THE GOVERNOR 50 THE GOVERNOR 51 most prestige at home and abroad and the greatest seniority and The victorious expeditionary forces then drove toward Peking, experience,not to mention a large number of henchmen hold- where on August 13,outside the city wall,they engaged in a fierce battle against General Tung Fu-hsiang's troops.The empress,in ing key posts all over the empire.Chang Chih-tung and Liu K'un-i were also possible choices,for they too were senior officials with a desperate attempt to rally her supporters,called a conference in their own military forces.However,if security was the supreme the palace on the 14th,but no one attended.The next day,only hours before the expeditionary forces entered the city,the em- consideration,Yuan's army might just tip the balance.At all events,its destruction woul have eliminated him from consid- press,the emperor,and their entourage fled in disguise.The siege eration. of the legations was lifted,and the infamous sack of Peking began. When the empress commanded Yuan to dispatch troops to Tien- While disaster fell on Tientsin and Peking,peace reigned in the southeast.Local authorities declined to follow Peking's lead and tsin on June 17,he sent only a token force of 3,o00 men under the command of Sun Chin-piao.After reaching Tehchow in northern adopted a policy of protecting their own territories.In a memorial to the throne on June 19;Yuan recommended this policy as the Shantung,they were ordered to return because Yuan heard of their lack of discipline;he replaced them with six battalions under best way to save the empire from catastrophe and to protect the economic resources of the southeast,which were vital to the dy- Hsia Hsin-yu's command,which were not units of the Right Divi- sion.These delaying tactics gained a day or two of precious time. nasty.Through Sheng Hsuan-huai,he arranged a rapprochement On June 20,two days after Seymour's defeat,the empress confi- with the British based at Chefoo.He and his senior colleagues, notably Li Hung-chang of Kwangtung,Chang Chih-tung of Hupei, dently ordered Yuan to recall Hsia's troops.This was swiftly done. Two days later the situation changed,and urgent calls for help and Liu K'un-i of Kiangsu,maintained a friendly attitude toward the foreign powers throughout the whole episode.Yuan's initial came from Peking.Yuan replied that Hsia's troops,having just diffidence gradually gave way,as he perceived the urgent need for returned,could not be sent again.Sheng Hsiian-huai begged him to reconsider,but Yuan remarked,"The critical illness is under- action to preserve peace in the southeast.Having advocated the recall of Li Hung-chang at the beginning of the Boxer troubles, going a change.Better not hurry with medicine." Sheng Hsuian-huai now wrote Yuan in a telegram dated July 14: .At the beginning of July,when Li Hung-chang himself urged "Ho-fei [Li Hung-chang]is too old:Sir,you are the man of Yuan to lead his troops to Chihli to suppress the Boxers,Yuan destiny." replied,"If I lead my troops to save the foreign ministers at Peking without imperial sanction,I am afraid I shall be defeated on the Day by day,Yuan's position became increasingly important.His way.This I really cannot do."1s When Sheng Hstian-huai entreated office in Isinan,close to the capital,was the center of telecom- munications between the court,the provinces,and the Chinese him again,he replied,"The less we talk about it,the better." legations overseas.He was not only the best-informed man in the However,as a gesture of Yuan's loyalty to.the throne,Hsia Hsin- empire but also the strongest,since by now the four other divi. yu's small contingent eventually arrived at Peking,only to be sions of the imperial army had been destroyed,leaving Yuan's swept away in the tide of events. force the only modern army in northern China.The stage was To persuade the empress of his undying loyalty,Yuan was the cleared for his entrance;supreme power was suddenly within his first to send money,silks,and even food to the imperial traveling grasp. lodge.Although Shantung was a relatively poor province,his con- Power did not just fall into his hands;his own astute judgment tribution to the igoI indemnity was to be the second-largest from helped.It was clear that after the Boxer crisis northern China a provincial governor.When there was talk that the foreign powers would once again be a power vacuum,as it had been after the should demand the termination of the empress's regency,he was downfall of Li Hung-chang five years earlier.The much coveted the first to oppose the idea.He left no room for anyone to stand viceroyalty of Chihli would have to be given to a strong man. between him and his mistress. It would be unfair to blame Yuan alone for lack of action in Among those eligible for the post,Li Hung-chang himself had the