Peking and throughout the empire.
"On another occasion, while the ladies were having refreshments,

the Empress Dowager requested me to come to her private
apartments, and while we two were alone together, with only a

eunuch standing by fanning with a large peacock-feather fan, she
asked me to tell her about the church. It was apparent from the

beginning of her conversation that she made no distinction
between Roman Catholics and Protestants, calling them all the

Chiao. I explained to her that the object of the church was the
intellectual, moral, and spiritual development of the people,

making them both better sons and better subjects.
"Few women are more superstitious than the Empress Dowager. Her

whole life was influenced by her belief in fate, charms, good and
evil spirits, gods and demons.

"When it was first proposed that she have her portrait painted
for the St. Louis Exposition, she was dumfounded. After a long

conversation, however, in which Mrs. Conger explained that
portraits of many of the rulers of Europe would be there,

including a portrait of Queen Victoria, and that such a painting
would in a way counteract the false pictures of her that had gone

abroad, she said that she would consult with Prince Ching about
the matter. This looked very much as though it had been tabled.

Not long thereafter, however, she sent word to Mrs. Conger,
asking that Miss Carl be invited to come to Peking and paint her

portrait.
"We all know how this portrait had to be begun on an auspicious

day; how a railroad had to be built to the Foreign Office rather
than have the portrait carried out on men's shoulders, as though

she were dead; how she celebrated her seventieth birthday when
she was sixty-nine, to defeat the gods and prevent their bringing

such a calamity during the celebration as had occurred when she
was sixty, when the Japanese war disturbed her festivities. On

her clothes she wore the ideographs for 'Long Life and
'Happiness,' and most of the presents she gave were emblematic of

some good fortune. Her palace was decorated with great plates of
apples, which by a play on words mean 'Peace,' and with plates of

peaches, which mean 'Longevity.' On her person she wore charms,
one of which she took from her neck and placed on the neck of

Mrs. Conger when she was about to leave China, saying that she
hoped it might protect her during her journey across the ocean,

as it had protected herself during her wanderings in 1900, and
she would not allow any one to appear in her presence who had any

semblance of mourning about her clothing.
"It is a well-known fact that no Manchu woman ever binds her

feet, and the Empress Dowager was as much opposed to foot-binding
as any other living woman. Nevertheless, she would not allow a

subject to presume to suggest to her ways in which she should
interfere in the social customs of the Chinese, as one of her

subjects did. This lady was the wife of a Chinese minister to a
foreign country, and had adopted both for herself and her

daughters the most ultra style of European dress. She one day
said to Her Majesty, 'The bound feet of the Chinese woman make us

the laughing-stock of the world.'
" 'I have heard,' said the Empress Dowager, 'that the foreigners

have a custom which is not above reproach, and now since there
are no outsiders here, I should like to see what the foreign

ladies use in binding their waist.'
"The lady was very stout, and had the appearance of an

hour-glass, and turning to her daughter, a tall and slender
maiden, she said:

" 'Daughter, you show Her Majesty.'
"The young lady demurred until finally the Empress Dowager said:

" 'Do you not realize that a request coming from me is the same
as a command?'

"After having had her curiosity satisfied, she sent for the Grand
Secretary and ordered that proper Manchu outfits be secured for

the lady's daughters, saying:
" 'It is truly pathetic what foreign women have to endure. They

are bound up with steel bars until they can scarcely breathe.
Pitiable! Pitiable!'

"The following day this young lady did not appear at court, and
the Empress Dowager asked her mother the reason of her absence.

" 'She is ill to-day,' the mother replied.
" 'I am not surprised,' replied Her Majesty, 'for it must require

some time after the bandages have been removed before she can
again compress herself into the same proportions,' indicating

that the Empress Dowager supposed that foreign women slept with
their waists bound, just as the Chinese women do with their

feet."
The first winter I spent in China, twenty years ago, was one of

great excitement in Peking. The time of the regency of the
Empress Dowager for the boy-emperor had ended. I have explained

how a prince is not allowed to marry a princess because she is
his relative, or even a commoner his cousin for the same reason.

That is the rule. But rules were made to be broken, and when the
time came for Kuang Hsu's betrothal the Empress Dowager decided

to marry this son of her sister to the daughter of her brother.
It mattered not that the young man was opposed to the match and

wanted another for his wife. The Empress Dowager had set her
heart upon this union, and she would not allow her plans to be

frustrated, so an edict was issued that all people should remain
within their homes on a certain night, for the bride was to be

taken in her red chair from her father's home to the palace. So
that in this as in all other things her will was law for all

those about her.
She was a bit below the average height, but she wore shoes, in

the centre of whose soles there were--heels, shall we call
them?--six inches high. These, together with her Manchu garments,

which hang from the shoulders, gave her a tall and stately
appearance and made her seem, as she was, every inch an empress.

Her figure was perfect, her carriage quick and graceful, and she
lacked nothing physically to make her a splendid type of

womanhood and ruler. Her features were more vivacious and
pleasing than they were really beautiful; her complexion was of

an olive tint, and her face illumined by orbs of jet half hidden
by dark lashes, behind which lurked the smiles of favour or the

lightning flashes of anger.
When seated upon the throne she was majesty itself, but the

moment she stepped down from the august seat, and took ones hand
in both of hers, saying with the most amiable of smiles: "What a

kind fate it is that has allowed you to come and see me again. I
hope you are not over-weary with the long journey," one felt that

she was, above all, a woman, a companion, a friend--yet for all
that the mistress of every situation, whether diplomatic,

business, or social.
I wish her mentalcharacteristics could be described as

completely as Japanese and other photographers have given us
pictures of her person. But perhaps if this were possible she

would seem less interesting. And it may be that in the relation
of these few incidents of her career there may have been revealed

something of the patriotism, the statesmanship, the imperious
will, and the ambitions that brought about the reeestablishment

and the continuation of the dynasty of her people. We have seen
how the enemies of her country fell before her sword. Dangerous

statesmen fell before her pen, and if they were fortunate enough
to rise again with all their honour it was to be divested of all

their former power. Every obstacle in her path was overcome