He Was At First
"Diligent And Circumspect," But He Has Now Become Disposed "To Overrate
His Own Importance." In Consequence, He Was Deprived Of All His
Appointments And Dismissed From The Scene Of Public Affairs.
Five weeks
after his fall, however, Prince Kung was reinstated, on May 8, in all his
offices, with the exception of that of President of the Council.
This
episode, which might have produced grave complications, closed with a
return to almost the precise state of things previously existing. There
was one important difference. The two empresses had asserted their
predominance. Prince Kung had hoped to be supreme, and to rule
uncontrolled. From this time forth he was content to be their minister and
adviser, on terms similar to those that would have applied to any other
official.
The year 1865, which witnessed this very interesting event in the history
of the Chinese government, beheld before its close the departure of Sir
Frederick Bruce from Pekin, and the appointment of Sir Rutherford Alcock,
who had been the first British minister to Japan during the critical
period of the introduction of foreign intercourse with that country, to
fill the post of Resident Minister at Pekin. Sir Rutherford Alcock then
found the opportunity to put in practice some of the honorable sentiments
to which he had given expression twenty years before at Shanghai. When Sir
Rutherford left Yeddo for Pekin, the post of Minister in Japan was
conferred on Sir Harry Parkes, who had been acting as consul at Shanghai
since the conclusion of the war. The relations between the countries were
gradually settling down on a satisfactory basis, and the appointment of a
Supreme Court for China and Japan at Shanghai, with Sir Edmund Hornby as
Chief Judge, promised to enforce obedience to the law among even the
unsettled adventurers of different, nationalities left by the conclusion
of the Taeping Rebellion and the cessation of piracy without a profitable
pursuit.
While the events which have been set forth were happening in the heart of
China, other misfortunes had befallen the executive in the more remote
quarters of the realm, but resulting none the less in the loss and ruin of
provinces, and in the subversion of the emperor's authority. Two great
uprisings of the people occurred in opposite directions, both commencing
while the Taeping Rebellion was in full force, and continuing to disturb
the country for many years after its suppression. The one had for its
scene the great southwestern province of Yunnan; the other the two
provinces of the northwest, Shensi and Kansuh, and extending thence
westward to the Pamir. They resembled each other in one point, and that
was that they were instigated and sustained by the Mohammedan population
alone. The Panthays and the Tungani were either indigenous tribes or
foreign immigrants who had adopted or imported the tenets of Islam. Their
sympathies with the Pekin government were probably never very great, but
they were impelled in both cases to revolt more by local tyranny than by
any distinct desire to cast off the authority of the Chinese; but, of
course, the obvious embarrassment of the central executive encouraged by
simplifying the task of rebellion.
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of 191255
