order to gain time they pretended to believe that no
such orders could have come from the throne. They must be forgeries of
the Boxers. They therefore refused to believe them until they had sent
their own special messenger all the way to Peking to get the edict from
the hands of Her Majesty and bring it to them in their provinces. This
messenger was also secretly instructed to find out what the contents of
the edict were, and if it was contrary to the desires of the Governor,
he was to dilly-dally on the way home until the Boxer trouble was ended
or until the foreigners had all been removed from the territory. And it
was such conduct as this on the part of three Chinese and one Manchu
viceroys that saved China from being divided up among the Powers in
1900, a fact which the Empress Dowager was not slow to understand and
reward.

In 1900 Yuan was made Governor of the Shantung province, and the court
was compelled to flee to Hsian. It was while the court was thus in
hiding that an incident occurred which indicates the fertility of the
Empress Dowager and the elasticity of all Chinese social customs.
Governor Yuan's mother died. In a case of this kind customs dictate,
and the rules of filial affection demand, that a man shall resign all
his official positions and go into mourning for a period of three
years. Yuan therefore sent his resignation to the Empress Dowager,
while "weeping tears of blood."

The country was of course in desperate straits and could ill afford to
lose, for three years, for a mere sentiment, the services of one of her
greatest and most powerful statesmen. However much he may have
regretted to give up such a brilliant career which was just well begun,
Yuan no doubt expected to do so. What was his surprise therefore to
receive from Her Majesty a message of condolence in which she praised
his mother in the highest terms for having given the world such a
brilliant and able son. Under the circumstances, however, it would be
impossible to accept his resignation as his services to the country
just at this juncture were indispensable. She would, however, appoint a
substitute to go into mourning for him, and this with the knowledge
that she had borne a son whose services were so necessary to the safety
of the government and the country, would be a sufficient comfort to the
spirit of his departed mother, and Yuan was forced to continue in his
official position as Governor of the province without the intermissi