SOME WINTER DAYS AT THE PALACE
The big, official portrait for St. Louis was advancing. I was able
to accomplish much more now that I had a place where I could work
uninterruptedly, and quietly study the painting when I was not working.
Her Majesty came, with her usual retinue, to pose, but it was not at
fixed times, and was often when I did not expect her. She was looking
more and more anxious these days; but she came to pose whenever it
was necessary, and was very particular as to all the details in the
portrait. She often had the jewels and ornaments changed, and her pearl
mantle was made over, after she saw it in the first sketch, as she did
not like its form.
The throne, about which there had been a question when I began the
portrait, and which had been a present to Her Majesty from the late
Emperor Tong Chih, her son, had been “lost” during the Boxer troubles,
but Her Majesty thought it might be reproduced from descriptions and
from sketches by the Palace painters who had seen it; but I could not
consent to work either from memory or other painters’ sketches, and
I was finally obliged to paint, “faute de mieux,” one of the carved
teakwood thrones of which Her Majesty is so fond. This throne did not
suit the straight lines of the composition so well as almost any other
in the Palace would have done, but Her Majesty wished it.
I found the representation of the nine life-size phenix, in vigorous
colors, on a blue cloisonné screen placed almost touching the throne,
very difficult to represent, so that they did not seem to be real birds
flying around her head. The vases of flowers and ornaments were also
placed at exactly equal distances on either side of the throne, but it
was necessary to paint them this way. It would not have been “proper”
otherwise. The figure was in the exact center of the three-fold
screen, and so near it, it was impossible to get any atmosphere in
the background. There was not a fold in either gown or sleeves; but
I had now resigned myself to convention and tradition, and I copied
mechanically what was placed before me, and made no more efforts at
artistic arrangements, nor tried any experiments in execution. I worked
like a good artisan, finishing so many inches a day.
The weather was now too cold for anything but the short constitutional,
and, besides, there was no place in the Winter Palace to tempt one to
promenades--only the walled-in courts and the shut-in walks, between
high walls. Even Her Majesty’s promenades were confined to going to the
Audience Hall in the morning, and walking through the courts, from one
Throne-room to another.
Every day we saw the Empress Dowager for some moments in her
Throne-room before I went to my work. On Theater days, I made her my
morning salutation in her loge at the Theater, and when the light
faded and I could paint no more, I would go into the young Empress’s
and the Ladies’ loge for the last play and the spectacular finale,
when there were always some good illuminations and pretty effects. Her
Majesty and the young Empress seemed now to perfectly understand that
I wanted to work, and must work, in order to finish the large portrait
for the St. Louis Exposition. They saw I appreciated the amusements and
ceremonies, etc, but that I did not wish them to interfere with my
work. When there was a special festival, or some fine ceremony, I was
always called in, but otherwise I might go or not, as I wished.
I lunched generally with the Ladies, with the charming young Empress as
gracious hostess, and dined at night at Her Majesty’s table. Two huge
copper braziers had now been placed in the Throne-room, and though so
picturesque with the blue flames curling above their openings in the
top, they made but little impression upon the temperature of this lofty
room. The curtains over the immense doors that opened on the courts
were constantly being raised for the passage of some eunuch, and it was
very drafty. But one could at least warm one’s hands by the braziers,
and they were so beautiful and picturesque, I was reconciled to being a
little cold; besides, I soon became accustomed to the temperature. The
Chinese Ladies wear heavy fur-lined dresses in the house, and cannot
stand the rooms very warm.
At dinner, a large carpet was now placed under the table, which was an
improvement over the cold marble floors. This was done for my comfort,
for the Chinese Ladies wear two-inch-thick cork soles to their
fur-lined shoes. Down the center of the table, during the winter, there
were several silver chafing-dishes, with burning charcoal beneath their
steaming contents. Soups, vegetables, and meat stews were thus kept
boiling hot on the table. One night I suggested to one of the eunuchs
to place the claret-bottle near the fire before serving it, that the
chill might be taken off. One very cold day, soon after, the eunuch
brought in a large teapot, and began pouring the boiling claret out
of this! The Chinese drink their wines hot, and he thought he would
improve on my suggestion of “taking off the chill,” and he naïvely
remarked “it was better for me to drink it thus on such a cold day!”
When there was no Theater, and it became too dark to paint, I would
join the young Empress and Ladies in their sitting-room at the left of
Her Majesty’s Throne-room and there await dinner. The young Empress
would then teach me Chinese. She was very particular about my accent
and seemed to take a real interest in my progress. The Chinese language
is very difficult for a beginner, even for one who has a good ear,
for the “tone” or inflection with which you pronounce the word may
change its meaning. Sometimes one after the other of the Princesses
would repeat the same word in different tones and make me repeat it
and then give the meaning of each tone. They would sometimes make puns
on words, or give me a string of difficult words for the accent and to
improve my enunciation, as the French teach the children, “Trois gros
rats dans trois gros trous.” When I would finally get quite tangled
up with these words I would retaliate with “Peter Piper picked a peck
of pickled peppers.” This would end the lesson for that day, for they
would all try to say it and get so hilarious that there was no effort
at further study, and dinner would be announced in the midst of the fun.
