family of the Empress Dowager's mother, the Empress' sister, and
many of the princesses and high official ladies in Peking. She
has visited them in a social as well as a professional way, has
taken with her her friends, to whom the princesses have shown
many favours, and they have themselves been constant callers at
our home. It is to my wife, therefore, that I am indebted for
much of the information contained in this book.

There are many who have thought that the Empress Dowager has been
misrepresented. The world has based its judgment of her character
upon her greatest mistake, her participation in the Boxer
movement, which seems unjust, and has closed its eyes to the
tremendous reforms which only her mind could conceive and her
hand carry out. The great Chinese officials to a man recognized
in her a mistress of every situation; the foreigners who have
come into most intimate contact with her, voice her praise; while
her hostile critics are confined for the most part to those who
have never known her. It was for this reason that a more thorough
study of her life was undertaken.

It has also been thought that the Emperor has been misunderstood,
being overestimated by some, and underestimated by others, and
this because of his peculiar type of mind and character. That he
was unusual, no one will deny; that he was the originator of many
of China's greatest reform measures, is equally true; but that he
lacked the power to execute what he conceived, and the ability to
select great statesmen to assist him, seems to have been his
chief shortcoming.

To my wife for her help in the preparation of this volume, and to