With the Empress Dowager of China — Story, Setting & Ideas

Gardens as Working Landscapes

Carl devotes considerable attention to the grounds of the Summer Palace, where ornamental flowers share space with fields of wheat, millet, and turnips. She observes that the Chinese plant useful crops within pleasure domains, satisfying what she calls “the utilitarian spirit, so strong in the Chinese.” This detail contradicts the common Western image of purely decorative imperial gardens. Carl also describes the “Flowery Mountain,” a terraced hillside covered in peonies, and notes the Empress Dowager’s particular delight in a green chrysanthemum variety with thread-like petals. The gardeners’ skill in color combinations and unusual shapes is presented as a point of pride.

Ruins and Foreign Depredations

Carl does not ignore the recent history of violence. She mentions that the Temple of the Ten Thousand Buddhas lost a sacred Buddha statue when foreign troops hurled it into the lake in 1900. She writes that the Empress Dowager felt the damage to temples “more keenly than anything else.” Carl also reflects on the ruins of the old Summer Palace, destroyed by European troops fifty years earlier, noting that they have become “picturesque with time” and provide a somber accent to the landscape. Her tone is critical of European conduct: “The European Christian soldier in China has burned, destroyed, and killed with as much barbarity as the heathen.”

The Painter’s Daily Routine

Carl’s account is structured around the progress of the portrait. She describes painting in the throne-room, where the Empress Dowager’s voice and movements were part of the session. She also recounts walks with Her Majesty, the presence of dogs and cats with their own pavilions, and the gift of a pet called “Me-lah.” The memoir includes details of meals, boating on the lake, and the imperial theater. Carl’s observations are grounded in her specific role: she is there to paint, and her days are organized around sittings, yet she also records the rhythms of court life that unfold around her.

Readers should approach this memoir as a personal record shaped by Carl’s dual position as artist and guest. Her descriptions of gardens, architecture, and court customs are filtered through her own cultural assumptions, which she occasionally acknowledges. The excerpts show that she is attentive to material details—flowers, buildings, meals—and willing to criticize foreign actions. The full text likely contains further observations on the Emperor, the ladies of the court, and the political context of the Boxer Rebellion’s aftermath.

Spending time inside Katharine Carl’s memoir felt less like reading history and more like sitting beside someone who quietly watched a world shift. That same intimacy surprised me again in Thomas Berthelet, Royal Printer and Bookbinder to Henry VIII., King of England — A Reader’s Guide—the care behind old craft, the hands behind power, lingering long after the page turned.