The Saint Paul globe. (St. Paul, Minn.) 1896-1905, 1900-09-30
. kGRA OF EMPRESS AN
How CHINA'S AUToCRAT WENDED
HER WAY OVER MOUNTAINS
TO HSIANFU
SCENES ALONG HER PATHWAY
Historical Outline of the DOwaxer
Queens Celebrated Route and
Ancient Capital of the
Celestial Kingdom.


interesting cities of the Middle Kingdom.
More than 5000 years ago, or about the
time of Solomon, this ancient city under
the name of Perpetual Peace was the
capital city of one Of the feudal princes
OF the Chou dynasty, and from~that time
10 this, under various fortunes, IT has
been either the first or the second city
OF the empire, says Prof Isaac T. Head
land, of the chair OF mental and moral
philosophy IN the University of Pel1fn,
writing in the st. Louis Globe Democrat.
1t is situated more than 600 miles south
west of Pekin, behind range after range
of mountains. Next Of the Chinese cities
In size to Pekin, it is of an entirely DIFF
ferent character. Let US imagine we are
taxing the trip thither with the empress
dowager, If the ''old lady is not hiding
in some of those wonderful wayside tern
pies in the mountains, and notice the road
as we pass over it.
The old empress, If she followed the
custom of the Chinese would have to
leave the city by the East Side Gate"
the West Side Cate or the Back
Gate for it is an understood law that
no woman connected with the palace
the Ch'ien Men or Front Gate" She
would then pass down to the southwest
over the eastern plain, crossing the Mud
dy river" (Hun Hoo, on the great stone
bridge which is called Marco PoIo's
Brldge. This is one of the most re-
markable bridges in China. On the top
or every upright stone which holds the
panels there is a lion carved, and the
Chinese say that it is impossible for any
70 A..
of the lions on the bridge Those who
nave counted them have all varied in
their estimate, and the Chinese in that
ne1ghborhood are so superstitious as to
be afraid to count them.
The next place of Importance, as con-
nected with the present trouble, to which
she would come would be Pao Ting Flu,
the capital city of the ChihH province, a
city, which, if reports be true, must take
a unique place in American-Chinese inter
course, as being the scene of the first
murder of any American citizen in China
by the Chinese.
One cannot be wonder whether when
the old empeGss, with the emperor and
the heir apparent, left the city, there
would be much repairing of roads as
there is on ordinary occasions when they
go for trip. When they go to visit their
ancestral tombs, or when the emperor
goes out to worship at the Temple of
Heaven, all the roads over which one
travels on ordinary occasions, "bumpety-
bump" in a springless cart, are leveled
down with hoes and rakes, sprinkled with
yellow earth, the royal color, brought
from outside the city 1t is to be feared
that the old lady did not have time to
start off in style on this occasion.
But this occasion is not her first run.
She is becoming accustomed to this kind
of thing, having done it before. When
her husband was still alive, and the Eng
lfsl1 and French armies paid a visit to
Pekin, it occurred to Hsien Feng and
his wife, with this lady as concubine,
that they wanted to pay a visit to Je-
haul, place northeast of Pefin, in the
direction of their native land. This pres
ent visit of the allied powers gives her
an opportunity of seeing the ancient capt.
tai OF the Chous, the Hans and the
T'angs.
IT will be impossible to note all she
sees on her way, though the trip at
more favorable season of the year, and
under more favorable circumstances,
would be one which any pleasure-seeker
or Globe pilgrim might we'll wish. to take
Ii lies through beautiful valleys and over
mountain ranges, through deep gorges
alongside muddy rivers or clear mountain
streams, over which, along winch OF
through which no carts can so, Httefs can
or mules go with difficulty. In some
nIaces she will pass along narrow road,
with a high mountain on one side abeVe
her and deep mountain gorge on the
other baIew, In which flows a clear
stream, bounding over great powders,
and falling over precipfces, sending up
q spray 10 join that which at the same
time NAV be coming down upon her from
the cloud above.
ho will mountain ranges
which she must ascend by little winding
paths, UP which it will be almost fmpos-
sible for men to carry her, which, when
she has azeended, will be so high as to
be almost above the region Of the ordi-
nary rains, and she will see De valleys
rolled full Of great white cloud masses,
as though they were heaped up with
snow. The sun will be shining In all his
splender@ above her. but it will not be
hot. while at the same time it may be
laundering and raining in the valleys be-
low.
But she will find other and milder beau
tbs tran mountain gorge and roaring
streams. She win find that which has
( given China one Of her most attractive
names, the "Flowery Land" Along these
valleys and covering these mountain
sides is spread a. carpet of flowers:
masses Of vari -aolored begonias, hun
dreds Of varieties Of purple flowers, which
have exchanged pollen with white and
pink flowers until the white ana pink and
the purple are almost lost Ia the highest
and most delicate shades of lavender.
She viii find great tracts of roses on
these mountains, planted in the Grst
pace by the dey otees of some Of the
Buddbi~t temples of the region, which
since that time have grown and He'd and
grown end spread, until the mountain top
is a wilderness of roses.
She will see as she passes along these
valleys great caves in the I.-sountain sfde4.
carved out Of the solid rock. In some Of
which a huge Puddha has been chiseled
in the making OF the cave, and left sit
ting in the center, the stone all cut away
from the statue which the pious excava-
tors saw IN Imae ration sitting In the CEN
ter of the solid mass of granite or saul
stone. She will see other caves. the
length or depth of which, Ike the great
Mammoth cave, has never vet been as
eertainsd, and which. like that, WAS not
. made by he work of mems hands, but
was the result Ct natures own convul-
= sions
) She will See advertisements painted ON
4 the mountain side. similar to our pain
destroying oil" and Sure relief ex-
=. of diseases of both body and mind may
be healed and all that is needed is that
the sick man or the sinner make pill
grimage thither, either with his staff OF
on his knees. or by measuring his length
on the ground at every third step, from
his home, however distant Indeed II
might be that she would pass in her
flight thousands OF these pilgrims going
TO or from some of these numerous tenn
pies, for there are those who SIN, and
who realize their sin to such an exteni
as to be unable to turn their minds
from it, even in time Of Boxer trouble
and foreign war, and who know of nc
better method of relieving the tension al
their conscience than to cast themseIve.
upon the ground at every third step fol
hundreds OF miles over these rough roads
so that it may be- either she or the1
might think of the proVerb: