whom we may perhaps be indebted both
for the problem and the solution.

When the deaths of both of their Imperial Majesties were announced at
the same time, the news also came that the Japanese suspected that
there had been foul play. With them, however, it was only suspicion;
none of them, so far as I know, ever undertook to analyze the matter or
unravel the mystery. There is no doubt a reasonable explanation, but we
must go for it to the Forbidden City, the most mysterious royal
dwelling in the world, where white men have never gone except by
invitation from the throne, save on one occasion.

In 1901, while the court was in hiding at Hsianfu, the city to which
they fled when the allies entered Peking, the western half of the
Forbidden City was thrown open to the public, the only condition being
that said public have a certificate which would serve as a pass to the
American boys in blue who guarded the Wu men, or front gate. I was
fortunate enough to have that pass.

My first move was to get a Chinese photographer--the best I could find
in the city--to go with me and take pictures of everything I wanted as
well as anything else that suited his fancy.

The city of Peking is regularly laid out. Towards the south is the
Chinese city, fifteen miles in circumference. To the north is a square,
four miles on each side, and containing sixteen square miles. In the
centre of this square, enclosed by a beautifully crenelated wall thirty
feet thick at the bottom, twenty feet thick at the top and twenty-five
feet high, surrounded by a moat one hundred feet wide, is the Forbidden
City, occupying less than one-half a square mile. In this city there
dwells but one male human being, the Emperor, who is called the
"solitary man."

There is a gate in the centre of each of the four sides, that on the
south, the Wu men, being the front gate, through which the Emperor
alone is allowed to pass. The back gate, guarded by the Japanese during
the occupation, is for the Empress Dowager, the Empress and the women
of the court, while the side gates are for the officials, merchants or
others who may have business in the palace.

Through the centre of this city, from south to north, is a passageway
about three hundred feet wide, across which, at intervals of two
hundred yards, they have erected large buildings, such as the imperial
examination hall, the hall in which the Emperor receives his bride, the
imperial library, the imperial kitchen,