THE TREATY OF 1842.
A one-sided bargain -- Not deemed by Chinese obligatory --
Condemned by powerful parties -- The Chinese conscience
against it -- Fulfilment therefore could not be voluntary
-- The Chinese and Manchus compared -- Repugnance to treaty
common to them both -- Much determination needed to obtain
fulfilment.
Out of such antecedents in peace and war it was a moral impossibility
that normal international relations between Chinese and foreigners
should follow the conclusion of peace.
The treaty signed at Nanking by Sir Henry Pottinger in 1842, simple
and explicit in its grammatical construction, and fulfilling as far as
words could do so all the conditions of a charter of fair trade, was
tainted with the vices of a one-sided bargain. Indeed the Chinese did
not regard it in the light of a bargain at all, but as a yoke
temporarily imposed on them which it was their business to shake off.
Sir John Davis has told us that "at Peking almost every Chinese of
rank and influence was opposed to the fulfilment of the stipulations
of the treaty. The negotiators of it shared in the odium of the
cowardly generals who had deceived their sovereign by false
representations of their powers of defence." The obligations of the
treaty, in fact, sat so lightly on their consciences, that only so far
as they were held rigorously to its provisions would they observe
them.
The open-mouthed denunciation of the treaty in high quarters was but
the textual confirmation of what was obvious in the nature of the
case, that the Chinese Government regarded the treaty of Nanking as a
_ruse de guerre_, a mere expedient for purchasing present relief, "a
temporary arrangement in order to recover from our losses."
The official animus and the political conscience were thus entirely on
the side of what we call bad faith, a state of things which has come
down unabated to our own time, though prudence on the one side and
pressure on the other have generally toned down the outward
manifestation of it.
Fulfilment of the treaty under these circumstances could only be hoped
for by the actual employment of the coercive agency which had secured
its signature, or by the conviction, firmly rooted in the minds of the
Chinese, that such agency was always ready to be invoked. But as
perpetual coercion on the part of Great Britain was not to be thought
of, the establishment and maintenance of satisfactory working
relations demanded on the part of the British agents responsible for
the execution of the treaty a rare combination of personal qualities.
They had, in fact, to assume a power which they did not possess, to
trade upon the prestige which their country had gained by the success
of its arms, trusting that their pretensions might be tacitly
acquiesced in. Had this attitude been consistently maintained, in
small as well as in great things, from the very outset, there is no
telling whether the observance of the treaty might not have become a
matter of Chinese routine, and in time acquired the sacred authority
of custom. But the contrary was the case, and it was not the
observance but the non-observance of the treaty that was allowed to
acquire the sanction of custom.
The conduct of the war offered conclusive evidence that though certain
individuals, from either better knowledge or higher principle than
their contemporaries, were inclined to meet their enemies fairly, yet
the conscience of the State, as authoritatively represented in the
emperor's edicts, rejected as absurd the notion of keeping any kind of
faith with the barbarians. Hence the barren result of all appeals to
the binding authority of the compact, unless when backed by force;
hence also the efficacy of every application of force in the dealings
of foreign nations with China whether before or after the treaty of
1842. This consideration is indeed of the essence of our Chinese
relations, though habitually ignored in the conduct of our
intercourse.
As regards the attitude of the Chinese Government towards foreigners
in connection with the war and the peace, an interesting and
suggestive distinction has been drawn by Sir John Davis between the
two elements in the Government, the Chinese and the Manchu,--a
distinction which has been independently made by other observers. It
is therefore a point well worthy of being kept in view both in the
conduct of official intercourse and in speculations as to the future
of the Chinese empire. Sir John Davis, who, first as a Company's agent
in China, then for a short time as British envoy before the war, and
eventually chief superintendent of trade for some years after that
event, had much experience in dealing with officials of the two races,
is emphatic on the point that moderation and humanity were always
found on the side of the Manchus, while implacable ferocity allied
with treachery distinguished the Chinese officials. The war, he says,
was solely the work of the latter, the peace, of the former. "New
Tajin was a thorough Chinese, and, like the rest of his tribe,
vociferous for war while it was absent, but unable to sustain its
presence; while the Tartars were generally advocates for peace, though
they did their duty in an emergency." The antithetic character of the
two races shown collectively and individually has been a matter of
general remark by foreigners acquainted with both. "Ilipu," says
Davis, "a Manchu by birth, possessed the un-Chinese quality of
straightforwardness and honesty of purpose.... As an early adviser of
the sovereign, he had endeavoured to dissuade him from risking a
foreign quarrel in making the English a party to the question of
restricting the consumption of opium among his own subjects."
