Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1900-09-21
A Survey of the Ruling Glass in
China.
MOMENTOUS CHANGES Since 1860
Usurpation by Tsze Hsi An, the
Empress Dowager.
a STEADY DEC A ID E \ G E


In 1860 the Emperor Hienfung and his
court hastily fed from the summer palace
As the French advance guard reached it
TO Jehol. the hunting palace in Mongolia,
more than 100 miles northeast of Pekin. 1t
the custom of the Manchu emperors to
repair to Jehol each year for season of
hunting and vigorous outdoor life, for re-
Taxation from the awful trammels of Pekin
palace etiquette. With the decadence of
that once sturdy race the outing to JehOl
had then been omitted for more than forty
years, has the court revisited Jehol
since that involuntary outing of 1860 Hen
flung remained in hiding after the igno-
miniouS peace was concluded by his brother,
Prince kung. and died at Jehol within the
year, when his body was brought to Pekin
and laid in state in the pavilion the
Meishan.
The empress. the one legal widow of
Hienfung. had an only child. but the little
princess could not count in the succession.
The Of one of Hienfung's inferior wives.
the child of a Concubine of the lowest rank.
was declared heir to the throne in the en-
perors last edICt. The mother of Hienfung
was at Jehol at the time of the emperor's
death, but this empress dowager seemed to
have had no part in the dramatic events,
the fierce intrigues and cabals that went on
in the mountain palace. and she returned
quietly TO Pekln with her retinue and all
the widows of lesser rank and was never
heard of by the outer circle. The guardian
ship of the baby Emperor Tungchih had
been left to a board of princely regents and
schemers at Jehoi. and the widow of HEN
flung and the mother of the little Tuugchih
fled in alarm to Prince Kung. as they saw
the intrigues closing around them. An i'm
perial decree raised the fortunate mother
of Tungch.h to the relative rank of en-
press, and another decree made this
mother of the sovereign, or Tsze HSi An,
the western empress. a co-regent with the
mother of the state" the eastern empress
or legal widow of HienfuHg both acting
with Prince Kung. The two empresses en-
Tungchih on the lap of his handsome and
courageous mother.
Tsze Hsi AUS First Stroke
The conspirator princes were seized as
they returned from JehoI and put to death |
and the two expresses and Prince Kung
ruled together amcably for the dozen years |
of the little emperor's minority In COM
piance with imperial custom Tungchih was
married with great state and spendor in
1872, and at the age of seventeen this child q
reared in the harem, with harem ideas only |
save for the dry bones of the classics taught
him in the deep palace seclusion began to |
rule. one account made him out weak
ling and debauche. who left everything
in the hands OF the eunuchs and degraded
and han-shed Prince kung when he remon-
Strated.
Another described him as being possessed
of some enlightened and progressive ideas: /
as having resented the routine of senseless /
ceremOnials and rites; as roaming Pekin in !
disguise and righting many of the small |
wrongs of his people. and it was said that
he and his high-spirited young Empress
Ahluta resented the constant domination |
and oV riding of their wishes by Prince
kung and the dowager empress. There were
wars and intrigues between the two fac
tons at court, and soon the assertive |
troublesome young emperor died of small /
inv tftrnfn -
his independent young Empress Ahluta !
quickly and mysteriously followed.
kwangsu's Accession.
Fate is under government control in
China" says Mr.. Harold Gorst significant
~. Disregarding all rules of succession. |
the astute empress chose and named as the
emperor one Kwangsu. the four-year-old
son of Prince Chun. This child being
nephew Of Hienfung and of the same gem
Grafton as the last emperor. Tungchih. could
not rightly succeed him nor worship his
tablets But the empress disposed of that
objection by prociaiming a posthumous
adoption by the Emperor Hlenfung by
which Hienfungs widows logically became |
the stepmothers of his adopted SON. who
was also their nephew. The Emperor Hen
fUng had died ten years before his adopted
son. kwangsu. was born but this break in
genealosy had no weight with the doughty
expresses. who We're tasting again the
sweets of power
Etiquette and law being compiled with
the two Stepmothers embarked upon an
other long regency. Ii Hung Chang tnera-
tattng himself with the regents at a time
when palace intrigue to displace them
was checkmated by his suddenly marching |
troops to a vicinity of Pekin to srDnort |
their authOrity-a lesson not lost upon the |
shiewd western empress. The eastern en-
press. the less assertive and forceful of the |
regents. died in 1881. and Tsze Hs An, |
only one in palace full of concubines |
twenty years before began her real reign |
became sole and undisputed ruler of more |
than three hundred millions of people |
usurper Of the oldest throne and autocrat |
OF the largest empire of one people on !
earth, tyrant over one-ffth of the human |
race and one-tenth Of the wOrld-a dizzy |
pinnacle for one of the sex despised by |
the land where woman is held in least es-
TEEN.
4 Wonderful Woman.
DoUager queens ard cmpresscs have been
court problems and national difficulties in
all time. but the end of the century has
seen them become the special dilemmas of |
the greatest of eastern and western en- |
pires. "A conference IF young emperors, |
with the mastcrful one of Germany as chief
adviser. might have spared Kwangsu his !
freedom. There have been expresses re-
gent in China. but TO precedents avail for
comparison with this mastcrful Manchu
sovereign and the most unbridled female
despOt the world has known. She rose
from the tarem's ranks. uneducatcd, ig-
nOrant Of public affairs; but by sheer abil-
ity, by her own wits, viii and shrewdness
she attained the supreme power Hers is
tho greatest of personal triumphs, her
strength of mind and force of character
and dominant personality having won every
step: centuries Of precedent and all the
shaCkles of oriental etiquette overborne by
her masterful strategy and remorseless will.
Her enemies have fallen away, sickened
and died, and scattered as chaff: no one
has opposed her will AMI survived no plot
or intrigue has awaited against her: no con-
spirator has found her unarmed or off her
guard; hers has been a charmed, relentless
terrible life.
Imperial Match-Making.
When Kwangsu had attained the age of
sixteen, his stepnother and aunt, the en-
press regent, threw herself with ardor into
matchmaking or wife-choosing for sec
ond time. The august Tsze Hsi An attend
ed to the marrying of her nephew as zeal
ously she had married her own son sew
enteen years before. the poor little bride
and bridegroom being. equally pawns and
puppets in her hands. She summoned all