The Sun.
London, England, 1840-04-25 00:00:00

Mr. EVANS begged to say a few words before the reso-
lution was put. With reference to the statement of the
gentleman who had last spoken, that the British Govern-
ment were entirely innocent of introducing opium to
China. He should, however, read to the meeting one or
two extracts from a document lately published, which
would show that the British Government, so far
from being entirely innocent of the crime of
encouraging the smuggling of opium into China, had car-
ried on the trade under its patronage, and that application
had, in consequence, been made to Parliament to put a
stop to the trade ; the result of which was, that Parlia-
ment had voted that the trade should be discontinued. The
pamphlet to which he alluded,had been written by a gen-
tleman who was well known in that metropolis—he meant
Mr. Pryme—and it contained papers and documents of
great authority upon the question they were met that day
to discuss. He would read for them an extract from a
letter received in the month of March last, not written by
an Englishman, but by a native Hindoo. Mr. Evans here
read an extract, the purport of which was, that the Red
Rover and the Sir Edward Ryan, two vessels, had lately
arrived in Calcutta from China, and had both sailed two
or three days previously to the date of the letter, the
former with 1,000, and the latter with 700 chests of opium
on board, armed to the teeth, and well manned. That
they had sailed out of a British port, under the
sanction of the British Government, their avowed
object being to land and sell their opium upon
the coast of China at all hazards.--LA gentleman on
the platform ceded out—" What authority have you for
that statement ?"I—He had the authority of the gentleman
whese name he had before stated to the meeting, Mr.
Pryme. He would tell them further, that under the sanc-
tion of the British Government, the British Indian Go-
vernment possessed a monopoly of the opium trade with
China.--( Cries of " Ycs," " No," cheers and uproar.)
During the last year 20,000 chests of opium, with the
knowledge and sanction of the British Government, had
been shipped to the ports of China. Would the advocates
of that trade assert that it was quite lawful and proper in
the British Government to sanction the export of opium,
which had been denounced by the Chinese authorities?—
( Hear, hear, hear.) They had no right to sanction or
encourage that illicit traffic, and persevere in
such a course of smuggling in the teeth
of the denunciations of the Chinese themselves.
This being the state of the case, he would read a very short
extract. (The Noble Chairman objected to this, and in-
timated the speaker should give the purport of it.) When
he heard gentlemen make objections, and argue as the
gentleman who had moved the resolution before the meet-
ing had done, he could not resist the desire to contradict
th, rn. He would refer to the report of a Committee to
Parliament, in 1832, in which the Committee represented
that the Opium Trade was so valuable, that it was not
expedient to give it up, to which report Parliament as-
sented. After this it was absurd for the English Govern-
ment to assert they were innocent of encouraging the Opium
Trade in China. We were placed then in this difficulty,
and here he did not make the charge exclusively against
the present Government, but against past Governments
also, all of whom were guilty of the encouragement of this
trade,—( Cheers.) But for the encouragement given to
the trade by British Governments, it never would have
been, as it was, the most important branch of our trade
with China. But we ought to consider what was to be
done under the circumstances in which we were placed.
Gentlemen had talked lightly of the war with China, and
called it merely reprisals. Why the last letter received
from Calcutta stated that an armament of 10,000 men
was equipped for this service. (A voice, " 16,000.)
Could any one suppose that 10,000 or 16,000 men could
be sent to China to make reprisals without occasioning
blood-shed ? Were then was the use of the distinction
drawn between reprisals and war? For his part, he thought
it a distinction without a difference, and he thought they
ought not to cover, under the name of reprisals, a war
which, if called war, no honest man would ever attempt to
justify.
The Rev, J. BURNETT (who was received with loud
cheers) said, he would be the last man to attempt to pre-
vent any person from speaking, he had been sitting there
with great patience calling " order," and every thing he
could call, to induce the meeting to listen to the gentle-
men who had endeavoured to address the meeting. His
impression was, that a meeting by listening, was much
more likely to come to a speedy decision on the question at
issue, than otherwise. He had frequently known meetings
under the influence of some little degree of very natural
impatience at the statements, or rather the incompetency
of rraking any, of the speakers—(Laughter)—interrupt
him, and thus keep him up by complaining and speaking
of the interruption, while, if he had been left to himself,
he would have broke down. They were kept up by inter-
ruption, and all they had to say was about it ; and if they
were allowed to speak of anything else, they could not
speak at all. He did not make this observation of all the
speakers who had addressed the meeting, for he thought
the gentleman who had moved the amendment before the
meeting had spoken fairly. Bethought he had taken the
ground that he might have been expected to take.
—(
Hear.) He thought he had spoken candidly, honestly,
and in that way he liked an opponent to speak. With re-
gard to what he said of the gentleman opposite renouecing
his country, he thought he had mistaken his:friend's mean-
ing. He had only renounced his country's crimes ; and if
his country would not renounce them, he said he would be
ready to renounce it too. And he was right. Who would
, not rather be an honest Chinese than a dishonest Briton ?
