Part 42

The title by which Her Majesty was canonised contains no less than twenty-two characters, sixteen of which were hers at the day of her death, the other six having been added in the Imperial Decrees which recorded her decease and praised her glorious achievements. The first character “Dutiful”—_i.e._ to her husband—is always accorded to a deceased Empress. It is significant of the unpractical nature of the _literati_, or of their cynicism, that the second of her latest titles signifies “reverend,” implying punctilious adherence to ancestral traditions! The third and fourth mean “Equal of Heaven,” which places her on a footing of equality with Confucius, while the fifth and sixth raise her even higher than the Sage in the national Pantheon, for it means “Increase in Sanctity,” of which Confucius was only a “Manifestor.” In the records of the Dynasty she will henceforth be known as the Empress “Dutiful, Reverend and Glorious,” a title, according to the laws of Chinese honorifics, higher than any woman ruler has hitherto received since the beginning of history.

Since her death the prestige of the Empress Dowager, and her hold on the imagination of the people, have grown rather than decreased. Around her coffin, while it lay first in her Palace of Peaceful Longevity and later in a hall at the foot of the Coal Hill, north of the Forbidden City, awaiting the appointed day propitious for burial, there gathered something more than the conventional regrets and honours which fall usually to the lot of China’s rulers. Officials as well as people felt that with her they had lost the strong hand of guidance, and a personality which appealed to most of them as much from the human as from the official point of view. Their affectionate recollections of the Old Buddha were clearly shown by the elaborate sacrifices paid to her _manes_ at various periods from the day of her death to that day, a year later, when her ancestral tablet was brought home to the Forbidden City from the Imperial tombs with all pomp and circumstance.

On the All Souls’ day of the Buddhists, celebrated in the 7th Moon, and which fell in the September following her death, a magnificent barge made of paper and over a hundred and fifty feet long was set up outside the Forbidden City on a large empty space adjoining the Coal Hill. It was crowded with figures of attendant eunuchs and handmaidens, and contained furniture and viands for the use of the illustrious dead in the lower regions. A throne was placed in the bows, and around it were kneeling effigies of attendant officials all wearing their Robes of State as if the shade of Tzŭ Hsi were holding an audience.

On the morning of the All Souls’ festival the Regent, in the name of the Emperor, performed sacrifice before the barge, which was then set alight and burnt, in order that the Old Buddha might enjoy the use of it at the “yellow springs.” A day or two before her funeral, hundreds of paper effigies of attendants, cavalry, camels and other pack animals, were similarly burnt so that her spirit might enjoy all the pomp to which she had been accustomed in life.

The following account of her funeral is reproduced from _The Times_ of 27th November, 1909:—

“The 9th of November at 5 A.M. was the hour of good omen originally chosen by the Astrologers for the departure of the remains of Her late Majesty the Empress Dowager from their temporary resting place in the Forbidden City to the mausoleum prepared for her at the Eastern Hills. To meet the convenience of the foreign representatives, the hour was subsequently changed to 7 A.M.

“The arrangements for the procession and the part taken therein by the Diplomatic Body, were generally similar to those of the funeral of His Majesty Kuang-Hsü, but the mounted troops were more numerous and better turned out, the police were noticeably smarter and well-dressed, and the pageant as a whole was in many respects more imposing. But for those who, in May last, witnessed the late Emperor’s funeral, the scene lacked one element of its brilliantly picturesque effect, namely, the bright sunshine which on that occasion threw every detail and distinctive note of the _cortège_ into clear relief against the grey background of the Palace walls. The day was cold, with lowering clouds, and the long delay which preceded the appearance of the catafalque at the point where the Diplomatic Body was stationed had an inevitably depressing effect on the spectators.

“The catafalque was borne by eighty-four bearers, the largest number which can carry this unwieldy burden through the City gates; but beyond the walls the coffin was transferred to a larger bier borne by one hundred and twenty men. In front walked the Prince Regent, the bodyguard of Manchu Princes and the members of the Grand Council, attended by the Secretariat staff. Behind rode first a smart body of troops, followed by a large number of camels whose Mongol attendants carried tent-poles and other articles for use in the erection of the ‘matshed palaces,’ wherein the coffin rests at night at the different stages of the four days’ journey to the tombs. Behind the Mongols were borne in procession the gaudy honorific umbrellas presented to the Old Buddha on the occasion of her return from exile at Hsi-an fu in 1901: all these were burnt on the 16th instant when the body was finally entombed. Following the waving umbrellas came a body of Lama dignitaries, and after them a contingent from the Imperial Equipage Department bearing Manchu sacrificial vessels, Buddhist symbols and embroidered banners. Conspicuous in the _cortège_ were three splendid chariots with trappings and curtains of Imperial yellow silk, emblazoned with dragons and phœnixes, and two palanquins similar to those used by the Empress Dowager on her journeys in State; these also were burned at the mausoleum. Noticeable figures in the procession were the six chief eunuchs, including the notorious Li Lien-ying and the short handsome attendant who usually accompanied the Empress’s sedan chair. The spectacle, as a whole, was most impressive; no such pomp and circumstance, say the Chinese, has marked the obsequies of any Empress of China since the funeral of the Empress Wu (_circa_ A.D. 700) of whom the annals record that hundreds of attendants were buried alive in her mausoleum.

