The Sun.
London, England, 1841-03-09 00:00:00

CHJNA.

MENIORIAT.
OP EE SIIEN, VICEROY OF PECHE-LEE (THE
SUCCESSOR
• OF LIN), RECOMMENDING THE EMPEROR TO
PUT A TEMPORARY STOP TO FOREIGN. INTERCOL7RSE WITH
CHINA.
I assert it as a fact, that what m country views with feel-
ings of the deepest indignation and pity, is seeing the land over-
• flown with foreign
aa.nd the people thereof duped and be-
fooled ; and, moreover, 1, rt that this evil springs from our
holding intercourse with foreigners,'esl no less than from native
traitors making light of the lak
Minister, Hwang Tseo-
It now appears that your Majesty'syohuais.sediutlyalomemerialized, praying
tszti, of the Hungloo 'temple,
decide this your Majesty t' take it upon
mat-
ter, but your Majesty has preferred to make to
oue inviries, and
as ordered
to examine into the circumstances of the case,
the acting Viceroys and Fooyunes of every province and.
osrio.resaid
body their ideas on the subject in duly prepared ital. "3-
Your Majesty is now fully aware that what thein
2lhaister recommended cannot be put in force, and you are
ow looking around you for some more sage, more feasible
plan. The .t.a,,,,,e plan required is nothing more than to
branches rnay act on
the principle of straightening the stem (that the
also be straight) and purifying the fountain (that the stream
may also run clear !) And if it be asked me how may this be
done ? I reply, by wise measures defeatingave the scheme
tos of thd
e
foreigners, and having done this, you h merely ben
down their back, and pin them by the col!ar ;
the co support the
people of your country with kindness, andcommon
people, barn, kindly treated, will not merely have smiling
faces, but ago grateful hearts. Draw the laws tightly around
the traitors, and those traitors being thus hemmed in by the
31et of the law, will lose heart, and their spirit Will desert them !
I beg the liberty of explaining myself. Let us in the first
place take up the subject of our sycee silver leaking out of the
country by means of these foreigners, and discuss it. This
commodity then, is the most valuable production of our inner
land. At bring At present the opium that these foreigners is not
battered
for other commodities, but exchanged alone for sycee
silva-r. Taking the amount (of opium sold) during the last 30
or 40 years, and adding it up, it comes to several thousand
triad myriads* (100,000 000' 000) These hundreds of
thousands of millions of taels, if distributed among the people
of our central land, would be no small amount, and here xe
see it leaking out to the distant foreigners, among whom seven
.er eight-tenths
of it remain. I have
examined and found that
the several hills we used
to
dhave abounding is silver ore,
1279
from the time of the Sung
ir33asty (A.n. 969-1279) the
Yuen dynasty (A.D. thel Ming dynasty (A.D.
1368-1644) and until now hare)' bet sna
m utterlyoua tmountain
exhausted.helang.
Only at Ke-nan, near Kinchow, there
ing to the Burmese where there is a
boundaries
of rite mining establish-
ment, and beyond the
ith belongs to ,Acaoncte there is the-
sung-Sling Mountain, - wli inehina, where
belong ore in these
there is another mining estabh:hhemyednot,
sof tom Chinai
mines is very abundant, but as motile
the natives are unacquainted with the proee,_
theettlingi
They only send a merchant (perhaps like one of
merchants here) to receive the duties and allow people from"'China to work them for their own account. Both places
ploy annually about forty t.r fifty thr.usand labourers, andethe
money they, annually extract does not exceed two millions of
tarts, which they remit to our inner land. It is, indeed, a
most difficult article to be obtained. Now then, we see that
the outside foreigners have, in the course of several tens of
''earn, 124.‘taken away from us more than we could make up again
they thousand years; and in return for the# most deadly drug
b have been obtaining our most valuable production ! It is
. Y' reason of this that in its salt taxes and transit duties Peking
is short 160,000
:440
Is; Keang-nan, Che• keang, and other
Place•, 140 or 150
*notes, and the Chee-fw
ttaels ; in Tartar there are only bills or
snaking their remittances and Chee-heenMagistrates are late in
There is not a department in
• There is some prodigious mistake
the f i
.ore gccrs to have abstracted every year for the las' c otv
years 10,000,000 tuels of here, Even allowing
of the kind) it couldonlysaraYeoeu(nant tod they have done nothing I
40%000,000 taels.

