Dowager Empress Tz'u-hsi
The Dowager Empress Tz'u-hsi was the daughter of Duke Chou, and therefore of good family. In person Tsi Thsi was tall and erect, with pronounced Tatar features, eyes piercing as those of an eagle and a voice made for the exercise of authority. She married, in 1853, the Emperor Hsien Feng, as his second consort. His first consort, the Imperial chief consort, did not bear him any sons, but his second consort presented him with a boy, later Emperor T'ung Chih. Thus her star came into the ascendant, because she was the mother of the Heir-apparent. She retained her power as regent when her nephew Kuang Hsu succeeded the Emperor T'ung Chih, and since then the whole world looked for years and years to this Empress of the East, with whom an entire regime, centuries old, came to a last supreme explosion of despair before going under for ever.
Of the two Empresses the legal wife of Hsien Feng was Tsi-an and generally known as the Eastern Empress. She was distinguished for her womanly virtues, but played no important personal part in the politics of her time. It was quite the reverse with her fellow Regent, the illustrious Tz'u-hsi, who more than any ruler of China for the past hundred years deserves, for her capacity and her strength of character, the epitaph of "Great." She was born in 1834 and rose from a somewhat lowly position to become the secondary wife of Hsien Feng and the mother of the heir. Thence she continued to rise till "by sheer ability, by her own wits, will and shrewdness, she attained the supreme power." Of the private character of this notable personality the most diverse views have been taken and we must look to the events which she more or less controlled to do their part in interpreting that side of her career to us. In later years, after the terrible days of Boxerdom, many foreigners were enabled to get close to this wonderful woman, and it is remarkable that those who were closest and most intimate were to a large extent the most enthusiastic as to her general womanly qualities.
The Empress Dowager was no novice at a coup d'etat. It had become manifestly a case for instant action if she were to save herself and her friends from the consequences of the new movement. She also held the sincere belief that the new craze for western materialism was likely to play into the hands of the greedy European powers ever on the alert for the partitioning of China. It is no reflection on her patriotism that she believed drastic measures were necessary for the Empire's salvation. Yuan Shih-kai has been blamed by some for warning the Empress of what was taking place in the Royal Palace. He too may be credited with the belief that hot-headed, inexperienced young enthusiasts were not the real leaders the time necessitated. So the blow fell; the reform leader Kang Yu-wei escaped with difficulty to live henceforth with a price upon his head. Most of his associates were ruthlessly beheaded; the poor young Emperor was from this time forth practically deposed and a prisoner.
A new era was inaugurated by an Edict which commences as follows: "Her Imperial Majesty the Empress Dowager, Tsi Thsi, since the first years of the reign of the late Emperor T'ung Chih down to our present reign, has twice ably filled the regency of the Empire, and never did her Majesty fail in happily bringing to a successful issue even the most difficult problems of government. In all things we have ever placed the interests of our Empire before those of others and looking back at her Majesty's successful handiwork, we are now led to beseech, for a third time, for the assistance from her Imperial Majesty, so that we may benefit from her wise and kindly advice in all matters of State. Having now obtained her Majesty's gracious consent, we truly consider this to be a great boon both to ourselves as well as to the people of our Empire."
The coup d'etat of the Empress was successfully carried out September 22, 1898. Troops had been silently collected; the Emperor was seized and consigned to the seclusion he had doubtless intended for his aunt. Two days later the Edicts of July were all annulled. At one fell swoop the cardhouse of reform was shattered and its authors seized or scattered. The Empress astutely managed to explain and consolidate her assumption of power by holding a reception for the wives of the Ambassadors who had no alternative but to accept the situation. A year later when it was announced that the Emperor had abdicated in favor of Pu Chii, the son of Prince Tuan, the Chinese and foreign ministers were indeed genuinely concerned and put sufficient pressure on Tsi Thsi to cancel the Edict of abdication. The British ambassador, moreover, hinted that the health of the incarcerated Emperor must be carefully considered or there might be consequences. So, although Kwang Hsu remained in prison, there was no further talk of abdication.
The activity of the Dowager was not solely in the interest of her retention of power. She was seriously alarmed at the aggressions of the foreigners and had a definite policy looking towards their expulsion. In the energetic words of one of her edicts: "The various Powers cast upon us looks of tiger-like voracity, hustling each other in their endeavors to be first to seize upon our innermost territories. They think that China, having neither money nor troops, would never venture to go to war with them. They fail to understand, however, that there are certain things which this Empire can never consent to, and that, if hard pressed, we have no alternative but to rely upon the justice of our cause, the knowledge of which ir> our breasts strengthens our resolves and steels us to present an united front against our aggressors."
A weapon was unhappily ready to hand. Among the anti-Manchu societies which were flourishing at the time was that known as the I Ho Chuan, or Righteous Harmony Fist's Association, popularly known as the Boxers. The Empress adroitly led them to reconsider their anti-dynastic prejudices and to enlist themselves in her anti-foreign campaign. This they did with a fanatical enthusiasm which boded ill. The Boxers were not only madly hostile to the foreigner but were profoundly convinced of their own invulnerability to the arms of the alien, and their numbers, swollen by all the elements which made for mischief, grew daily more formidable. An alliance of anti-reformers seemed to Tsi Thsi to ensure doubly the success of her plans.
For several years after the Boxer Rebellion little or no change was apparent in China upon the surface. The Emperor exerted little or no influence and the humbled Dowager was apparently indifferent to the fate of Manchuria, from which Russia showed no signs of budging. In several other directions concern was given to the Chinese Government, notably in Tibet, where, in 1904, Great Britain felt herself obliged to interfere. The city of Lhassa was occupied by General Younghusband in August of that year, but in the end, after the flight of the Dalai Lama to Mongolia and the exaction of certain pledges the country was handed back to the suzerain power. The real question of the day was Manchuria. The protests of Japan, Great Britain and the United States against its continued occupation secured from Russia the promise to evacuate in eighteen months from April, 1902, but as there was manifested no intention of fulfilling the promise, Japan pushed the matter to the ordeal of war, and on Feb. 8, 1904, the Russo-Japanese War, which had long been regarded as inevitable, commenced.
Even the Empress Dowager was influenced by the new spirit. She had become much more conciliatory to foreigners since the dark days of 1900, and now set herself, cautiously and tentatively, to carry out some of the very reforms she had so ruthlessly cut off in 1908. In 1905 an Imperial Commission headed by Prince Tsai Tse, was appointed to study out a system of representative government with a view to granting Parliamentary control. The Commission in leaving Peking was greeted with a bomb which showed that the old spirit was by no means dead, but on its return edicts were issued promising at some time in the future a National Assembly. A further Edict in 1908 announced that a Parliament would be convoked nine years from that date.
On November 14, 1908, according to the official account, the Emperor, whose health had manifestly suffered from his semi-incarceration, passed away. On the following day the last great representative of the spirit which had won China for the Manchus, the Dowager Empress Tsz hsi, followed her nephew to the shades of the ancestors. Rumors of a violent ending in either or both cases were not unnaturally rife, and in some instances circumstantial accounts were given of a great Palace tragedy, but the matter may perhaps best be left in obscurity undisturbed by speculation. One may be permitted to admire the high spirit of the dead Empress without condoning her crimes.
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