China under the Empress Dowager

Although the collapse of the Tsai Yüan conspiracy, and the stern justice administered to its leaders, rendered Yehonala’s position secure and made her de facto ruler of the Empire (for her colleague was, politically speaking, a negligible quantity, or nearly so), she was extremely careful, during the first years of the Regency, to avoid all conspicuous assumption of power and to keep herself and her ambitions in the background, while she omitted no opportunity of improving her knowledge of the art of government and of gaining the support of China’s leading officials. For this reason all the Decrees of this period are issued in the name of the Emperor, and Tzŭ Hsi’s assumption of authority was even less conspicuous than during her period of retirement at the Summer Palace after the conclusion of Kuang-Hsü’s minority. The first Regency (1861-1873) may be described as Tzŭ Hsi’s tentative period of rule, in which she tasted the sweets, while avoiding the appearance, of power. During the second Regency (1875-1889), while her name appeared only occasionally as the author of Imperial Decrees, she was careful to keep in her hands all official appointments, the granting of rewards and punishments and other matters of internal politics calculated to increase her personal popularity and prestige with the mandarinate. The “curtain was not suspended” during Kuang-Hsü’s minority, as he was the nominee of the Empresses, whereas the Emperor T’ung-Chih held his mandate direct from the late Emperor, his father. It was not until the final Regency (1898-1908), which was not a Regency at all in the strict sense of the word but an usurpation of the Imperial prerogative during the lifetime of the sovereign, that, assured of the strength of her position, she gave full rein to her love of power and, with something of the contempt which springs from long familiarity, took unto herself all the outward and visible signs of Imperial authority, holding audience daily in the Great Hall of the Palace, seated on the Dragon Throne, with the puppet Emperor relegated to a position of inferiority, recognised and acclaimed as the Old Buddha, the sole and undisputed ruler of the Empire.

At the outset of her career, she appears to have realised that the idea of female rulers had never been popular with the Chinese people; that even the Empress Wu of the eighth century, the greatest woman in Chinese history, was regarded as a usurper. She was aware that the Empress Lü (whose character, as described by historians, was not unlike her own), to whom was due the consolidation of power that marked the rise of the Han Dynasty, enjoys but scant respect from posterity. On the other hand, she knew—for the study of history was her pastime—that the Empresses Dowagers of the past had often wielded supreme power in the State, principles and precedents notwithstanding, and their example she determined to follow. Upon the taking off of the three chief conspirators, the Censors and Ministers urged her to deal in similar drastic fashion with their aiders and abettors, and Prince Kung was anxious, if not for revenge, at least for precautions being taken against those who had had the ear of the late Emperor during the last months of his reign. But Yehonala showed statesmanlike forbearance: early in life she realised that a few victims are better than many, and that lives spared often mean whole families of friends. After cashiering Prince Yi’s remaining colleagues of the Grand Council, she dealt leniently with other offenders. When, for instance, Chen Tu-en, President of the Board of Civil Appointments, was impeached on the ground that it was he who had first persuaded the Emperor to flee to Jehol against her advice, and that, after the Emperor’s death, he alone of all the high officials at the capital had been summoned to Jehol by the usurping Regents, she contented herself with removing him from office, though his guilt was clearly proved. Another official, a Minister of the Household, who had endeavoured to further the aims of the conspirators, by dissuading Hsien-Feng from returning to Peking in the spring of 1861, on the plea that an insurrection was impending, was also cashiered. But there was nothing in the nature of a general proscription, in spite of the pecuniary and other advantages which usually commend retaliation to the party in power at Peking. In an able Decree, Tzŭ Hsi let it be understood that she wished to punish a few only, and those chiefly pour encourager les autres. It was always a characteristic of hers that, when her ends were safely secured, she adopted a policy of watchful leniency: moderata durant. In this instance she was fully aware of the fact that Tsai Yüan and his colleagues would never have had the opportunities, nor the courage, to conspire for the Regency had they not been assured of the sympathy and support of many of the higher officials, but she preferred to let the iron hand rest in its velvet glove unless openly thwarted. She would have no proscriptions, no wreaking of private grudges and revenges. It was this characteristic of hers that, as will be seen in another place, obtained for her, amongst the people of Peking in particular, a reputation for almost quixotic gentleness, a reputation which we find expressed in frequent references to the “Benign Countenance,” or “Benevolent Mother,” and which undoubtedly represented certain genuine impulses in her complex nature. So, having crushed the conspiracy, she contented herself with exhorting all concerned to “attend henceforth strictly to their duty, avoiding those sycophantic and evil tendencies which had brought Chen Tu-en and Huang Tsung-ban to their disgrace.” In another Decree she emphasised the principle that sins of omission are not much less grave than overt acts, roundly censuring the Princes and Ministers of her Government for having failed to denounce the conspirators at once, and charging them with cowardice. It was fear and nothing else, she said, that had prevented them from revealing the truth; and then, with one of those naïve touches which makes Chinese Edicts a perpetual feast, she added that, should there be any further plots of usurpers, she would expect to be informed of their proceedings without delay. Above all, she bade the Imperial Clan take warning by the fate of the three conspirators, and intimated that any further attempts of this kind would be far more severely dealt with.