P

.. , . .
which the evil is not felt. This is, indeed, the extreme of
knavery and cunning craftiness !
Again, in reference to the foreign money-that these said fo-
reigners bring, it is all boiled with, and reduced by quicksilver.
If you wrap it up and put it past for several years without
touching it, it will become moths and corroding insects, t and
their silver cups will change into feathers (or wings). Their
•money is all of this species, and if we leave it • for four or five
hundred years, I am sure I don't know what it will change
into at last I If you take foreign dollars and weigh them, their
wcilht is 7 mace 3 candareens, but on putting them into the
crucible, they only yield 6 mace 3 candareens of pure silver,
thus on making a calculation, we find that they lose 1 mace and
5 cash ; what sort of trash can they be made of ? Yet we find
that in Keang-nan, and where the river Hwae runs (i. e. Ho-
nan and Che-keang), and all to the south, these dollars are used
in trade and circulate most abundantly ; we even find- them at
a premium when compared with sycee silver, and this is really
what I cannot understand. .

Moreover, it is a fact that we Chinese possees a rod of autho-
rity with which to chastise the foreigners at all times ; and
yet so far from using this rod of authority to constrain them,
to be bit and duped by them, this is, indeed, a circumstance
to be much lamented. The rod of authority that I allude to is

to be found in the articles tea and rhubarb.
Of all the countries that lie to the N.W., Russia is the
Largest by far, and the people of that country, as well as those
of all other foreign countries, cannot possibly do without these
two articles. lie is,
e reason of this that their climate is
rough and rigorous, the sun and wind both fierce and strong ;
day by day they subsist on beef and mutton; the digestion of
this food is not easy; their bowels are bound up, andthey
speedily die. Therefore it is, that every day after meals they
take of this divine medicine (i. e., tea and rhubarb), in order
to get a motion in their bowels.
The Great Western Ocean (or Portugal) is distant from
our country 100,000 Chinese miles (i. e., 30,000 English.
miles), and these articles are no less necessary to them. Eng-
land is a little nearer, and they stand equally in need of them.
Now, however, the traitorous merchants of the inner land
covet their woollens and camlets, watches, and curiosities, in
order to make a little profit by them, and thus they carry on
trade with them, hoping to realise their expectations. But,
little do our merchants know that these foreigners have pon-
dered deeply to provide measures against distant misfortune.
They have (in their country) heaped up a supply (of tea and
rhubarb) for ten or twenty years, so that when prevented from
carrying on trade with us they may experience no calamity,
and may not have occasion to sit with their hands bound,
waiting patiently for their death. Indeed, it may be said,
that ;heir plans are complete in the extreme. Now, although
I admit both the wealth and the power of these foreigners to
be very great, yet in these two important articles alone they
are quite at fault. They have wished to buy them in order to
plant and grow them themselves, and yet they cannot realise
their hopes, the ground and the plant being quite unsuitable.
Thus then a kind Providence seems to have put the rod
into our hands by which we may curb and restrain these
distanj foreigners.
My humble view then of the matter is this, that in order
to stop the deluge of opium poison that is now overflowing the
country, large proclamations should be posted up at the ports
and custom-houses, rigidly prohibiting for the meantime inter-
course with the foreigners. Let us stop until the opium evil
be entirely cut off, which will be several years alter this, and
the stock that they have on hand will gradually become ex-
hausted when they will again come before us with the most
abject language, begging and praying; we may then wait pa-
tiently until they have begged us a second and a third time,
when we may open to them a side of the net, and, as a proof of
extraordinary goodness, permit them to trade with us again.-
Still these two aforesaid articles, ere they leave the port, must
be paid for in sycee silver, they must neither be bought with
(their false) foreign money, nor bartered for commodities; if
arty man oppose this law, let him suffer one grade less than
death by strangling. Thus, in the course of a few tens of
years, the sycee silver that previously went out of our country
in payment fur opium, will gradually return to us without any
difficulty; and, in like manner, will the spurious foreign
money go back gradually to the places whence it came !
This is the real way to ward off the ills of the foreigners
by wisdom ! this is the sage law that is to them in the native
traitors I

