The year 1850 had not long begun when the capital was agitated by the news that the Empress Mother had died. Only a short time before there had been rejoicings at her having attained the venerable age of eighty years, and the Emperor had expressed the hope that she might survive until her hundredth birthday. As the consort and widow of Kiaking, she had been a spectator of the gradual decadence of the Empire during the first half of the present century, but her influence on the progress of public events was probably not very great. It is said that she only once actively interfered in public affairs, and that was when she counselled the vigorous prosecution of the foreign war. There is no doubt, however, that she and Taoukwang were on affectionate terms; and although Chinese public men always write with a view to effect, his protestation was probably sincere that he had tenderly cared for her during the twenty-nine years that he had occupied the throne. But the hope that she might attain the felicity of her hundredth year was soon dispelled, and after a brief illness the Empress Mother, as the Emperor poetically expressed it, "drove the fairy chariot and went the long journey." Daily libations were ordered to be poured out in the Palace of Contentment, a long term of mourning was ordained, during which the courtiers wore white, and laid aside their jewels and seals of office, and Taoukwang only consented, at the urgent prayer of his ministers, to dismiss his grief and devote his attention to the brief period of authority that still remained for him to enjoy.

Taoukwang only survived his adopted mother by a few weeks. One of his last acts showed to what a depth of miserable mental hesitation he had sunk. It happened that the day on which the Chinese new year commenced, 12th of February, 1850, was to be marked by an eclipse of the sun, an inauspicious omen for the introduction of a new year, especially under the circumstances which had but recently occurred within the Imperial family. Taoukwang was at the time doubly

Consul, on the 19th of March, 1849; and in the following January, Dr. George Smith was consecrated first Bishop of Victoria-the name given to the see and island of Hongkong.

susceptible to the superstitious influences of his country and position, and he thought to avoid the evil consequences of the coincidence by a proclamation ordering the first day of the new year-the thirtieth of his reign-to be celebrated on the previous day. It speaks well for the good sense underlying the peculiarities of the Chinese character, that this alteration was disregarded and treated with marks of derision. At Shanghai the people even went so far as to pull down the placards officially announcing the fact. Even a Celestial Emperor had not the power to avert the course of time, or to avoid its natural and ordered consequences. This confession of superstitious dread and of Imperial impotence appropriately heralded the end of a reign marked by many disasters, and without a glimmer of success.

The new year of the Chinese calendar had not run its first fortnight when the inmates of the palace perceived that the Emperor's end was near at hand. The recognition of the dread truth which ultimately comes home to all the sons of man was not denied to Taoukwang, although those who have enjoyed absolute power on earth are naturally more slow than others to admit the presence of a master. But although the closing scenes of a Chinese Emperor are religiously shielded from the profane gaze of an inquisitive public, the greatest publicity was given to the fact that on the 25th of February a great council was held in the bed-chamber of the Emperor, at the very bedside of the dying Taoukwang. There may have been much discussion, and some conflict of opinion. To us it is only given to know the result, which was that Yihchoo, the fourth son, was proclaimed Heir Apparent, and his father's chosen successor.*

Taoukwang survived this important act a very short time, although the precise date is matter of uncertainty; but there

*The Vermilion Edict, signed with the pencil of that colour, reads as follows:-"Let Yihchoo, the Imperial fourth son, be set forth as the Imperial Heir Apparent. You princes and high officers, why wait for our words? Assist and support him with united hearts, and do you all regard whatever pertains to the concerns of the country and the public as of high importance, without sympathy for aught else." Yihchoo became the Emperor Hienfung.

TAOUKWANG'S CHARACTER.

197

is reason to believe that his death was hastened by the alarm caused by the outbreak of a fire within the Imperial city, and that it happened a few hours after the bedside council. The notification of his death was conveyed in an Imperial order issued by his successor, in which there is expressed the stereotyped hope that he had wished his father to attain his hundredth year. Taoukwang was in the 69th year of his age, having been born on the 12th of September, 1781. He was a young man while the power of his grandfather, Keen Lung, was at its pinnacle, and as a child he had listened to the tales of victorious campaigns and extensive conquests. But the misfortunes of his father's reign proved to be the precursors of the greater misfortunes of his own, and the school of adversity in which he had passed the better years of his manhood only imbued him with the disposition to put up with misfortune rather than with the vigour to grapple with it. The panegyric in which his son and successor extolled the paternal virtues is composed of generalities, which do not assist the reader in arriving at any certain view as to Taoukwang's character. If we do not deny to Yihchoo's periods the honourable and natural motive of personal affection, we must regret the absence of any attempt to sum up the events of his father's reign, or to convey some idea as to his character.

If an opinion may be formed on the latter point from the terms of his will, in which he might be expected to reveal the true tenor of his thoughts, it would seem that he was averse to all unnecessary display, and it is natural to suppose that this moderation may have been due to a sense of the difficulties of his people as well to his habitual reluctance to waste treasure on personal matters. As a young man he had been much attached to active pursuits, and it will not have been forgotten that his skill in military exercises was once usefully shown in saving his father's life. Even after ascending the throne, he preserved his old partiality for archery and riding; and it was even said of him that he took "strengthening pills" to develop his muscular power. Whatever the effect of this medicine in other ways, it destroyed his teeth, and detracted greatly from his personal appearance.

He was described in not very attractive language as being "lank, tall, hollow-cheeked, black-visaged, toothless, and consequently with a pointed chin."

Although Taoukwang's reign of thirty years was one of unredeemed failure, that monarch had some satisfaction in the belief that his authority had to all appearance survived the rude shocks to which it had been so constantly exposed. The foreign war, with all its penalty of increased intercourse with foreigners and lowered dignity on the part of the Celestial Emperor, had come and gone without those grave consequences to the Chinese constitution which at one time it seemed must inevitably follow. The symptoms of internal rebellion which had revealed themselves in more than one quarter of the Empire had not attained any formidable dimensions. The great tributaries were passive and obedient. Yet it is possible that Taoukwang distrusted this calm as deceptive, and if he could not have realized the depth of popular discontent, he yet perceived that there was a resentful national feeling in the hearts of the Chinese which all the wiles and wisdom of Manchu statecraft had failed to reach. Taoukwang left to his successor the example of much fortitude. If he had been unable to vanquish his most formidable enemies, he at least showed how evils might be borne with patience and dignity. If there was not much to admire in Taoukwang's action, all sympathy will not be denied to him for the sake of his misfortunes.

THE selection of Yihchoo for the throne threatened to disturb even the perfect arrangements of the Chinese system, which seldom fails to stifle all opposition before incurring the responsibility of making a decision. The principal ministers, Muchangah, the premier, who shared the indecision of the master he had just lost, and Keying, who was so smitten with grief at the death of the prince whose favourite companion he had been from an early period of his life, remained inactive while they should have been stirring in order to establish the authority of their new sovereign. Their inaction seems for a moment to have inspired the eldest prince, Hwuy Wang, the brother of the deceased man, with the idea of disputing the claim of his young nephew; but happily the impulse of revolt was resisted, and Hienfung's accession was generally recognized. Hwuy Wang, who had lost the favour of the Emperor and been an object of suspicion at Court through his over-eagerness to acquire possession of the throne on the occasion of Taoukwang's serious illness in the early part of his reign, was now content to become the friend and principal courtier of his nephew; but there was no reason for overlooking the hesitation of Muchangah and Keying, who were quietly removed from their places in the administration.

Hienfung was still a very young man when he ascended

Born in August, 1831; he was, therefore, in his nineteenth year. The name of Hienfung means "great abundance" or "complete prosperity."