The Sun.
London, England, 1859-10-06 00:00:00

OBSERVATIONS.

(1.) The Prince llwui is Mien Yu, only surviving bro-
ther of the late Emperor; Kung is Yih Su, brother of the
present Emperor; Khing is a Prince of the 2d Order of
Imperial Nobility, whose name I cannot ascertain.

(2.) Kwailiang, Hwashana, Mingsheu, and Twau Ching.
shih.

(3.) _Lit., such a peace fashion, or such peach measures.
(4.) Made up, concocted; a certain amount of fraud is
implied.
(5.) When application is made.
(6.) Immediate payment, viz., of the indemnity. -
(7.) Lit., a thousand consents, and a hundred compliances.
(8.) More literally employ this (language) for the pur-
pose of tethering—a favourite word of Keying and others
in relation to the government of foreigners.
(9.) The barbarian is the robber, Hwang, Governor-
amoral of the Two Kwang, the master of the house, whom

he has injured ; will Government forget itself so far as to
make terms with the barbarian by persecuting Hwang ?
(10.) The despatches to the Emperor are returned to the
high officers authorised to address them, with some slight
•bservation written in red ink by the Emperor, If his an-
swer is of great length, or requires deliberation, he writes
merely, " Our Alacet will be given separately." In tho lat-
tar caso he sends down what we call an Imperial Decree to
the Great Council for transmission to the officer or officers
concerned.

(11.) Lit., where there is a determined bias and self-
opinion there is indeed no such word as happiness (or for-
tune).

(12.) A place near the Yellow River, at which the Go-
vernor-General Ho was to have met the commissioners as
they came down. The rumour here alluded to is probably
a revival of the above, which was in circulation in August
and September.

(13.) The form in which the inferior addresses the supe
rior official.

(14.) Rather, spy out.
(15.) Baron Gros did not sign the tariff, &c.. until some
days after Lord Elgin's departure for Hankow. It was
stated that some missionary question was under discus-
sion between his Excellency and tho Commissioners.
(16.) Returns from Hank-ow.
16A.) The Commissioners sat more than once to the
Honourable N. Jocelyn, who photographed them at the
British olnsulate.

(17.) Ilowque, and some other ex-hongists had been
expected at Soo-chow, to advise the Commissioners regard-
ing the amendment of the tariff.
(18.) This report probably grew out of the collision of
the Ngan-king rebels with the squadron escorting Lord
Elgin, of whose approach, to judge from appearances, the
Imperialist force endeavoured to make some use.
(19). There are more than one doctor of the Han Lin
of this surname at Canton. (Signed) T. WADE.

Inclosure 2 in No. 10.
Memorandum by Mr. Wade, intended to accompany the
translation of a letter forwarded by Mr, Parkes, from
Canton, to the Earl of Elgin, on the 15th January, 1859,
pri.cis of which was inclosed to the Foreign-office.
The letter-forwarded by Mr. Parkes, of the genuineness
of which I see no reason to entertain any doubt, read by
the light of the correspondence of the Imperial commis-
sioners and earlier proceedings of the Chinese Government,

ever since negotiations fairly commenced at Tien-tsin, fur-
nishes, to my mind, a clue deserving of attention to the
course the Government has in this last instance pursued.
According to the writer, evidently an official who has
access to good information, the Emperor determined, the
moment our backs were turned, to cancel the whole treaty
extorted from him in June, 1858, and for this purpose sent
Kweiliang and his colleagues south. This accords with a
rumour purront at Shasighae in August ; Kweiliang was
said to be in deep disgrace for his negotiations, the first
public notice of which by the Chinese Government was in
a decree of the 25eh July, to the effect that the barbarians
who "burst into the river" with their ships had retired in
obedience to the affectionate commands of Kweiliang.
The use of the term "barbarian," as Lord Elgin com-
plained in a letter to the commissionez s of the 7th. Septem-
ber, was itself an infraction of Article LI of the Treaty,
committed within one month of its signature.

The mission of Kweiliang and his colleagues, ostensibly

to revise the tariff, was remqrkable as being so much more
than what the treaty required. It had been stipulated
merely that a high officer of the Board of Revenue should
repair to Shanghae. Two ex-commissioners of the Canton
Customs were indeed added to the commission, but one of
of these was replaced by Twau Chingshih, one of the under-
secretaries most actively employed during the treaty nego-
tiations. His leave-taking manorial, also published in the
" Gazette," assured the Emperor, in stock phrase, that he
would be zealous in " soothing the barbarians."
Rumour, as I have said, made the object of this mission
anything but a revision. Nothing, however, very positive
was stated, nor did the reports on the subject command
general attention.