As to stopping the flow of opium poison, by means of killing
every person who smokes it, on the principle that there being
now no longer any person to use the drug, no more of the drug
will come ; thus cutting off the stream, in order to stop up the
source. 1 his I lan, I say, would be imitating the former ex-
ample of Kaou-lew-pa (Europe? or Kalapa ? i. tr. Batavia?)
and taking a lesson from the previous wisdom of the Cochin
Chinese, without being aware that the circumstances of the
case are widely different ! Because, at the time that Bombay
had intercourse with Cochin China, the attempt of the people
of the former place to induce those of the latter to smoke did
not succeed ; the Cochin Chinese having rendered their scheme
abortive at the very outset, so at the first prohibition, the evil
instantly stopped. It has, however, been current among us
now, for several tens of years, and throughout the whole of the
eighteen provinces. How, then, is it possible, were a similar
command now given, that it would have the same effect? Per-
haps in the two provinces of Keang-nan and Che-keang, where
the people tremble at the laws, and cherish a whole-
some dread of punishment—perhaps there, there might
be a Chow district or a Heen district that would not
dare to disobey,. but you could not take these as a rule for the
rest. There are for instance the provinces of Hoo-kwang,
llonan and Sze-chuen ; in many of the Chow and Heen dis-
tricts live the Illeaou tsze barbarians, indiscriminately mixed
with our own people; our settlements and their fastnesses are
studded in and out, out and in, like a dog's upper and under
teeth fast locked, and these Aleaou tsze have never submitted
to our laws! Again, in Kwang se are the five districts of Kwei
lin foo, Lew chow foo, Ping nan foo, Woo chow foo, and 'rain
chow too, where the Chwang barbarians (or Chwang koo laou
urh) are much more numerous than our own people in the
proportion of seven of he twiner to three of the latter ; and at
Sew jin, Shih pae, and Teen ho they are still mr,re fierce and
fiery. If these barbarians smoke opiums they will not c nsent
to stoop their heads and be tamely bound, but must assemble
in great numbers and give downright battle ; and this is a
circumstance that we cannot but feel anxious about !

- •
Moreover, as regards the people of Fukien, Canton, and all
along the coast, these people are accustomed to the use of
arms ; they have many ways of getting out and coming in, and,
rnor, over, those among them who smoke opium aro very nume-
rous. If these fly off and escape to the little i.slands of the sea,
the foreigners may supply them with food and clothes, and by
means of that be continually finding out what is going on
among us; and, in some ban en and secluded parts, where our
mandarins, soldiet s, and police cannot go by reason of the by •
paths, they (the foreigners) may with to take part with these
runaways, and if these assembled brigands once rise, our forts
on the land roads would be found mere idle contrivances !
'lhis causes one still more anxiety than the rebelling of the
Chwang barbarians !

As regards the smokers of opium, these consist of noble and
base, rich and poor, worthy men and depraved wretches, good
and bad; for those among them who are idle and sloth-
ful, stupid and impotent, who work evil and do harm, I
have not a word to say. But those who are the leal-hearted
descendants of loyal ancestors! who have worn with honour
the civilian's cap and the soldier's armour ! who ate im-
bued with literature and refinement! perhaps rich people
who adorn politeness, who give up all for the service of the r
country, and who take delight in doing good! men whose cha-
racter is upright, whose conduct is irreproachable ! who may
be Sew tsae, Keen sang, or Ken jin, and possess the most
astonishing talent ! or secretaries and clerks in public offices,
who love justice and act purely ! or, perhaps, the most beau-
tiful, the most refined, the most accomplished of our women,
or, perhaps, virtuous widows, chaste as the icicle itself, down
to the husbandman, mechanic, and merchant, who keep their
place, and conduct themselves well—if such persons, I say,
are for the mere whiffing of a pipe of opium to fall into the
net of the law, then the clanking of bonds and fetters will
be heard in every highway ; the prisons will be so crammed
as not to leave an inch of space ; moreover, those who require
to take a large quantity of opium to renovate, will not be
able to await the reply from the Board of Punishments
(confirming or annulling their sentence), but will die off
by thousands anti tens of thousands at a time. Now
in the instance of a rebellion, when we levy soldiers to exter-
minate the rebels, when we have "clipped their wings," and
massacred their wives and children, it only amounts to a few
hundreds or a few thousands of people after all, and there the
affair ends. But, on the other hand, as regards opium smo-
kers, if you wish to annihilate them, let us look at the pro-
vinces of Fokien and Canton alone, where, out of every ten
men, some seven or eigkt smoke opium, and I fear that, evt n
should you butcher some eighty or a hundred thousand people.
yet would you be as far from effecting your object as ever
Again, if afterwards you are obliged by circumstances to loosen
the severity of the law, then those who have already suffered
the awful penalty have suffered unjustly ; if you change it to a
new statute, then those whom you have put to death have been
murdered ! But the foundations (of the Government) of
my native country are laid on benevolence and kind-
ness ! We are exceedingly careful in awarding punishment !
so much so that even so small a thing as a single life cannot be
taken away without a minute investigation into the circum-
stances previously, and afterwards the warrant for execution
receiving the imperial rubric ; therefore it is that our laws and
punishments have now attained a state of perfection that they
never had before ! In consequence of this for these last two
hundred N ears, has this country been steeped with the dew of
vast prosperity (from your Majesty's family occupying the
throne), and the line of succession of your 11.1ajesty's descen-
dants promies to be long; now, however, by a single word,
hurriedly and unadvisedly to convert the whole of your empire
into one vast prison '1 his is, I say, what never may be dune!

