Two Years in the Forbidden City | Page 4

charge devolved upon my mother, who was without
doubt the genius of the party in arranging matters and straightening out
difficulties.
When the launch from the steamer arrived at the jetty off the French
Bund, we were met by the Shanghai Taotai (the highest official in the
city), the Shanghai Magistrate and numerous other officials, all dressed
in their official robes. The Taotai told my father that he had prepared
the Tien Ho Gung (Temple of the Queen of Heaven) for us to reside in
during our stay in Shanghai, but my father refused the offer, saying that
he had telegraphed from Hong Kong and made all arrangements to go
to the Hotel des Colonies in the French Concession. We had had
previous experience staying in this temple while on our way to Japan,
where my father went as Minister in 1895, and did not care to try it a
second time. The building is very old and very much out of repair. It
was a beautiful place in its prime, but had been allowed to go to rack
and ruin. The custom is that the magistrate has to find a place and
supply the food, etc., for high officials when passing through, and it is
not exactly the thing to refuse their kind offer, but my father was
always very independent and politely declined all proffers of
assistance.
At last we did safely arrive in the Hotel des Colonies, where my father
found awaiting him two telegrams from the Imperial Palace. These
telegrams ordered my father to go to Peking at once, but, as the river to

Tientsin was frozen, it was out of the question for us to go by that route,
and as my father was very old and quite ill at that time, in fact
constantly under the doctor's care, the only accessible way, via
Chinwangtao, was equally out of the question, as it was a long and
most tedious journey and quite beyond his strength. In view of all these
difficulties, he telegraphed that, after the ice had broken up in the Peiho
River, we would come by the first steamer leaving Shanghai for
Tientsin.
We left Shanghai on the 22d of February and arrived at Tientsin on the
26th, and, as before, were met by the Customs Taotai of the port and
numerous other officials (the same as when we arrived at Shanghai).
There is a very curious custom of reverence, which must be performed
by all high officials on their return from abroad. Immediately upon
landing on the shores of China, arrangements are made with the nearest
Viceroy or Governor to receive their obeisance to Ching Sheng An (to
worship the Emperor of Peace), a Taotai being considered of too low a
rank for such an honor. As soon as we arrived, Yuan Shih Kai, who
was then Viceroy of Chihli Province at Tientsin, sent an official to my
father to prepare the time and place for this function, which is an
extremely pretty one. When arrangements had been made, both my
father and Yuan Shih Kai dressed in their full ceremonial robes, which
is the dragon long robe, with a reddish black three-quarter length coat
over it, chao chu (amber beads), hat with peacock feather and red coral
button, and repaired at once to the Wan Shou Kung (10,000 years
palace), which is especially built for functions of this kind, where they
were met by a large number of officials of the lower grades. At the
back centre of this Temple, or Palace, stands a very long narrow table
on which are placed the tablets of the Emperor and Empress Dowager,
on which is written, "Wan sway, wan sway, wan wan sway" (10,000
years times 10,000 years times 10,000 10,000 years). The Viceroy, or
in this case Yuan Shih Kai, and the other officials arrived first. Yuan
stood at the left side of this table and the others arranged themselves in
two diminishing lines starting from the front corners of the table. Soon
afterward my father came and knelt directly in front of the centre of the
table and said, "Ah ha Ching Sheng An" (Your servant gives you
greeting). After this ceremony was over my father immediately arose
and inquired after Their Majesties' health, and Yuan replied that they

were quite well. This closed the function.
We stayed in Tientsin for three days, arriving in Peking on the
twenty-ninth. My father's condition was much worse and he begged for
four months' leave of absence, in which to recuperate, which was
granted by Her Majesty, the Empress Dowager. As our beautiful
mansion, which we had built and furnished just before leaving for Paris,
was burned during the Boxer Rising of 1900, entailing a loss of over
taels 100,000, we rented and moved into a