ed for his commands. Jung Lu told him to leave the order
with him, and as soon as Yuan had departed he took the train for
Peking, called on Prince Ching, and they two went to the Summer Palace
and showed the order to Her Majesty, suggesting to her that it might be
well for her to come into the city and give him a few lessons in
government.

As the Empress Dowager had been behaving herself so circumspectly
during all the summer months, allowing the Emperor to test himself as a
ruler, one can scarcely blame her for not wanting to be bottled up in
the Summer Palace when she had done nothing to deserve it. When
therefore this second delegation of officials, consisting of the two
highest in rank in the empire, came to request her to once more take
charge of the government, she called her sedan chair and started for
the capital. She went without an army, but was accompanied by those of
her palace eunuchs on whom she could implicitly depend, and enough of
them to overcome those of the Emperor in case there should be trouble.
That force was necessary is evident from the fact that she condemned to
death a number of his servants after she had taken the throne.

When the Emperor heard that she was coming he sent a messenger with
letters urging Kang Yu-wei to flee, and to devise some means for saving
the situation, while he attempted to find refuge for himself in the
foreign legations. This however he failed to do, but was taken by the
Empress Dowager, and his career as a ruler ended, and his life as a
prisoner began.

X

Kuang Hsu--As a Prisoner

Kuang Hsu deserves a place in history as the prize iconoclast. He sent
a cold shiver down the spine of the literati by declaring that a man's
fitness for office should not depend upon his ability to write a poem,
or upon the elegance of his penmanship. This was too much. The literati
argued that at the rate at which the Emperor was going, it might be
expected that he would do away with chop-sticks and dispense with the
queue.--Rounsevelle Wildman in "China's Open Door."

X

KUANG HSU--AS A PRISONER

The year that Kuang Hsu ascended the throne a great calamity occurred
in Peking. The Temple of Heaven--the greatest of the imperial temples,
the one at which the Emperor announces his accession, confesses his
sins, prays and gives thanks for an abundant harvest, was struck by
lightning and burned to the ground. When the Emperor worships here it
is as the representative of the