Moreover, the people of the land are your Majesty's chil-
dren. Having received the opium poison from the foreigners,
and having been foolishly seduced to somke it, their property.
is .ktterly exhausted, and their very lives are in great danger,
i.ll"..llnxltta._ g
deett tboydetts, by terly repent of their folly ? But
sistle.tass;..4iist, as t. Against:le haelythsoen of
eashea,
alas! big
.. _ y-,stin with` the infection, they have nomeans
should feel ifeel cro)urrn-
er
urortunate people,
.i.Upasseion altYheir (stilly, should 'pity ti:etlisetiPe-gg°l-91;rei; inYth"e'wkiaaute:
esstiyt svhemerold:
withtherefore, bails -
andt take e this
sores,
eYoavurered,Maaj
couch, and point thaw out the path that leadsf. them up.in the
age ; how can your Majesty ever assume the to a hass--
res old
titude of an executioner, fiourishinw about unbecoming old
titude
to butcher your own children, while you axe, and threat-
mit the poison-spreading plans of foreigners)ofuroetdy per-
To sum up the whole in one word ; the livesln afar?
must not be looked upon as grass and reeds; heof the people
your people must not be alienated from you • affections cf
va-
luable commodity of the central land must
not
most
mitted to leak out ; the outside foreigners must ontotbe
per-
mittedper-
to trade with us on such easy terms, and the whole
tof our sea-coast must not be so slothfully guarded. Alongv the
whole range of our sea-coast, say, Leaoutung, Pichelee,e
Shantung, Keangnan, Chekeang, Fokien, Kwangtung, an
Kwangsee, we must first place strong garrisons, and have nu-
merous patroles constantly on the alert. At the mouth of
every ferry, pass, or creek belonging to the central land
we must take like precautions, to make of these as
it were our horns of strength, so that the foreigners
may not come peeping and spying about, and then we shall
that we do
have large and clear proclamations announcing
not permit them to hold intercourse with us. Thus, then,
Hill opium in the course of time leave off coming; thus will
the Hong merchants no longer require to give
. their
insecurity—
thus will the opium brokers no longer lurk
their mysterious
dens—and thus will no more " last crabs" or " scrambling
dragons" be required for the transport of the drug, which give
us so much troulls in the catching. As for the opium that has
already entered the inner land, there is no occasion to take the
trouble of seizing and destroying it. As for those who smoke,
let them continue to smoke, or let them leave it off, just as
they please. After a year, or even after half a 3 ear, when they
know that no more will come, then those who sell it will seek
out some other means of livelihood, and those who smoke it
will take measures to secure their shattered constitutions.
Thus, then, by going to work leisurely, and without any violent

t When one reflects that this nonsense is written by one of
the most learned and talented mandarins of China, one might
suppose that he was hoaxing the good-natured Emperor, were
it not that jokes of that kind would be attended with fatal con-
seqcsuces in China. Is it not possible that the memorialist
may. have in his possession some mutilated translation of the
Scriptures?
and, seeing such passages as Matt. vi. 19—" Lay
not up for
Tonrselres treasures on earth, where moth and rust
do corrupt, sic.; prov. xxiii.
o " Riches make themselves
wings and fly away," Fee., may have taken them in their literal
acceptation?
t. 'I he Chzilk Koo 11431 orb ars said to be fond of opium to
excess.