courage that was titanic to do so. But she never flinched, though

we may suppose that many of her poorest subjects, who could sleep
from dark till daylight with nothing but a brick for a pillow,

might have rested more peacefully than she.
She had a myriad of other duties to perform. She was the

mother-in-law of that imperial household, with the Emperor, the
Empress, sixty concubines, two thousand eunuchs, and any number

of court ladies and maid-servants. Their expenses were enormous
and she must keep her eye on every detail. The food they ate was

similar to that used by all the Chinese people. I happen to know
this, because one of her eunuchs who visited me frequently to ask

my assistance in a matter which he had undertaken for the
Emperor, often brought me various kinds of meat, or other

delicacies of a like nature, from the imperial kitchens.
I want you to visit three of the imperialtemples in these

beautiful palace grounds. The first is a tall, three-story
building at the head of that magnificent Lotus Lake. In it there

stands a Buddhist deity with one thousand heads and one thousand
arms and hands. Standing upon the ground floor its head reaches

almost to the roof. Its body, face and arms are as white as snow.
There is nothing else in the building--nothing but this

mild-faced Buddhist divinity for that brilliant, black-eyed ruler
of Chinas millions to worship.

Standing near by is another building of far greater beauty. It is
faced all over with encaustic tiles, each made at the kiln a

thousand miles away, for the particular place it was to occupy.
Each one fits without a flaw, a suggestion to American architects

on Chinese architecture.
The second of these temples stands to the west of the Coal Hill,

immediately to the north of the homes of their Majesties. One day
while passing through the forbidden grounds I came upon this

temple from the rear. In the dome of one of the buildings is a
circular space some ten feet in diameter, carved and gilded in

the form of two magnificent dragons after the fabled pearl. It is
to this place the Emperor goes in time of drought to confess his

sins, for he confesses to the gods that the drought is all his
doing, and to pray for forgiveness, and for rain to enrich the

thirsty land. The towers on the corners of the wall of the
Forbidden City are the same style of architecture as the small

pavilion in the front court of this temple.
Now as the buds of spring are bursting and the eaves on the

mulberry-trees are beginning to develop, will you go with the
Empress Dowager or the Empress into a temple on Prospect Hill,

between the Coal Hill and the Lotus Lake, where she offers
sacrifices to the god of the silkworm and prays for a prosperous

year on the work of that little insect? Above it stands one of
the most hideousbronze deities I have ever seen--male and

naked--in a beautiful little shrine, every tile of which is made
in the form of a Buddha's head. During the occupation tourists

were allowed to visit this place freely, and their desire for
curios overcoming their discretion, they knocked the heads off

these tiles until, when the place was closed, there was not a
single tile which had not been defaced.

One other building in the Forbidden City is worthy of our
attention. It is the art gallery. It is not generally known that

China is the parent of all Oriental art. We know something of the
art of Japan but little about that of China. And yet the best

Japanese artists have never hoped for anything better than to
equal their Chinese teacher. In this art gallery there are stored

away the finest specimens of the old masters for ten centuries or
more, together with portraits of all the noted emperors. Among

these portraits we may now find two of the Empress Dowager, one
painted by Miss Carl, and another by Mr. Vos, a well-known

American portrait painter.
XIII

The Ladies of the Court
I love to talk with my people of their Majesties, the princess" target="_blank" title="n.公主；王妃；亲王夫人">princesses,

and the Chinese ladies, as I have seen and known them. Your
friendship I will always remember. Her Majesty, your imperial

sister, found a warm place in my heart and is treasured there.
Please extend to the Imperial Princess my cordial greetings and

to the other princess" target="_blank" title="n.公主；王妃；亲王夫人">princesses my best of good wishes.
--Mrs. E. H. Conger, in a letter to the Princess Shun.

XIII
THE LADIES OF THE COURT

The leading figure of the court is Yehonala, wife of the late
Emperor Kuang Hsu. She has always been called the Young Empress,

but is now the Empress Dowager. After the great Dowager was made
the concubine of Hsien Feng, she succeeded in arranging a

marriage, as we have seen, between her younger sister and the
younger brother of her husband, the Seventh Prince, as he was

called, father of Kuang Hsu and the present regent.
The world knows how, in order to keep the succession in her own

family, she took the son of this younger sister, when her own son
the Emperor Tung Chih died, and made him the Emperor Kuang Hsu

when he was but little more than three years of age. When the
time came for him to wed, she arranged that he should marry his

cousin, Yehonala, the daughter of her favourite brother, Duke
Kuei. This Kuang Hsu was not inclined to do, as his affections

seem to have been centred on another. The great Dowager, however,
insisted upon it, and he finally made her Empress, and to

satisfy,--or shall we say appease him?--she allowed him to take
as his first concubine the lady he wanted as his wife; and it was

currently reported in court circles that when Yehonala came into
his presence he not infrequently kicked off his shoe at her, a

bit of conduct that is quite in keeping with the temper usually
attributed to Kuang Hsu during those early years. This may

perhaps explain why she stood by the great Dowager through all
the troublous times of 1898 and 1900, in spite of the fact that

her imperial aunt had taken her husband's throne.
Mrs. Headland tells me that "Yehonala is not at all beautiful,

though she has a sad, gentle face. She is rather stooped,
extremely thin, her face long and sallow, and her teeth very much

decayed. Gentle in disposition, she is without self-assertion,
and if at any of the audiences we were to greet her she would

return the greeting, but would never venture a remark. At the
audiences given to the ladies she was always present, but never

in the immediate vicinity of either the Empress Dowager or the
Emperor. She would sometimes come inside the great hall where

they were, but she always stood in some inconspicuous place in
the rear, with her waiting women about her, and as soon as she

could do so without attracting attention, she would withdraw into
the court or to some other room. In the summer-time we sometimes

saw her with her servants wandering aimlessly about the court.
She had the appearance of a gentle, quiet, kindly person who was

always afraid of intruding and had no place or part in anything.
And now she is the Empress Dowager! It seems a travesty on the

English language to call this kindly, gentle soul by the same
title that we have been accustomed to use in speaking of the

woman who has just passed away."
My wife tells me that,--"A number of years ago I was called to

see Mrs. Chang Hsu who was suffering from a nervousbreakdown due
to worry and sleeplessness. On inquiry I discovered that her two

daughters had been taken into the palace as concubines of the
Emperor Kuang Hsu. Her friends feared a mentalbreakdown, and

begged me to do all I could for her. She took me by the hand,
pulled me down on the brick bed beside her, and told me in a

pathetic way how both of her daughters had been taken from her in
a single day.