The Last Manchu

by Henry Pu Yi

Shortly afterward, Cheng, as a fund-raising measure, proposed that the encyclopedia of China, which included the four divisions of all the important literature, be shipped to Shanghai for photographing and publication by the commercial press. Transport for this project was stopped by order of the Republic. At this time my father came to see me, and in a very roundabout way said that the measures of Cheng Hsiao-hsu should be carefully reconsidered and explained that if the Republic did not approve of what he had already done, there might be worse trouble later on.

  Soon after this Shao Ying, the former Household Comptroller, appeared before me to say that the Commander of the Republican Army was deeply dissatisfied with Cheng Hsiao-hsu’s actions and that if Cheng persisted with his measures and the Republic took action, he would be able to do nothing to help me. I became frightened by this news and then on top of it Cheng memoralized me asking to be relieved of his duties. The result of it all was that Cheng reverted to being a Companion of the Great Diligence Hall and Shao Ying resumed control of the Household Department.

  III

  MY EXILE

  13

  From the Forbidden City to the Legation Quarter

  ALTHOUGH THE REORGANIZATION OF THE HOUSEHOLD DEPARTMENT was declared a failure, it did not make me “stop the car” insofar as my efforts to improve my situation were concerned, and there were plenty of people to offer me advice.

  After my marriage, there were many retired Ch’ing officials who secretly presented plans for my restoration. One group operated in China and abroad through an organization called the Imperial Chinese Constitutional Monarchist Party, which in a memorial claimed 100,000 members abroad and five newspapers and suggested that I support it with my personal wealth. Reports on its activities were transmitted to me in the palace via Reginald Johnston.

  I also gave money to charity. I have forgotten which of my tutors suggested the idea to me. At that time the social pages of the Peking papers would carry items almost every day about the gifts to the poor by the Emperor. My gifts usually were of two types. Sometimes I would send money to a newspaper office to distribute when the paper carried items about poor people, and at other times I would send Ch’ing officials with gifts of money direct to destitute families. Whichever method I used, the newspapers would carry an item about it within the next day or two.

  My biggest donation was made after the Japanese earthquake of September, 1923. Japan’s losses from this disaster had shocked the world, and I thought I would take this opportunity to display my benevolence. My tutor Chen Pao-shen showed foresight in advising this. After praising “the magnificence of the imperial bounty and the humanity of the celestial mind,” he told me that “this action will make its influence felt in the future.” Since I was short of ready cash I sent antiques, paintings and calligraphy that were valued at about 300,000 U.S. dollars. The Japanese Minister Yoshizawa came with a delegation from the Japanese Diet to thank me, and the excitement in the palace was similar to that created by the presence of foreign envoys at my wedding.

  This relatively placid life went on until November 5, 1924, when the struggles between the various war lords around Peking reached a climax and the army of General Feng Yu-hsiang drove me out of the Forbidden City. September, 1924, had marked the beginning of the second Chihli-Fengtien war, a renewal of the convulsive struggle between the North Chinese and Manchurian war lords. At first the war lord Wu Pei-fu was on top, but in October while attacking the forces of Chang Tso-lin on the Manchurian border, his subordinate Feng Yu-hsiang deserted him, marched his troops back to Peking and issued a peace telegram. Under the combined pressure of Feng Yu-hsiang and Chang Tso-lin, Wu’s troops collapsed and Wu himself fled. (Two years later he made a comeback.) Even before the news of Wu’s defeat came through, Feng’s army occupied Peking, put the President of China under house arrest and dissolved Parliament.

  When the news of this coup d’état reached the palace, I immediately felt that the situation was dangerous. The Palace Guard had already been disarmed by Feng’s army and moved out of the inner city. His troops had taken over their barracks and posts at the Gate of Divine Valor. From the Imperial Garden, I looked at Coal Hill through a telescope and saw that it was swarming with soldiers. The Household Department sent them tea and food which they accepted, and although there was nothing alarming about their behavior, everyone in the Forbidden City was worried. We all remembered that previously Feng had published telegrams demanding that the court be expelled from the Forbidden City and this made us realize that the coup d’état, and the replacement of the Palace Guards boded ill for the future. I sent for Johnston and asked him to go to the Foreign Legations, find out the latest news, and arrange for me to take refuge somewhere.

