Page:China Under the Empress Dowager - ed. Backhouse and Bland - 1914.pdf/182



August 1898 — at the end of the 7th Moon — the position of affairs in the Palace (known only to a few) was that the Empress Dowager had been won over to the reactionary party; she was postponing a decisive step, however, until she and the Emperor made their proposed visit to Tientsin in the 9th Moon. It was her intention there to confer with Jung Lu before resuming the Regency, because of the unmistakable hostility towards her then prevailing in the southern provinces, which she wished to allay, as far as possible, by avoiding any overt measures of usurpation until her preparations were made. On the 1st of the 8th Moon, the Emperor, who was then in residence at the Summer Palace, received in audience Yüan Shih-k'ai, the Judicial Commissioner of Chihli, and discussed with him at great length the political needs of the Empire. Yüan (then in his fortieth year) had owed his rapid advancement to the protection of the great Viceroy Lï Hung-chang; nevertheless, among his rivals and enemies there were many who attributed the disastrous war with Japan in 1894 to his arbitrary conduct of affairs as Imperial Resident in Corea. There is no doubt that his reports and advice on the situation at Seoul precipitated, if they did not cause, the crisis, leading the Chinese Government to despatch troops into the country in the face of Japan's desire and readiness for war, and thus to the extinction of China's sovereignty in the Hermit Kingdom; but the fact had not impaired Yüan's personal prestige or his influence at Court. As a result of this audience the Emperor was completely won over by Yüan's professed interest in the cause of reform, and was convinced that in him he had secured a powerful supporter, His Majesty