er to the west side of the
lake and, assisted by us, would cut the tops of the young plants and set
them in flower pots. I was very much surprised at this, as there were
no roots, only the stems of the flowers, but Her Majesty assured me that
they would soon grow into very pretty plants. Every day we went over to
water these flowers until they began to bud. In case it rained heavily,
Her Majesty would order some of the eunuchs to go over and cover up
these chrysanthemum plants with mats, so that they would not be broken.
It was characteristic of Her Majesty that, no matter what other business
she had to attend to, her flowers had her first consideration and
she would, if necessary, even go without her usual rest in order to
superintend them personally. She also spent quite a time in looking
after her orchard, where she had planted apple trees, pear trees, etc.
Another thing which I began to notice was that when the spring and
summer days had passed, she got quite irritable and sad, while in the
winter she was simply unbearable. She loathed cold weather.

One day, during the eighth moon, Her Majesty was taken slightly ill, and
complained of suffering from severe headaches. This was the only time I
ever saw Her Majesty actually sick. She, however, got up as usual in
the morning, and held audience, but was unable to take her luncheon, and
very soon had to retire to her bed. Several doctors were summoned, each
of whom took her pulse. This was quite a ceremony in itself. The doctors
knelt at the bedside, and Her Majesty stretched forth her arm, resting
her hand upon a small pillow which was provided for that purpose. After
this each doctor wrote out his prescription, all of which were different
from each other. We handed them to Her Majesty, who chose the one which
she thought was the nicest to take, and two attendants and the doctor
himself had to take a dose in her presence before she would touch it.
Then she would take it all right.

During this time it rained a great deal and was very hot. The climate at
this time of the year is very damp, which causes the flies to make their
appearance in millions. If there was one thing more than another that
Her Majesty detested it was these flies. During the actual summer they
were not so troublesome as at this particular time. Of course every
precaution was taken to keep them away, a eunuch being posted at each
door, provided with sort of a switch made of horse hair fastened at the