The Sun.
London, England, 1860-12-14 00:00:00

back every farthing of the cost, if they please, and

that without pressing ruinously, or even very pain-
fully, on the Chinese Exchequer. It may be done
by the very same process by which loans have been
raised frequently in Europe, and by which the
Turkish Government is at this moment offer-
ing security for the repayment of a loan
as well as for the payment of the interest—the
security of the Customs Revenues.

The indemnity must of course be repaid in a
series of years ; it would not be of the least
consequence that the payment should be extended
over ten years or more, if necessary ; it might
then be a very light impost on the immense
foreign trade which must spring up if the country
were thoroughly opened to us, the anti-commercial
policy of the Mandarins completely nullified by
their humiliation, or their overthrow, and all the
large cities accessible to European and American
vessels at once thrown open to the trade of the
world. The late Return shows that the
trade of Shanghae alone amounts to about
£9,000,000 of exports, and X 15,000,000
of imports annually. Five per cent. on this
alone would give us about a million and a
quarter per annum ; but, of course, the average
customs might be higher than that, though per-
haps the lowest duties the Chinese would think
reasonable would be best, as we can hardly
doubt that the foreign trade with this industrious
and thoroughly commercial people would be im-
mense indeed, were it perfectly free. to strong
are their trading tendencies that, as we see at
this very moment, neither the general war with
the EMPEROR at Pekin nor the local war between the
rebels and the Mandarins in the neighbourhood of
Shanghae itself, could hinder an immense business
from being transacted. Some indeed urge this as
showing the folly of going to war at all, represent-
ing it as being merely a diplomatic war. But it

must be remembered that it was a war, not at all
more necessary, which gave us Shanghae itself and
all the additional ports in China, and delivered us
from ignominious restriction to a narrow strip of
ground in Canton; and that the result of this war
will as certainly be to carve a way for our commerce
to an extent which it has never known before.

As to the position and difficulties of our troops,
we have little anxiety on that score. Supplies of
the necessaries of life they will find in abundance
in a city of such immense size, where if money
would not, as it certainly will, command anything,
force would; but there will be no need for that.
JOHN CHINAMAN, though not his Tartar Master,
will bring out anything he has for the omnipotent
Dollar. Can we blame him ? Why should he
lose a good bargain to forward the objects of his
Tartar Masters ? As to the cold, we have now
authentic information. It is that the Winters of
Pekin are on the average ten degrees colder than
those of London, and the Summers nineteen degrees
hotter. Though the cold is occasionally very
severe, and the heat occasionally excessive, there
can be little difficulty in sending to Pekin,
either from India or from Europe, all the
military supplies which may be needed, and
if the Peiho be frozen we must remember that the
muddy soil will also be frozen; and transit overland
proportionally easy. Should the army, however,
winter at Tien-tsin, of course there will not be
much difficulty in communication with the
coast, and we shall have shown the Mandarins
that we are ready any day to re-enter
Pekin, and, if they have not come to
their senses, to send to Nankin for an Emperor
with an army of Tae-pings at his back, who will be
quite ready to make a treaty with us, and who
already regards trade with foreigners as the best
policy for the Empire he desires to govern. We
need not long want an Emperor and Government
with whom to treat.