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V.—Norices or Cuina, by Papre Serra.*—Communicated by J. F. Darts, 
Ese, M.R.A.S. 
Read July 17, 1830. 
No. 1. 
Nomination of the present Emperor T'4ou-xwane in 1821. 
In China the Imperial dignity is not the certain inheritance of the Prince 
next in succession, but of him whom the deceased Monarch may have left 
named in a note, which is deposited in a casket: the reigning Prince having 
the power of preferring not only the younger sons to the eldest (though this 
should be the son of the Empress and those the children of concubines), 
but also his grandsons. Women have but little influence on this nomina- 
tion in the present dynasty, but in some of the former they have exercised 
it so far as to promote a concubine to the dignity of Empress Mother, 
obliging the latter to abdication, or imprisonment. 
The present Empress Mother is not the parent of the reigning Prince, 
though she has two sons who, at the death of their father, were more than 
twenty years of age. These are superior in personal appearance to the 
Emperor, who is thin and toothless, and the youngest of them is tolerably 
well educated ; but the eldest is a drunkard. The second is also extremely 
immoral and fond of plays, for which purpose he entertains a number of 
young companions. ‘Though the Emperor, their father, united in his own 
person all the -vices of these his sons, he preferred his present Majesty 
for a successor, as being the most virtuous. Some, however, attribute this 
preference to the good conduct evinced by Taou-Kwane in the rebellion 
* Padre Serra was a Missionary of the College of San José de Macao, and Assistant in the 
Imperial Observatory, who resided in Peking from 1804 till 1827, during which period some 
matters of great secresy were imparted to him by a Wang (i.e. a Regulus, or little king), his 
intimate friend. 
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