His Majesty the Emperor Kwang-Hsu was nearing the completion of his thirty-second year when I was first presented to him. I found him an interesting study, but not to the degree of Her Majesty the Empress Dowager, who has charm and is so fascinating. The Emperor is singularly devoid of this quality of “charm,” and has but little personal magnetism. He interests one, nevertheless. Her Majesty is Universal, the Emperor is typically Oriental. In person he is of slight and elegant figure, not more than five feet four in height. He has a well-shaped head, with the intellectual qualities well developed, a high brow, with large brown eyes and rather drooping lids, not at all Chinese in form or setting. His nose is high and, like most members of the Imperial Family, is of the so-called “noble” type. A rather large mouth with thin lips, the upper short with a proud curve, the lower slightly protruding, a clear-cut, thin jaw, a strong chin a little beyond the line of the forehead, with not an ounce of superfluous flesh on the whole face, give him an ascetic air and, in spite of his rather delicate physique, an appearance of great reserve strength. His complexion is not so white and clear as that of the other members of the Imperial Family, for the Manchus have whiter skins than the Chinese; but this seems more the result of delicacy than natural with the Emperor. His luxuriant, very long hair, a characteristic of the Manchus, is beautifully silky and glossy and always arranged with the greatest care. It is said he much dislikes being shaved, but tradition, immutable in China, does not allow a man under forty, even if he be the “Son of Heaven,” to wear a mustache or whiskers. Like all well-bred Chinese, he has small feet and hands, the latter long and thin and most expressive. The Emperor dresses with extreme neatness and great simplicity, wearing few ornaments and no jewels except on State occasions. His face is kindly in expression, but the glance from his rather heavy-lidded eyes is shrewd and intelligent. His manner is shy and retiring, but this does not seem to be so much from a lack of confidence in himself as from the absence of that magnetic quality, which gives one an appearance of assurance. He seemed to me the ideal of what one would imagine an Oriental potentate to be, whose title is the “Son of Heaven.” There is a Sphinx-like quality to his smile. In his eyes one sees the calm, half-contemptuous outlook upon the world, of the fatalist. There is an abstractness in the subtilty of his regard, an abstractness that embodies one’s idea of the “Spirit of the Orient.” At first it is difficult to tell whether this comes from a sense of power or from a knowledge of the lack of it, but that firm and fleshless jaw, that ascetic face and keen eye, show there must be reserve strength, that there can be no lack of power, should he wish to exert it. Over his whole face there is a look of self-repression, which has almost reached a state of passivity.