The meeting took place in a large room on the east side of the grand staircase on the first floor of the palace. The rooms of the palace have not been named for the time being, and this large room is estimated to be called the "East Hall".

The "East Hall" is the largest room in the entire palace, and the function of the original design was to be used for the queen mother to receive ministers and VIPs, or to hold small ceremonies, which is regarded as the "main hall" of the palace; It is also very suitable to hold a dance party and enjoy a theatrical performance. Its spaciousness is almost comparable to the Ming Hall of the Forbidden City's Heart Cultivation Palace, and Gao Xuan is still excessive; The Queen Mother of the Two Palaces usually receives her subordinates in the Dongnuan Pavilion, and there is no way to compare it at all.

For the decoration of the "East Hall", Guan Zhuofan "referenced" Buckingham Palace in the United Kingdom. The "East Hall" is divided into two parts: the main hall and the side hall, the side hall is the place where the pilgrimage is waiting to be summoned, and the "Green Painting Hall" of Buckingham Palace is reproduced - but there are no paintings on the wall for the time being; The main hall is a copy of the "throne room" of Buckingham Palace - the main colors are white, gold and rose red, the towering dome is prosperous, the four corners and the center, each hanging a large crystal chandelier, five huge lights are magnificent, illuminating the whole hall more and more magnificent.

In front of the north wall of the main hall, there is a three-level Danqi in the center, covered with a rose red carpet, and a throne is set on it. However, this high-backed throne is Western-style, and the Queen Mother sits on it, feeling much more comfortable than those thrones in the Forbidden City.

In front of the throne, yellow veil hangs on it, and this pattern is the same as that of the Forbidden City.

On the left side of Danqi, Li Lianying is in charge; On the right side of Danqi, Yu'er is holding a fan and standing in pairs.

Uh, this just-

A class of generals of the Xuan Army. At the time of the audience. This eunuch and a palace maid. In their eyes, everyone takes it for granted - isn't it all sung like this in the play?

In fact, it's a one-of-a-kind arrangement.

If the courtiers are only ceremonial in nature, such as the Majesty's meeting or the Majesty's speech, there will be eunuchs waiting in the palace, but they will stay far away in the corner, and it is impossible to stand next to the throne. If it is "called" -- to discuss political affairs in a serious manner. In principle, eunuchs were not allowed to stay in the house; If the "call" is the "rising" of the Minister of Military Aircraft, the matter involves privy council, and the guards are becoming more and more strict, then the eunuch can only wait outside the house.

As for the palace maid, it is impossible to appear on this kind of occasion at any time.

In the early days of the two-house curtain, this system was implemented quite strictly; In the later period, Cixi was the sole ruler of the government, and this system was imperceptibly annihilated. When the monarch and the ministers played the right role, the eunuchs were close to the cronies - especially Li Lianying. When they appeared in front of the Gozen, there were more and more of them. This is also an important reason why Li Lianying can gain power.

This arrangement today. From Guan Zhuofan's Jianyì. His purpose, of course, is not to open the door for Xiao Lizi to gain power, but to give Yu'er a chance to "meet" her future husband with her own eyes. Li Lianying was actually brought in to be a balance and a foil - otherwise, it would be too strange that there was only one palace maid by the side of the Queen Mother.

Guan Zhuofan's idea, Cixi thought it was very interesting. Besides, this is not Beijing either, and once it happens, it is harmless, so I agreed.

Of course, the real purpose of this arrangement is not to sue Sù Yu'er, otherwise she would have to be ashamed, and she might not lose her temper at that time. However, even if she doesn't tell her, thinking that with her cleverness, she will not let go of this God-given opportunity to see the demeanor of the "candidate" husband.

The chief and deputy commanders of the Songjiang Army of the Xuan Army, Hua Er and Daniel Zhang, and the five division-level generals: Forrest, Bai Qiwen, Ixan, Jiang De, and Anderson, all met alone; The other four deputy division-level generals, Fang Jicheng of the 1st Division, Xu Dayou of the 2nd Division, Zheng Guokui of the 3rd Division, and Schroeder, chief of staff of the Corps, attended the meeting together.

The Songjiang Army also had four generals at or above the deputy division level, not in Tianjin.

Wu Jianying, a full division, is stationed in the Fengtai camp and guards the Beijing division. Three deputy divisions: Zhan Donglu of the Fourth Division, who went to the northwest with Zuo Zongtang and was attacking Dong Zhiyuan's bandits in Gansu; Liu Yulin, who was assigned to the Fourth Division from the Fifth Division, returned directly to the original defense area in Jiangsu when he returned from Japan; The chief quartermaster, Bellinger, went on a business trip to Jiangning, and went to settle accounts with Zeng Guofan--as explained above, the conquest of Japan, the domestic part, Liangjiang was responsible for handling the grain platform for the Xuan army.

The navy of the Xuan Army did not belong to the Songjiang Army, and Ding Ruchang and a group of British guest secretaries met and then made arrangements.

The Chinese soldiers who met them, including naturalized Forrest and Bai Qiwen, wore military uniforms and gave a military salute of kneeling on one knee and clenching their fists on their chests. The two guests, Anderson bowed three times; Schroeder, on the other hand, was willing to do a one-knee kneeling with his Chinese colleagues – which would have saved Guan Zhuofan's trouble, otherwise he would have to think of another arrangement. Otherwise, four people will go to Hajj side by side, three people will kneel on one knee and one person will bow, which is strange.

"Leading the class" is naturally Guan Zhuofan.

Wall, Forrestal, and Bai Qiwen are all able to speak Chinese fluently or not very fluently; Only Anderson still needs Guan Zhuofan to translate sentence by sentence. As for Schroeder, because the four deputy divisional generals came to see each other, the Queen Mother would not ask questions one by one, and after a few words of comfort, she could give thanks, so he just saluted with everyone, and did not need to say anything, and there was no need to bother with the translation.

Cixi attached great importance to this meeting of the generals of the Xuan army - this was not because she wanted to give Yu'er a "blind date". In fact, if it wasn't Guan Zhuofan who was "leading the class", she would be willing to spend time and "have in-depth exchanges" with the generals one by one. But since Guan Zhuofan is present, if he has ten points, he can only say three or four points. However, even so, Cixi still had a way to impress the pilgrims, especially a few foreign devils.

For example, when receiving Wall, Cixi greeted his Chinese wife, Yang Ying; When he met Forrestal, he mentioned that when he was in Qingpu, he unfortunately fell into the hands of thieves, but "he was severely tortured, but he was unyielding and never fell into the prestige of the court"; When meeting with Anderson, Wen Yan asked, how many children do you have? What are they all doing?

Hearing this, Guan Zhuofan's heart was moved: Arrange for the royal sister to meet the generals of the Xuan Army - is this move right or wrong?

However, Cixi paid the most attention to the two of Ixan and Jiang De, and the "attention" even exceeded Daniel Zhang.

Keep an eye out for Ixan for a simple reason: he is a banner man.

Among the banner people, it is rare that there is another "capable fighter", and there is quite a group of people in the clan and the Eight Banners, each with their own thoughts, who want to arch Ixan up - just like when he praised Guan Zhuofan. When rewarding the heroes of the expedition, some people secretly asked for "grace and exceedance" to Ixan. Cixi also had her own thoughts on this issue, but she was very sober: the promotion of Ixan must not go past Guan Zhuofan, and should be based on Guan Zhuofan's opinion - at least, at this stage.

And pay attention to Jiang De because although Guan Zhuofan did not say it directly, the arrangement of this audience has clearly indicated his attitude: he wants to match Yu'er to this Jiang De.

*(To be continued......)