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His Imperial Majesty, Tsai-Shun, deputed by Heaven to reign over all within the four seas, expired on the evening of Tuesday the 13th January 1875, aged eighteen years and nine months. He was erroneously known to foreigners as the Emperor T'ung Chih; but T'ung Chih was merely the style of his reign, adopted in order that the people should not profane by vulgar utterance a name they are not even permitted to write.[*] Until the new monarch, the late Emperor's cousin, had been duly installed, no word of what had taken place was breathed beyond the walls of the palace; for dangerous thoughts might have arisen had it been known that the State was drifting rudderless, a prey to the wild waves of sedition and lawless outbreak. The accession of a child to reign under the style of Kuang Hsu was proclaimed before it was publicly made known that his predecessor had passed away.
[*] Either one or all of the characters composing an emperor's name are altered by the addition or omission of certain component parts; as if, for instance, we were to write an Alb_a_rt chain merely because Alb_e_rt is the name of the heir-apparent. Similarly, a child will never utter or write its father's name; and the names of Confucius and Mencius are forbidden to all alike.