  All the princes and high officials were concerned. Some had already made reservations for themselves in the Wagon-Lits Hotel in the Legation Quarter, but when they heard that I wished to leave the Forbidden City they said it was not yet necessary. They argued that since all the foreign powers recognized the Articles of Favorable Treatment nothing serious could happen to me.

  But the inevitable at last did happen. At a little after nine o’clock on the morning of November 5, I was eating fruit in the Palace of Accumulated Elegance and conversing with my wife, Wan Jung, when the high officials of the Household Department suddenly entered in great disorder. Shao Ying, the head of the Department, was in the lead with a document in his hand.

  “Your Majesty . . . Your Majesty,” he panted, for he was out of breath, “Feng Yu-hsiang has sent soldiers with an envoy who has told us that the Republic is going to abolish the Articles of Favorable Treatment. They have sent us this document and they want you to sign it.”

  I jumped up at once, dropped my half-eaten apple on the floor, and grabbed the document from him. It was a “revision” of the Articles of Favorable Treatment which abolished my position as Emperor and made me an ordinary citizen, reduced the size of the annual subsidy from $4,000,000 a year to $500,000, required me to abandon the Forbidden City, provided for the protection of my ancestral temples and mausoleums and guaranteed the retention of my private property.

  Actually, these Revised Articles were not nearly as bad as I had originally anticipated. What startled me the most was a remark of Shao Ying’s—“They said that in three hours’ time, we must move out of the Forbidden City.”

  “But what shall I do about my property? What about the High Consorts?” I was so nervous that I paced back and forth.

  “Telephone Johnston,” I said after a moment.

  “The wires have been cut . . . cut . . . cut,” my father-in-law interjected.

  “Send someone to fetch the Prince Regent. I always said that something would happen, but you people wouldn’t let me go away. Look for the Prince Regent, look for the Prince Regent!”

  “But we can’t get out; there are people on guard at the gate and they won’t let anyone out.”

  “Then go and negotiate for me.”

  “Yes, Your Majesty.”

  The High Consort Than Kang had died a few days before and there were only two High Consorts left in the palace. They absolutely refused to move. Using this as an excuse, Shao Ying finally went to negotiate with Feng’s envoy and succeeded in getting an extension of the time limit until 3 P.M. After midday it was arranged that my father should be allowed into the palace along with my tutors Chu Yi-fan and Chen Pao-shen; only Johnston was kept out.

  When I learned that my father had come, I went out to meet him and as soon as I caught sight of him coming through the gate I shouted, “Your Highness, what are we going to do?”

  At the sound of my voice he stood stock-still, as if a spell had been cast upon him. He neither came any closer nor answered my question; his lips quivered and then he got out a completely useless sentence: “I . . . I . . . obey the e . . . edict. I obey the edict. . . .”

  Now angry as well as worried, I spun around and went back into my room. Later I heard from a eunuch that when my father had learned that I had put my
signature on the Revised Articles, he had pulled his hat with a peacock feather off and thrown it on the floor, muttering, “It’s all over, it’s all over. I won’t need this again.”

  Subsequently Shao Ying returned to my room, his face an even more dreadful sight than it had been earlier. He was shaking as he said, “Their envoy is pushing us. He says we can only have another twenty minutes, and that if we aren’t out by then . . . they’ll open fire with artillery from Coal Hill.”

  Although Feng’s envoy had only brought twenty soldiers armed with pistols, his threat was effective. My father-in-law became so frightened that he rushed into the Imperial Garden to find someplace to hide from the threatened artillery fire and refused to come out again. Seeing the terror of the princes, I decided to accept the demands for my immediate departure and go to my father’s house.

  The Army had five cars ready for us. Feng’s envoy rode in the front car, I followed in the second, my wives Wan Jung and Wen Hsiu, and Shao Ying and others came behind.