Sometimes the young Empress and the Ladies would play cards in the
evenings. Her Majesty seemed only to like her fairy game! The cards
were narrow slips of pasteboard with curious devices on each, but
little more than an inch wide, and there were one hundred and fifty
in a pack. I never succeeded in getting into the merits of the game.
Sometimes when the Ladies felt industriously inclined, they would weave
a kind of braid. The threads, gold, silver, or silk, were attached to
the center of a wooden table and were weighted at the ends. They would
weave these in and out into cunningly fashioned braids and ribbons. The
Princesses did a great deal of beautiful embroidery, making their own
shoes, which are of exquisitely embroidered satin, but they could not
do this at night, for only candles are used in the two Peking Palaces,
the Summer Palace being the only one in China lighted by electricity.
One night at dinner the young Empress asked me to come earlier than
usual the next morning, as there was something she wished me to see.
Several eunuchs were waiting at the gate of the Palace to conduct us
to the young Empress when we arrived at nine o’clock the next morning,
and I then learned this was her Birthday. I hurried in and found the
Imperial Princess and all the Ladies of the Palace, besides a number
of visitors, standing in front of the young Empress’s pavilion. They
told me she had asked them to wait to present their congratulations
until I came, and said that I was to go in first. I did so, and there,
on a throne, sat the young Empress in full Court dress, wearing the
Court coiffure, with its veil of pearls, which was most becoming to her
narrow patrician face. She was looking very sweet and gracious and held
out her tiny hand to me on my entrance. I bowed low over it and kissed
it, and wished her from the bottom of my heart “ten thousand” years
of happiness and all kinds of “felicitous omens.” I then started to
move out, but she told me to remain in the room at one side and watch
the Princesses and Ladies as they came in. Each made the prostrations
before her and presented a jade “ruyie,”[8] which she received with due
ceremony--the same ceremony as for the Emperor’s and Empress Dowager’s
Birthday!
[8] Also spelled jiu.
But these winter days were not all given up to the Theater and
festivals. There were some days of sadder import. Days of mourning
were often celebrated at the Palace. The anniversary of the deaths
of some Emperor or Ancestor was of frequent occurrence. It seemed to
me they celebrated the anniversary of the death of every Emperor of
the Dynasty! On these days there would be sacrifices at the ancestral
tablets and religious ceremonies early in the mornings. The Empress
Dowager and the whole Court would wear mourning for the day and there
was never any sort of amusement. White, which is full mourning, is
not worn on these anniversaries after the third, but violet and blue
(second mourning) is put on. The flowers worn in the coiffure were
also in violet, white or blue, the mourning colors. One night at dinner
the young Empress, who acts as Mistress of Ceremonies in the Palace,
told me the following was a day of mourning. She asked me if I would
wear one of the mourning colors, as it was the anniversary of the death
of the Emperor Tung-Chih (the Empress Dowager’s son).
The next day I put on a black dress, our mourning, and wore violet
flowers in my hair. When we entered, Her Majesty was sacrificing at
the small shrine in her sitting-room. She was dressed in dark violet,
heavily trimmed with black, and had not a flower of any kind in her
hair--only a few pearls. She looked very sad and was more earnest and
reverent at the sacrifice than usual, but when she had finished her
sacrifice, she bade us “Good morning” and inquired after our health,
with her usual consideration. We soon left the Throne-room for my
working-hall, and I did not see her again until after our dinner with
the Empress and Ladies, when we went into the Throne-room to make our
adieus. As I had not been wearing black for some time (as Her Majesty
said she didn’t like it), she now noticed that I had it on and she
asked Lady Yu-Keng, in an aside, “why.” She was told that when I knew
what anniversary it was, I had put it on on that account. She seemed
much touched, took my hand in both hers, and said, “You have a good
heart to think of my grief and to have wished to sympathize,” and tears
fell from her eyes on my hand, which she held in hers.
Poor lady! Private sorrows and sad memories were not all she had to
grieve her now. I had noticed her growing anxiety for many days! She
seemed to feel all the gravity of the political situation of China. As
the rumors of war between Russia and Japan grew, her anxiety increased
and she was looking sad and careworn. She seemed to be full of doubt
and fear, and quite unlike her usual self. I fancy she thought of the
unprepared state of her country and feared that it might be drawn into
this struggle. She seemed to be in doubt as to the course that was best
to be taken. Even should the Empire not be drawn into the conflict,
two hostile nations were to meet within its borders. The struggle was
to take place in Manchuria, the cradle of the Dynasty. That beautiful,
smiling country would be ravished by war, and the awful possibility
of the ancestral tombs being desecrated, loomed up before her. The
desecration of the tombs of one’s ancestors in China is supposed to
bring dire consequences upon the family, and a pious Chinaman would
face any material loss rather than run the risk of these tombs being
desecrated. She felt it all, and was sad indeed.