ho dwelt with the
Empress Dowager in the palace, the other being Prince Ching's fourth
daughter. She is a niece by marriage of the Empress Dowager, though she
really was never married. The nephew of the Empress Dowager, to whom
she was engaged, though she had never seen him, died before they were
married. After his death, but before his funeral, she dressed herself
as a widow, and in a chair covered with white sackcloth went to his
home, where she performed the ceremonies proper for a widow, which
entitled her to take her position as his wife. Such an act is regarded
as very meritorious in the eyes of the Chinese, and no women are more
highly honoured than those who have given themselves in this way to a
life of chastity.

The second of these ladies who remained in the palace with the Empress
Dowager is the fourth daughter of Prince Ching. Married to the son of a
viceroy, their wedded life lasted only a few months. She was taken into
the palace, and being a widow, she neither wears bright colours nor
uses cosmetics. She is a fine scholar, very devout, and spends much of
her time in studying the Buddhist classics. She is considered the most
beautiful of the court ladies.

The Empress Dowager took charge of most of the domestic matters of all
her relatives, taking into the palace and associating with her as court
ladies some who were widowed in their youth, and keeping constantly
with her only those whom she has elevated to positions of rank, or
members of her own family. Nor was she too busy with state affairs to
stop and settle domestic quarrels.

Among the court ladies there was one who was married to a prince of the
second order. Her husband is still living, but as they were not
congenial in their wedded life, the Empress Dowager made herself a kind
of foster-mother to the Princess and banished her husband to Mongolia,
an incident which reveals to us another phase of the great Dowager's
character--that of dealing with fractious husbands.

XIV

The Princesses--Their Schools

The position accorded to woman in Chinese society is strictly a
domestic one, and, as is the case in other Eastern countries, she is
denied the liberty which threatens to attain such amazing proportions
in the West. There is no reason to suppose that woman in China is
treated worse than elsewhere; but people can of course paint her
condition just as fancy seizes them. They are rarely admitted into the
domestic surroundings of Chinese ho