  When I got out of the car at the main gate of the Northern Mansion (my father’s house), Feng’s envoy came up and shook hands with me. “Mr. Pu Yi,” he asked, “do you intend to be Emperor in future or will you be an ordinary citizen?”

  “From today onward I wish to be an ordinary citizen.”

  “Good,” he said with a smile, “then we shall protect you.”

  “I have felt for some time,” I explained, “that I did not need the Articles of Favorable Treatment and I am pleased to see them annulled. I had no freedom as Emperor, and now I have found my freedom.”

  When I finished this little speech the soldiers of Feng’s army who were standing nearby applauded. My last sentence was not entirely untrue. I was sick of the restrictions with which the princes and high officials had surrounded me. I wanted my freedom and also “freedom” with which to realize my ambition of regaining my ancestral heritage in my own way.

  After speaking these words I hurried past Feng’s army guard and through the gate of the Northern Mansion. But as I sat in my father’s study, I came to realize that it was more like a tiger’s mouth than a princely mansion. The first thing I had to do was find out how dangerous my situation really was.

  My father was a big disappointment to me. He was even more flustered than I was. From the time I entered the Northern Mansion he never stood still for a moment. When he was not walking up and down muttering to himself, he was rushing in and out in a panic, making the atmosphere even more tense. When I could not bear it any longer, I said to him:

  “Your Highness, sit down and talk it over. We must decide what to do, and before we do that we must get some news from the outside.”

  “Decide what to do? Very well.” He sat down, but before two minutes were up, he leapt to his feet, made some meaningless remarks, and started pacing up and down again.

  “We must get some news,” I repeated.

  “Get some news? Very good, very good.” Then he went out of the room and came back a moment later. “They . . . won’t let us out,” he stammered. “There are soldiers at the main gate.”

  “Use the telephone.”

  “Telephone, yes, yes, the telephone,” But before he had gone many steps, he came back. “Whom shall I telephone?” he asked.

  I saw that the only thing to do was have the eunuchs summon the senior officials of the Household Department. But of these, Jung Yuan, my father-in-law, had already entered a foreign hospital with a nervous disorder (he stayed two months) and the others were either moving out my clothing and personal effects, dealing with the eunuchs and palace maids, or looking after the two High Consorts who had stayed behind. Only Shao Ying was with me. He was in much the same state as my father and incapable of making a single phone call.

  Fortunately other princes and officials soon came as did my tutors; otherwise I do not know how bad the confusion in the Northern Mansion would have become. The best news was that brought by Johnston, who said that the Dutch Minister Oudendijk, as doyen of the Diplomatic Corps, along with the British and Japanese Ministers had already protested my treatment to the new Foreign Minister who had guaranteed the safety of my life and possessions. This news calmed everyone in the Northern Mansion except my father.

  Next day the restrictions at the gates were tightened and people were allowed in but not out. Later they were relaxed a little, but still only my tutors Chen Pao-shen and Chu Yi-fan and the senior officials of the Household Department were allowed in and out; foreigners were absolutely barred. This really alarmed everyone in the Northern Mansion; if the Army had no respect for foreigners there was no guarantee for the future at all.

  The storm of November 5, 1924, that had blown me out of the Forbidden City had dropped me at the crossroads. Three roads of action stretched out before me. One was to do what the Revised Articles suggested: to abandon the imperial title and my old ambitions and become an enormously wealthy private citizen. Another was to try to get the help of my “sympathizers” to cancel the new Articles and restore the old Articles in their entirety, to regain my title and return to the Forbidden City to continue to live my old life. The third possible course was the most tortuous: first to go abroad and then to come back to the Forbidden City, the Forbidden City as it had been before 1911. In the words of that time, this course was “using foreign power to plan a restoration.”

  As I faced the problem of which decision to make I was surrounded by men who argued endlessly over the merits of the different choices. They regarded the first possibility as not worthy of serious consideration, but fought stubbornly over the other two; and even the advocates of the same course would differ over their specific proposals.