One of the first steps of the Regency was to determine the title of the new reign. The usurping Princes had selected the characters “Chi-Hsiang,” meaning “well-omened happiness,” but to Yehonala’s scholarly taste and fine sense of fitness, the title seemed ill-chosen and redundant, and as she wished to obliterate all memory of the usurpers’ régime, she chose in its place the characters “T’ung-Chih,” meaning “all-pervading tranquillity,” probably with one eye on the suppression of the rebellion and the other on the chances of peace in the Forbidden City. As far as all good augury for the Emperor himself was concerned, one title was, as events proved, no more likely to be effective than the other.

On the same day as the proclamation of the new reign was made by Edict, the Empresses Dowager issued a Decree explaining, and ostensibly deprecating, the high honour thrust upon them.

Following upon this, a Decree was issued in the name of the Emperor, which represented the boy as thanking their Majesties the Regents and promising that, so soon as he came of age, he would endeavour, by dutiful ministrations, to prove his gratitude.

For the procedure of Government it was then arranged that the Empresses should daily hold joint audiences in the side Hall of the main Palace. At these, and at all except the great Court ceremonies, the Emperor’s great-uncle and four brothers were excused from performing the “kotow,” the Emperor’s respect for the senior generation being thus indirectly exhibited.

Upon their acceptance of the Regency, honorific titles were conferred upon both Empresses. Each character in these titles represents a grant from the public funds of 100,000 taels per annum (say, at that time, £20,000). Thus the Empress Consort became known by the title of Tzŭ An (Motherly and Restful) while Yehonala became Tzŭ Hsi (Motherly and Auspicious), one being the Empress of the Eastern, and the other of the Western Palace. At various subsequent periods, further honorific characters, in pairs, were added unto them, so that, on her seventieth birthday, Tzŭ Hsi was the proud possessor of sixteen. On that occasion she modestly and virtuously refused the four additional characters with which the Emperor Kuang-Hsü (not unprompted) desired to honour her. Tzŭ An lived to receive ten in all; both ladies received two on their thirtieth birthdays, two on the Emperor T’ung-Chih’s accession, two just before his death in recognition of their “ministrations” during his attack of small-pox, and two on their fortieth birthdays. Tzŭ Hsi received two more on her fiftieth birthday, two on Kuang-Hsü’s marriage, and two on her sixtieth birthday. Tzŭ Hsi’s complete official designation at the end of her life was not easy to remember. It ran, “Tzŭ-Hsi-Tuan-yu-K’ang-yi-Chao-yu-Chuang-ch’eng-Shou-kung-Ch’in-hsien-Ch’ung-hsi-Huang Tai-hou,” which, being translated, means “The Empress Dowager, motherly, auspicious, orthodox, heaven-blessed, prosperous, all-nourishing, brightly manifest, calm, sedate, perfect, long-lived, respectful, reverend, worshipful, illustrious and exalted.”