“The police arrangements attracted general attention by their remarkable efficiency, which many Chinese attribute to the present Empress Dowager’s constant fear of assassination. Every closed door along the route of the procession was closely guarded by soldiers and special precautions taken against bomb-throwing. The street guards were numerous and alert, and the arrangements generally were characterised by discipline and decorum. There was little confusion in the _cortège_, and none of the unseemly shouting usual on such occasions.

“Ninety miles away, in a silent spot surrounded by virgin pine forest and backed by protecting hills, are the Eastern Tombs, towards which, for four days, the great catafalque made its way along the yellow-sanded road. There stands the mausoleum, originally built by the faithful Jung Lu for his Imperial Mistress at a cost which stands in the government records at eight millions of taels. It is close to the ‘Ting Ling,’ the burial-place of her husband, the Emperor Hsien-Feng. To the west of it stands the tomb of her colleague and co-Regent (the Empress Tzŭ An), and on the east that of the first Consort of Hsien-Feng, who died before his accession to the Throne, and was subsequently canonised as Empress. Throughout her lifetime, and particularly of late years, Yehonala took great interest and pride in her last resting-place, visiting it at intervals and exacting the most scrupulous attention from those entrusted with its building and adornment. On one occasion, in 1897, when practically completed, she had it rebuilt because the teak pillars were not sufficiently massive. After the death of Jung Lu, Prince Ch’ing became responsible for the custody of the tomb and its precious contents—the sacrificial vessels of carved jade, the massive vases and incense burners of gold and silver, which adorn the mortuary chamber; the richly-jewelled couch to receive the coffin, and the carved figures of serving maids and eunuchs who stand for ever in attendance. After the last ceremony at the tomb, when the Princes, Chamberlains and high officials had taken their final farewell of the illustrious dead, while the present Empress Dowager, with her attendants and the surviving consorts of the Emperors Hsien-Feng and T’ung-Chih, offered the last rites in the mortuary chamber, the massive stone door of the tomb was let down and the resting-place of Tzŭ Hsi closed for ever.

“The cost of the late Emperor’s funeral has been officially recorded, with the nice accuracy which characterises Chinese finance, at 459,940 taels, 2 mace, 3 candareens and 6 li. As the cost of a funeral in China closely reflects the dignity of the deceased and the “face” of his or her immediate survivors, these figures become particularly interesting when compared with the cost of the Empress Dowager’s funeral, which is placed at one and a-quarter to one and a-half million taels. Rumour credited the Regent with an attempt to cut down this expenditure, which attempt he abandoned at the last moment in the face of the displeasure of the powerful Yehonala Clan. That the Old Buddha’s magnificent funeral was appreciated by the populace of Peking is certain, for to them she was for fifty years a sympathetic personality and a great ruler.

