Chinese horrors and persecutions of the Christians; containing a full account of the great insurrection in China; atrocities of the "Boxers" ..together with the complete history of China down to the present time .. . Sacred Onesbefore Us, and in devotion to Our govern-ment and love towards Our people, madethe fear of Heaven and the example ofOur Forefathers the mainspring of everyact. To be unwearied day by day hasbeen Our single purpose. Our bodilyconstitution has through Our life beenstrong, and when, in the nth moon ofthis year, We were attacked by small-pox. We gave the utmost care to thep
Chinese horrors and persecutions of the Christians; containing a full account of the great insurrection in China; atrocities of the "Boxers" ..together with the complete history of China down to the present time .. . Sacred Onesbefore Us, and in devotion to Our govern-ment and love towards Our people, madethe fear of Heaven and the example ofOur Forefathers the mainspring of everyact. To be unwearied day by day hasbeen Our single purpose. Our bodilyconstitution has through Our life beenstrong, and when, in the nth moon ofthis year, We were attacked by small-pox. We gave the utmost care to thepreservation of Our health; but for somedays past Our strength has graduallyfailed, until the hope of recovery haspassed away. We recognize in this thewill of Heaven. And then the dying mannamed his successor in the person of his firstcousin. So soon as the august patient has ceasedto breathe, his heir strips from his cap theornaments which adorn it, and wails andstamps in evidence of his excessive griefThe widow and ladies of the harem in thesame way discard the hair-pins and jewelrywhich it is ordinarily their delight to wear,and show their practical appreciation of theposition by setting to work to make the. 175 176 CHINA: PAST AND PRESENT. mourning clothes and habiliments. Thecoffin prepared for the remains having beencarried into the principal hall of the palace, isinspected by the heir, and receives its augustburden. By an ordinance, v/hich is probablymore honored in the breach than in the per-formance, the new Emperor and his courtierssacrifice their queues as a token of their sor-row, and the ladies of the harem, not to beoutdone, submit their flowing locks to thescissors of their attendants. Periods of Mourning. For three years, which by a fiction isreduced to twenty-seven months, the youngEmperor mourns the decease of his prede-cessor. The exigencies of administration,however, make it necessary that he shouldconfine the period of unrestrained grief to ahundred days ; w
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