At the beginning of the Regency it suited Yehonala to conciliate and humour Prince Kung. In conjunction with her colleague, she therefore bestowed upon him the titles of “I-Cheng Wang,” or Prince Adviser to the Government, and by special Decree she made the title of “Ch’in Wang,” or Prince of the Blood (which had been bestowed upon him by the late Emperor), hereditary in his family for ever.[11] Prince Kung begged to be excused from accepting the former honour, whereupon ensued a solemn parade of refusal on the part of the Empresses, one of whom, as events proved, certainly wanted no adviser. Eventually, after much deprecation, Their Majesties gave way as regards the hereditary title, but on the understanding that the offer would be renewed at a more fitting season. Yehonala who, in her better moments of grateful memory, could scarcely forget the brave part which Prince Kung had played for her at Jehol, made amends by adopting his daughter as a Princess Imperial, granting her the use of the Yellow palanquin. The influence of this Princess over Tzŭ Hsi, especially towards the end, was great, and it was strikingly displayed in 1900 on behalf of Prince Tuan and the Boxer leaders.

Ignorant at the outset of many things in the procedure of Government routine, feeling her way through the labyrinth of party politics and foreign affairs, afraid of her own youth and inexperience, it was but natural that Tzŭ Hsi should have recourse to the ripe wisdom of the late Emperor’s brother and be guided by his opinion. But as time went on, as her knowledge of affairs broadened and deepened, her autocratic instincts gradually asserted themselves in an increasing impatience of advice and restraint. As, by the study of history and the light of her own intelligence, she gained confidence in the handling of State business and men, the guidance which had previously been welcome became distasteful, and eventually assumed the character of interference. Despotic by nature, Tzŭ Hsi was not the woman to tolerate interference in any matter where her own mind was made up, and Prince Kung, on his side, was of a disposition little less proud and independent than her own. When the young Yehonala began to evince a disposition to dispense with his advice, he was therefore not inclined to conceal his displeasure, and relations speedily became strained. As Tzŭ Hsi was at no pains to hide her resentment, he gradually came to adopt a policy of instigating her colleague, the Empress of the East, to a more independent attitude, a line of action which could not fail to produce ill-feeling and friction in the Palace. In the appointment of officials, also, which is the chief object and privilege of power in China, he was in the habit of promoting and protecting his own nominees without reference to Yehonala, by direct communications to the provinces. Eye-witnesses of the events of the period have recorded their impression that his attitude towards both Empresses at the commencement of the Regency was somewhat overbearing; that he was inclined to presume upon the importance of his own position and services, and that on one occasion at audience, he even presumed to inform the Empresses that they owed their position to himself, a remark which Tzŭ Hsi was not likely to forget or forgive.

At the audiences of the Grand Council, it was the custom for the two Empresses to sit on a raised daïs, each on her separate Throne, immediately in front of which was suspended a yellow silk curtain; they were therefore invisible to the Councillors, who were received separately and in the order of their seniority, Prince Kung coming first in his capacity as “adviser to the Government.” Beside their Majesties on the daïs stood their attendant eunuchs; they were in the habit of peeping through the folds of the curtain, keeping a careful eye upon the demeanour of the officials in audience, with a view to noting any signs of disrespect or breach of etiquette. Strictly speaking, no official, however high his rank, might enter the Throne room unless summoned by the chief eunuch in attendance, but Prince Kung considered himself superior to such rules, and would enter unannounced. Other breaches of etiquette he committed which, as Her Majesty’s knowledge of affairs increased, were carefully noted against him; for instance, he would raise his voice when replying to their Majesties’ instructions (which were always given by Tzŭ Hsi), and on one occasion, he even ventured to ask that Tzŭ Hsi should repeat something she had just said, and which he pretended not to have understood. His attitude, in short (say the chroniclers), implied an assumption of equality which the proud spirit of the young Empress would not brook. Living outside the Palace as he did, having free intercourse with Chinese and foreign officials on all sides, he was naturally in a position to intrigue against her, did he so desire. Tzŭ Hsi, on the other hand, was likely to imagine and exaggerate intrigues, since nearly all her information came from the eunuchs and would therefore naturally assume alarming proportions. There is little doubt that she gradually came to believe in the possibility of Prince Kung working against her authority, and she therefore set herself to prove to him that his position and prerogatives depended entirely upon her good will.

