He had been the moving spirit of the abortive revolution; he was a fine scholar, and had completely gained the ear of the Emperor.

The latter became henceforth to the end of his life a person of no importance, while China, for the third time in history, passed under the dominion of a woman.

There was no secret about it; the Empress Dowager, popularly known as the Old Buddha, had succeeded in terrorizing every one who came in contact with her, and her word was law.

It was said of one of the Imperial princes that he was "horribly afraid of her Majesty, and that when she spoke to him he was on tenter-hooks, as though thorns pricked him, and the sweat ran down his face." All promise of reform now disappeared from the Imperial programme, and the recent edicts, which had raised premature hope in this direction, were annulled; the old regime was to prevail once more.

The weakness of this policy was emphasized in the following year (1899), when England removed from Japan the stigma of extra-territorial jurisdiction, by which act British defendants, in civil and criminal cases alike, now became amenable to Japanese tribunals.