincial post in abject poverty, but unfortunately for the truth of the narrative, it has been established beyond shadow of doubt that neither the wife nor the family of Tzŭ Hsi’s father were with him at the time of his death. They had gone on ahead to Peking, in anticipation of his early return thither to take up a new appointment in the White Banner Corps.

Before proceeding further, it may be well to refer briefly to the Yehonala clan and its position in relation to the elder branch of the Imperial family, a question of no small importance, past and future, in its effect on the history of modern China. Jealousy and friction there have always been between the Imperial house and this powerful patrician clan, since the first Yehonala became _de facto_ ruler of the Empire after the collapse of the Tsai Yüan conspiracy, but their relations became more markedly strained after the _coup d’état_ in 1898, and although the wholesome fear of the Empress Dowager’s “divine wrath” prevented any definite cleavage, the possibilities of trouble were ever latent in the Forbidden City. Recent events at Peking, and especially the dismissal of the Chihli Viceroy, Tuan Fang, for alleged irreverence at the funeral ceremonies of the late Empress Dowager, have emphasised the divisions in the Manchu camp and the dangers that beset its Government, now bereft of the strong hand of Tzŭ Hsi. It is difficult for foreigners to form any clear idea of the actual conditions of life and of party divisions in the Palace, confused as they are by intricate questions of genealogy, of inter-marriage and adoptions by relatives, of ancient clan feuds. It should, however, be explained that the Imperial Clansmen (known in their own tongue as Aisin Gioros) divided into the Yellow and Red Girdles, are the descendants respectively of Nurhachu himself and of that ruler’s ancestors, by virtue of which ancestry they consider themselves (and the Chinese would recognise the claim) to be the _sang pur_ and highest nobility of the Manchu Dynasty. The Yehonala clan, although in no sense of Royal blood (as marriages between the sovereign and female members of a family do not entitle that family to claim more than noble rank) owes its great power not only to its numbers, but to the fact that it has given three Empresses Dowager to the Empire; but, above all, to the great prestige and personal popularity of Tzŭ Hsi. If recent events are to be interpreted in the light of history, and of her significant death-bed mandate, the present leaders of the Yehonala clan are determined that the present Empress Dowager, the widow of Kuang-Hsü, shall follow in the footsteps of her august aunt, and control the business of the State, at least during the Regency. And, thanks to Tzŭ Hsi’s far-seeing statecraft, the young Emperor is a grandson of Jung Lu, and may be expected therefore to reverence the policy handed down by the Old Buddha.