“The conveyance of Her Majesty’s ancestral tablet from the tombs of the Eastern Hills to its resting-place in the Temple of Ancestors in the Forbidden City was a ceremony in the highest degree impressive and indicative of the vitality of those feelings which make ancestor-worship the most important factor in the life of the Chinese. The tablet, a simple strip of carved and lacquered wood, bearing the name of the deceased in Manchu and Chinese characters, had been officially present at the burial. With the closing of the great door of the tomb the spirit of the departed ruler is supposed to be translated to the tablet, and to the latter is therefore given honour equal to that which was accorded to the sovereign during her lifetime. Borne aloft in a gorgeous chariot draped with Imperial yellow silk and attended by a large mounted escort, Tzŭ Hsi’s tablet journeyed slowly and solemnly, in three days’ stages, from the Eastern Hills to Peking. At each stage it rested for the night in a specially constructed pavilion, being ‘invited’ by the Master of the Ceremonies, on his knees and with all solemnity, to be pleased to leave its chariot and rest. For the passage of this habitation of the spirit of the mighty dead the Imperial road had been specially prepared and swept by an army of men; it had become a _via sacra_ on which no profane feet might come or go. As the procession bearing the sacred tablet drew near to the gates of the capital, the Prince Regent and all the high officers of the Court knelt reverently to receive it. All traffic was stopped; every sound stilled in the streets, where the people knelt to do homage to the memory of the Old Buddha. Slowly and solemnly the chariot was borne through the main gate of the Forbidden City to the Temple of the Dynasty’s ancestors, the most sacred spot in the Empire, where it was ‘invited’ to take its appointed place among the nine Ancestors and their thirty-five Imperial Consorts. Before this could be done, however, it was necessary that the tablets of Tzŭ Hsi’s son, T’ung-Chih, and of her daughter-in-law, should first be removed from that august assembly, because due ceremony required that the arriving tablet should perform obeisance to those of its ancestors, and it would not be fitting for the tablet of a parent to perform this ceremony in the presence of that of a son or daughter-in-law. The act of obeisance was performed by deputy, in the person of the Regent acting for the child Emperor, and consisted of nine kowtows before each tablet in the Temple, or about 400 prostrations in all. When these had been completed, with due regard to the order of seniority of the deceased, the tablets of the Emperor T’ung-Chih and his wife were formally ‘invited’ to return to the Temple, where obeisance was made on their behalf to the shade of Tzŭ Hsi which had been placed in the shrine beside that of her former colleague and co-Regent, the Empress Tzŭ An. Thus ended the last ceremonial act of the life and death of this remarkable woman; but her spirit still watches over the Forbidden City and the affairs of her people, who firmly believe that it will in due time guide the nation to a happy issue out of all their afflictions. As time goes on, the weaknesses of her character and the errors of her career are forgotten, and her greatness only remembered. And no better epitaph could be written for this great Manchu than that of her own valedictory Decree which, rising above all the pettiness and humiliations of her reign, looking death and change steadfastly in the face, raises her in our eyes (to quote a writer in the _Spectator_)[130] ‘to that vague ideal state of human governance imagined by the Greek, when the Kings should be philosophers and the philosophers Kings.’”

XXVIII

CONCLUSION

“All sweeping judgments,” says Coleridge, “are unjust.” “_Comprendre_,” says the French philosopher, “_c’est tout pardonner_.” To understand the life and personality of the Empress Dowager, it is before everything essential to divest our minds of racial prejudice and to endeavour to appreciate something of the environment and traditions to which she was born. In the words of the thoughtful article in the _Spectator_, already quoted, “she lived and worked and ruled in a setting which is apart from all western modes of thought and standards of action, and the first step in the historian’s task is to see that she is judged by her own standards and not wholly by ours.” Judged by the rough test of public opinion and accumulating evidence in her own country, Tzŭ Hsi’s name will go down to history in China as that of a genius in statecraft and a born ruler, a woman “with all the courage of a man, and more than the ordinary man’s intelligence.”[131]

Pending that reform and liberty of the press which is still the distant dream of “Young China,” no useful record of the life and times of the Empress Dowager is to be expected from any Chinese writer. Despite the mass of information which exists in the diaries and archives of metropolitan officials and the personal reminiscences of those who knew her well, nothing of any human interest or value has been published on the subject in China. From the official and orthodox point of view, a truthful biography of the Empress would be sacrilege. It is true that in the vernacular newspapers under European protection at the Treaty Ports, as well as in Hongkong and Singapore, Cantonese writers have given impressions of Her Majesty’s personality and brief accounts of her life, but these are so hopelessly biassed and distorted by hatred of the Manchus as to be almost worthless for historical purposes, as worthless as the dry chronicles of the Dynastic annals. Reference has already been made to the best known of these publications, a series of letters originally published in a Singapore newspaper and republished under the title of “The Chinese Crisis from within,”[132] by a writer who, under the _nom-de-plume_ of “Wen Ching,” concealed the identity of one of K’ang Yu-wei’s most ardent disciples. His work is remarkable for sustained invective and reckless inaccuracy, clearly intended to create an atmosphere of hatred against the Manchus (for the ultimate benefit of the Cantonese) in the minds of his countrymen, and to dissuade the foreign Powers from allowing the Empress to return to Peking. Drawing on a typically Babu store of “western learning,” this writer compares the Empress to Circe, Semiramis, Catherine de Medici, Messalina, Fulvia, and Julia Agrippina; quoting Dante and Rossetti to enforce his arguments, and leavening his vituperation with a modicum of verifiable facts sufficient to give to his narrative something of _vraisemblance_. But his judgment is emphatically sweeping. He ignores alike Tzŭ Hsi’s undeniable good qualities and her extenuating circumstances, the defects of her education and the difficulties of her position, so that his work is almost valueless.