The Manchu Kishen, who replaced Commissioner Lin on the failure of the
latter, was also a man of good faith. He did his best first to avoid
and then to terminate the war, and in the middle of it concluded a
convention with Captain Elliot by which Hongkong was ceded and six
millions of dollars were to be paid as ransom for Canton. Yet having
been admonished by the emperor "to arouse the patriotism of the nation
and send the heads of the rebellious barbarians to Peking in baskets,
for to treat them reasonably is out of the question," he had to excuse
himself by resort to a false pretence of treachery. The convention he
represented as a ruse, because "his reinforcements were yet far off";
but he declared that, "bearing the barbarians many a grudge," he only
abided his time "for exterminating them whenever it can be done." In
the impeachment of that capable statesman one of the charges was, "You
gave to the barbarians Hongkong as a dwelling-place, contrary to our
law of indivisibility," to which he was fain to answer, "I pretended
to do so, from the mere force of circumstances, to put them off for a
time, but had no such serious intention; ... a mere feint to avert the
further outrages of the barbarians."
He took up similar ground in apologising for the conduct of Admiral
Kwan, a brave and respectable officer, who had asked and obtained an
armistice in the Canton river: "He has agreed to a truce with the
barbarians merely to gain time and be in a state to resist them."
The courtesy of the Manchus was no less conspicuous. Lord Jocelyn, as
quoted by Mr Hunter, remarked, after a meeting with Kishen: "He rose
at our entrance and received the mission with great courtesy and
civility. Indeed the manners of these high mandarins would have done
honour to any courtier in the most polished Court of Europe." A French
envoy was similarly impressed in an interview with Kiying: "I have
visited many European Courts," he said, "and have met and known many
of the most distinguished men belonging to them, but for polished
manners, dignity, and ease I have never seen these Chinese surpassed."
While the noblest of the officials were thus driven to assume a
perfidy which was not really in their heart in order to accommodate
themselves to the prevailing temper, the baser minds were clamouring
open-mouthed for meeting honour with dishonour. For it is instructive
to recall that the most truculent officials--Commissioner Lin, for
example--based their slippery strategy on the known good faith of the
barbarians, "which made their engagements sacred," as the Roman
generals took advantage of the Sabbatical prejudices of the Jews. The
Chinese could afford to play fast and loose with their end of the
rope, knowing the other end to be secured to a pillar of good faith.
The commissioners who signed the treaty in their report to the throne
also testified that "the English had acted with uniform sincerity."
The confiding spirit of the English tempted the common run of Chinese
officials to practise systematic deception. Thus a disreputable
Tartar, who was governor of Canton, reported that he had "resolved to
get rid of them by a sum of money, as by far the cheapest way.... But
once having got rid of them, and blocked up all the passages leading
to Canton, we may again cut off their commerce, and place them in the
worst possible position," thus anticipating almost to the letter what
took place at the Taku forts in the second war between 1858-59. A
pamphlet, attributed to Commissioner Lin, whose wanton atrocities had
provoked the war, after testifying to the habitual good faith of the
barbarian, urged the Government "never to conclude a peace: an
armistice, a temporary arrangement for the present, in order to
recover from our losses, is all we desire."
The Manchu and Chinese races are the complement of each other in the
economy of the State. The Manchus, with their military heredity, were
best fitted for the imperial _rôle_, while the Chinese are by
tradition rather men of business than administrators. From which it
may be inferred that the material progress of the country will rest
more with the Chinese with all their faults than with the Manchus with
their governing instincts. The Peking Court, indeed, has been long
under the numerically preponderant influence of the Chinese, and
except in matters of dynastic interest they are Chinese rather than
Manchu ethics which govern the acts of State. The counsels of such men
as Lin and the Chinese party generally prevailed, as we have seen,
over those of the distinguished Manchus, some of them belonging to the
imperial family, who had to do with the foreign imbroglio, and it was
in full accord with Chinese sentiment that the Emperor Tao-kuang was
brought to declare that such a nation as the English should not be
allowed to exist on the earth.
Much of the hostility to the treaty may no doubt be fairly referable
to the military humiliation of a Government to whom war was rebellion
and rebellion parricide. Nor is the exasperation of the Chinese
against their conquerors to be measured by those chivalrous standards
which have been evolved from the traditions of nations accustomed,
even in war, to meet as equals. They were playing the game under a
different set of rules. But when every such allowance has been made,
the moral principle governing Chinese official conduct cannot be
designated by any word in Western vocabularies but perfidy.
Belligerency as understood by Western nations did not enter into their
conception, and their war tactics of kidnapping, poisoning the water,
torturing and massacring prisoners, and so forth, differed little from
their procedure in time of peace, being in either case based on the
implicit negation of human rights in connection with foreigners.
It may thus be seen what difficulties had to be encountered, even
under the treaty, in guiding the intercourse between Chinese and
foreigners into safe and peaceable channels; how much depended on the
tact and capacity of the newly appointed consuls, and how little
assistance they could hope for from the department which commissioned
them. For no matter how perspicacious the Home Government might from
time to time be, they were as much in the hands of their
representatives after as they had been before the war. The distance
was too great and the communication too slow for the most vigilant
ministry to do more than issue general instructions. "The man on the
spot" would act as his judgment or his feelings or his power prompted
as emergencies might arise, and we have seen how even the clear
intentions of Lord Palmerston were thwarted by the idiosyncrasies of
some of his agents in China.
[Illustration]