  Meanwhile the situation in Peking continued to deteriorate and warnings of violence began to drift into the Northern Mansion. My tutor Lo Chen-yu insisted that Feng planned action against me any day and stated, “Your Majesty must leave here as soon as possible and take refuge in the Legation Quarter.” After the withdrawal of Feng’s troops from the gate, Johnston turned up with news that Feng was going to make a new move against Peking, and my tutor Chen Pao-shen pointed out that since Feng’s troops were not at the gate it was imperative for me to seek refuge in the Legation Quarter. He suggested that on arrival in the Quarter I first enter the German Hospital where there was a doctor who was an acquaintance of mine. Once there, arrangements could be made for me to seek refuge in a foreign legation. He and Johnston and I discussed these plans secretly, since they not only had to be kept from Feng’s people but also from my father who was bitterly opposed to my leaving his mansion.

  We acted according to secret plans and carried out the first step. I went with my tutor Chen Pao-shen to visit the two High Consorts, who had finally moved out of the palace a few days after me and were now living in Chilinpei Lane, and then came back to the Northern Mansion. This was to make those in the Northern Mansion believe that I was trustworthy and had no intention of leaving. We decided to carry out step two the following day. I was to say that I was going to inspect a house that I intended to rent in Piaopei Lane and, once out of my father’s house and en route, slip into the Legation Quarter and enter the German Hospital. The third step would be to go to a legation. Once I was in the Legation Quarter, this third step and the fourth step of having Wan Jung and Wen Hsiu rejoin me would be easy. But when we were about to start out on step two, my father ordered his Chief Steward to accompany us. I rode in the first car with Johnston and the steward sat behind Chen Pao-shen in another.

  “That’s a bit awkward,” Johnston said in English, frowning as he got in the car and motioning toward the steward.

  “Never mind him.” I was furious. I told the driver to start and we drove out of the Northern Mansion. I never wanted to enter its gates again in my life.

  Johnston felt that we could not ignore the steward and would have to think of some way of shaking him off. As we drove along, he decided that we should stop at a shop to buy something and send him back.

  There was a foreign stor
e selling watches, clocks and cameras situated at the entrance of the Legation Quarter. When we reached it, I went in with Johnston, and after looking around, I chose a French pocket watch. But although I delayed for a long time the steward waited outside and obviously had no intention of leaving. Johnston therefore had to fall back on a last resort and told the steward that I did not feel well and was going to visit a doctor at the German Hospital. The steward became suspicious and followed us there. Johnston explained to Dr. Dipper why I had come and he ushered me into an empty sickroom to rest. The steward, seeing that something was up, disappeared at once. Since we knew that he would be bound to go back to the Northern Mansion to report to my father, Johnston lost no time in going to negotiate with the British Legation. But as hours passed and I had no news from him, I became very anxious. While I was worrying, fearing that the steward would bring my father, Chen Pao-shen turned up, followed by Cheng Hsiao-hsu, who recommended that, rather than wait for Johnston, I go to the Japanese Legation. I sent him there to negotiate for my refuge, which he arranged. Immediately upon his return, we left the hospital by the back door and quickly traveled the quarter mile to the Japanese Legation.

  In those days the Legation Quarter and the foreign concessions were definitely hospitable places. Seven years earlier the then President of China had been driven to take shelter in a legation when I was briefly restored as Emperor, and then the war lord Chang Hsun himself, after I had abdicated for the second time, had become a “guest” of the Netherlands Legation a few days later. Whenever a legation was going to receive some “guests,” the hotels and hospitals in the Legation Quarter would also become very busy since many nervous people whose status was too low to get into a legation would pack these places so full that some would even be willing to pay for space under the stairs in order to gain admission.

  My reception was the first and probably the last of its kind. Later, when I sent for my wives from the Northern Mansion, Feng’s police would not let them out, so the Japanese Legation delegated a secretary to arrange the matter. And when he too failed, the Japanese Minister personally went to see the Chief Executive of the new government, Than Chi-jui, and, as a result, Wan Jung and Wen Hsiu with their eunuchs and ladies-in-waiting rejoined me.