—(Cheers.) But the gentleman who had made this
mistake, after he had closed his speech, moved an
amendment that the word " British" should be
turned into " Chinese"—he who had such an
abhorrence of converting a Britain into a Chinese, pro-
prosed the word " British " should be translated " Chi-
nese."—( Laughter.) Very odd things occurred. some-
times on the platform, especially when individuals at-
tempted to defend the cause of injustice. He did not
wonder at it. He did not wonder that the loftiest mind
quailed when it came forward as the apologist of the opium
trade. He would say, in reply to the mover of the
amendment, that he had not taken along with him the
whole of the case. He had said that this was not an opium
war, but only the occasion ?—(Mr, Robertson, " Not
an opium war.") The Hon. Gentleman repeated his words
in order that there should be no doubt upon
the subject. Now, if he were to repeat every
word that he uttered in the same way, it would
take up just double the time—( Cheers and laughter)—
which might not, perhaps, be agreeable to the meeting.—
( Laughter.) He would grant that every man had a right
to speak ; but every man had not a right to be heard. If
that were the case there would be no end to speaking.
They might compel time meeting to remain to-day and to-
morrow, until they became in as bad a plight as Captain
Elliot and his companions, if every person had a right to
compel a meeting to submit to the infliction of long
speeches.—(Laughter.) Let them, then, now look to
the opium question, and see whether it was not a cause of
reprisals, as he supposed he must call it, and perhaps they
were now talking of reprisals, while the houses at Canton
were falling beneath our cannon and shells..—(A voice in
the meeting, " Serve them right.") Serve them right I
Here was a man who approved of the war, and afraid that
he should not have time to give expression to that approba-
tion when he (Mr. B.) had done. That person had inter-
rupted him to express that approbation in a parenthesis.—
( Cheers and laughter.) He should be sorry to say any
persons were rightly served if shells and cannon balls were
showered about their houses, and thousands of immortal
beings hurried into eternity.—( Hear.) He should be
sorry to say that any persons thus served were served
right. If he were an inhabitant of Pandemonium, he
might delight in such a scene ; but as he did not belong to
that degraded portion of the intellectual race, fora portion
of the intellectual race they were, he could not say servo
them right.—( Cheers.) What had the greatest hero that
this or any other age had ever produced—what had the
Duke of Wellington—(Loud cheers)—said on this sub-
ject. He had seen many shells burst, and many houses
fall—he knew full well the terrible vengeance which the
British military power could inflict, and lie had said we
must not force our trade on the Chinese.--( Cheers.) But
it had been said, we must not look upon the opium Tees-
tion as a cause, but simply as an occasion. lie would ask
what had been done by the Chinese themselves recently.
A Governor, and a Lieutenant- Governor, had always
been resident at Canton, and it had been found that all
that they had done to put down this traffic had been insuf-
ficient, and Commissioner Lin, a High Commissioner, a
superior authority, had been sent down by the Chinese
Government to Canton specially to put down the opium
e ado. In consequence of this opium traffic, Commissioner
Lin had been induced to take the steps which he had taken.
lie did not blame Captain Elliott for doing what he had
done—shutting himself up with the British merchants—
knowing that the Chinese authorities must answer for their
success with their heath. When he saw the Captain gal-
lantly going into the factory to be imprisoned with his
fellow-countrymen he might not blame him ; but what
was the consequence? Why they were told that the con-
dition of their liberation was the giving up their illicit
goods, which were then in the Chinese waters. That pro-
mise had been kept by Commissioner Lin, and when the
op'urn had been given up he had not kept Captain Elliot
or his companions. He would allow that the Chinese had
insulted us ; he would allow that it was not consistent with
the principles of straightforward justice to compel persons
to answer for their success with their heads. But we knew
the laws of China before we went there, and he contended
that from opium, and opium alone, had all this arisen.
They might call this if they pleased reprisals, but what he
would ask was the nature of reprisals ? His friend had
, made a distinction between that and war. That distinc-
tion in his opinion was, the difference between the volume
and the preface.—( Cheers.) They were both bound up
together in the same book.—( Cheers.) It sometimes
did happen that reprisals were not followed by war, but
by negotiation and peace; but let him remember that
before orders were issued for reprisals, there ought to
exist a full justification of war.—( Cheers.) They ought
therefore to take no advantage of the fact that they were
only in a state of reprisals with China. Now, what was
the practice of reprisals? Why we should go to China
with our boats up the Bocce Tigris, and enter into the
Chinese waters with every article of warfare on
board.—( Hear, and cheers.) We should go there.
telling them that we were ready to fire ; but then
it might be said that was not firing—that might be all very
well, but then he was one who would never do that until he
had a righteous cause. If they could blow down the walls of
Canton righteously let them say so, but do not let them say
that they were going to do so when they had no righteous
cause in view. For his own part, he believed that reprisals
against a semi-barbarous people were worse than war itself,
—( Cheers.) He was not prepared to write, in horrid car-
nage, the word " reprisals" upon the people of China. In
the time of Charles the First the country made an attempt
at China, and prowled about her coasts to see what she
could get, and was it, therefore, to be wondered at, though
years had gone by, that China should think we were fol-
lowing the same course again. Well, then, under these cir-
cumstances the question came to be, what was to be done?
It was true the East India Company did force the
opium into China, but they paved the way for its embarka-
tion in India, and that at a time whea they knew it had
been declared illegal in China. Captain Elliot might say
to the High Commissioner Lin, that he had nut caused
opium to be sent to China, that it was not done by the
East India Company, but by private parties. What would
Commissioner Lin say to that? Private individuals, in-