Equally valueless, for purposes of historical accuracy, are most of the accounts and impressions of the Empress recorded by those Europeans (especially the ladies of the Diplomatic Body and their friends) who saw her personality and purposes reflected in the false light which beats upon the Dragon Throne on ceremonial occasions, or who came under the influence of the deliberate artifices and charm of manner which she assumed so well. Had the etiquette of her Court and people permitted intercourse with European diplomats and distinguished visitors of the male sex, she would certainly have acquired, and exercised over them also, that direct personal influence which emanated from her extraordinary vitality and will-power, influence such as the western world has learned to associate with the names of the Emperor William of Germany and Mr. Roosevelt. Restricted as she was to social relations with her own sex amongst foreigners, she exerted herself, and never failed, to produce on them an impression of womanly grace and gentleness of disposition, which qualities we find accordingly praised by nearly all who came in contact with her after the return of the Court, aye, even by those who had undergone the horrors of the siege under the very walls of her Palace. The glamour of her mysterious Court, the rarity of the visions vouchsafed, the real charm of her manner, and the apparently artless _bonhomie_ of her bearing, all combined to create in the minds of the European ladies who saw her an impression as favourable as it was opposed to every dictate of common sense and experience. In certain notable instances, the effect of this impression reacted visibly on the course of the Peace Protocol negotiations.

From the diary of Ching Shan we obtain an estimate of Tzŭ Hsi’s character, formed by one who had enjoyed for years continual opportunities of studying her at close quarters—an estimate which was, and is, confirmed by the popular verdict, the common report of the tea-houses and market places of the capital. Despite her swiftly changing and uncontrolled moods, her childish lack of moral sense, her unscrupulous love of power, her fierce passions and revenges, Tzŭ Hsi was no more the savage monster described by “Wen Ching,” than she was the benevolent, fashion-plate Lady Bountiful of the American magazines. She was simply a woman of unusual courage and vitality, of strong will and unbounded ambition, a woman and an Oriental, living out her life by such lights as she knew, and in accordance with the traditions of her race and caste. Says Ching Shan in the Diary: “_The nature of the Empress is peace-loving: she has seen many springs and autumns. I myself know well her refined and gentle tastes, her love of painting, poetry and the theatre. When in a good mood she is the most amiable and tractable of women, but at times her rage is awful to witness._” Here we have the woman drawn from life, without _arrière pensée_, by a just but sympathetic observer, the woman who could win, and hold, the affectionate loyalty of the greatest men of her time, not to speak of that of her retainers and serving maids; the woman whose human interest and sympathy in everything around her, were not withered by age nor staled by custom; yet who, at a word, could send the fierce leaders of the Boxers cowering from her presence. _Souvent femme varie._ Tzŭ Hsi, her own mistress and virtual ruler of the Empire at the age of twenty-four, had not had much occasion to learn to control either her moods or her passions. Hers, from the first, was the trick and temper of autocracy. Trained in the traditions of a Court where human lives count for little, where power maintains itself by pitiless and brutal methods, where treason and foul deeds lie in waiting for the first signs of the ruler’s weakness, how should she learn to put away from the Forbidden City the hideous barbarities of its ways?

Let us remember her time and place. Consider the woman’s environment and training, her marriage to a dissolute puppet, her subsequent life in that gilded prison of the Imperial City, with its endless formalities, base intrigues and artificial sins. Prior to the establishment of China’s first diplomatic relations with European nations, the Court of Peking and its ways bore a strong resemblance to those of Medieval Europe; nor have successive routs and invasions since that date changed any of its cherished traditions and methods. In the words of a recent writer on medieval history, the life of the Peking Palace, like that of our fourteenth century, “was one of profound learning and crass stupidity, of infantile gaiety and sudden tragedy, of flashing fortunes and swift dooms. There is a certain innocence about the very sinners of the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries. Many of their problems, indeed, arose from the fact that this same childlike candour was allied to the unworn forces of full manhood.” Whatever crimes of cruelty and vengeance Tzŭ Hsi committed—and they were many—be it said to her credit that she had, as a rule, the courage of her convictions and position, and sinned _coram publico_. Beneath the fierceness without which an Oriental ruler cannot hope to remain effective, there certainly beat a heart which could be kind, if the conditions were propitious, and a rough sense of humour, which is a common and pleasing trait of the Manchus.