She continued watching her opportunity and patiently biding her time until the occasion presented itself in the fourth year of the Regency (April, 1865). In a moment of absent-mindedness or bravado, Prince Kung ventured to rise from his knees during an audience, thus violating a fundamental rule of etiquette originally instituted to guard the Sovereign against any sudden attack. The eunuchs promptly informed their Majesties, whereupon Tzŭ Hsi called loudly for help, exclaiming that the Prince was plotting some evil treachery against the persons of the Regents. The Guards rushed in, and Prince Kung was ordered to leave the presence at once. His departure was speedily followed by the issue of an Imperial Decree, stating that he had endeavoured to usurp the authority of the Throne and persistently overrated his own importance to the State. He was accordingly dismissed from his position as adviser to the Government, relieved of his duties on the Grand Council and other high offices in the Palace; even his appointment as head of the Foreign Office, or Tsungli Yamên, was cancelled. “He had shown himself unworthy of their Majesties’ confidence,” said the Edict, “and had displayed gross nepotism in the appointment of high officials: his rebellious and usurping tendencies must be sternly checked.”

A month later, however, Tzŭ Hsi, realising that her own position was not unassailable, and that her treatment of this powerful Prince had created much unfavourable comment at Court and in the provinces, saved her face and the situation simultaneously, by issuing a Decree in the name of herself and her colleague, which she described as a Decree of explanation. In this document she took no small credit to herself for strength of character and virtue in dealing severely with her near kinsmen in the interests of the State, and pointed to the fact that any undue encouragement of the Imperial clansmen, when inclined to take a line of their own, was liable, as history had repeatedly proved, to involve the country in destructive dissension. Her real object in inflicting punishment on the Prince for treating the Throne with disrespect was to save him from himself and from the imminent peril of his own folly. But now that several Memorials had been sent in by Censors and others, requesting that his errors be pardoned, the Throne could have no possible objection to showing clemency and, the position having been made clear, Prince Kung was restored to the position of Chamberlain, and to the direction of the Foreign Office. The Prince, in fact, needed a lesson in politeness and, having got it, Her Majesty was prepared to let bygones be bygones, it being clearly understood that, for the future, he should display increased energy and loyalty as a mark of his sincere gratitude to their Majesties.

A week later, Tzŭ Hsi, in order to drive the lesson home, issued the following Decree in the name of the Empresses Regent.

In the autumn of this year, 1865, took place the burial of the late Emperor, Hsien-Feng, the preparation of whose tomb had been proceeding for just four years. With him was buried his consort Sakota, who had died in 1850, a month before her husband’s accession to the Throne; her remains had been awaiting burial at a village temple, seven miles west of the capital, for fifteen years. As usual, the funeral ceremonies and preparation of the tombs involved vast expenditure, and there had been considerable difficulty in finding the necessary funds, for the southern provinces, which, under ordinary circumstances would have made the largest contributions, were still suffering severely from the ravages of the Taiping rebellion. The Emperor’s mausoleum had cost nominally ten million taels, of which amount, of course, a very large proportion had been diverted for the benefit of the officials of the Household and others.

The young Emperor, and the Empresses Regent proceeded, as in duty bound, to the Eastern Tombs to take their part in the solemn burial ceremonies. Prince Kung was in attendance; to him had fallen the chief part in the preparation of the tomb and in the provision of the funds, and Her Majesty had no cause to complain of any scamping of his duties. The body of the Emperor, in an Imperial coffin of catalpa wood, richly lacquered and inscribed with Buddhist sutras, was borne within the huge domed grave chamber, and there deposited in the presence of their Majesties upon its “jewelled bedstead,” the pedestal of precious metals prepared to receive it. In the place of the concubines and eunuchs, who in prehistoric days used to be buried alive with the deceased monarch, wooden and paper figures of life size were placed beside the coffin, reverently kneeling to serve their lord in the halls of Hades. The huge candles were lighted, prayers were recited, and a great wealth of valuable ornaments arranged within the grave chamber; gold and jade sceptres, and a necklace of pearls were placed in the coffin. And when all was duly done, the great door of the chamber was slowly lowered and sealed in its place.

Next day the Empresses Dowager issued a Decree in which Prince Kung’s meritorious acts are graciously recognised, and their Majesties’ thanks accorded to him for the satisfactory fulfilment of the funeral ceremonies.

The Empress Dowager was essentially a woman of moods, and these Imperial Decrees simply reflect the fact, at the beginning of her autocratic rule, as they did until its close. Four years later Prince Kung was to incur her deep and permanent dislike by conspiring with her colleague to deprive her of her favourite, the chief eunuch An Te-hai.