Meanwhile, as Kweiliang and his colleagues had pro-
mised at Tien-tsin, on the 4th July, to obtain from the Em-
peror, as soon as they returned to Pekin, a decree appoint-
ing a Commissioner to revise the tariff, which decree
would reach Shanghae as soon as Lord Elgin, his Lordship,
after ten days' delay at Shanghae, had written on the 21st
July to complain that he was still without a line from P,kin
on the subject.
On the 27th he received a letter from Ho Kwei-tsin, an:
nouncing the appointment of the Commission, composed,
with the addition of himself, of the members enumerated
above, who, he said, would arrive about the 18th of Aug.
Lord Elgin visited Japan ; and having made his Treaty
there, hurried back to Shanghao, to learn, by a letter from
the Commissioners themselves, that they could not be at
Shanghae before the 6th of October.

It is, I repeat, quite clear that Kweiliang and Hwashana,
the highest officers of the Civil estabrshment, were not
coming to revise a tariff. Indeed, another object of their
mission was eventually stated in their own letter of the
22d of October, to which we shall come in duo time.
Ho Kwei-tsing'a assurance that they would be down by the
18th of August, was given, I imagine, to prevent the possi-
bility of Lcrd Elgin's returning to the Peiho.
The decree he forwarded was dated the 15th July. The
prescribed time for an official journey of the distance is 55
days. This would have brought the commissioners to
Shanghae by the 10th of September. I presume Ho chose
a middle term for safety's sake.
I attribute the Commissioners' delay of their departure
from Pekin, or their loitering by the way, to the one cause
-the fears of the Government that, when the commission-
ers had declared their errand, we might revisit the Peiho.
\Ve knew from the Gazettes that the forts were being re-
built—this of course was in itself no matter of surprise; that
timber was purchased to stake the river, at which we could
not either be astonished , but lastly, and this is noteworthy,
that these operations were conducted under the special au-
thority of Sung-ko lin-sin, x Mongolian prince allied by
marriage to the Imperial family, distinguished as the con-
queror of the rebels on the occasion of the Tai-ping incur-
sion into Chih-li in 1853-54, and appointed during our stay
at Tien-tsin High Commissioner of War and Commander.
in- chief of a force stationed at Tungchow to cover the ca-
pital should we advance upon it. It is also important that
his labours had proceeded with such rapidity, that, by
the 21st November, he was enabled to report the com-
pletion of the works on the Tien-tsin river ; for which ser-
vice, by a decree of the above date, he was rewarded by a sur-
coat of honour.

My impression is confirmed, by all that has since occurred,
that the arrival Gf the commissioners was delayed purposely
until the river defences were in a state of forwardness. Fbr,
once more, they were coming, not to revise the tariff, but, as
Canton letter states, and their own correspondence presently
shows, to discuss modification if not abrogation of three
important privileges which distinguished our treaty from
any other; to wit, the residence of a Minister at Pekin, cir-
culation of British merchants in the interior, and the navi-
gation of the great river; also to require the rendition of
Canton.

Ho Kwei-tsing, as in duty bound, went to meet the
senior commissioners as they entered bis jurisdiction;
and the statement in the Canton letter that it was on
the strength of his representations, supported by those of
,his provinoial Treasurer Wang, that they were led to mo-
dify materially the course prescribed by their instruetions,
is borne out not only by the gossip of the period, but by a
communication subsequently made by an indisputable au-
thority, which I do not feel at liberty to name, that they had
come down charged to make war rather than concede the per-
manent residence of a minister. The words stated by Ho,
when remonstrating against such policy, were " that war
would be absolute madness." I confess that, with some
faith in the narrator, I believed him, at the time he stated
this, guilty of a simple exaggeration, a la Chinoise.
It must not be forgotten that throughout the whole of
this period, from June to October, affairs in the south were
in a condition that augured ill for peace.
Long after the Treaty was signed, Hwang, and a com-
mittee of three Cantonese of high standing in the class we
style " the gentry," who held an Imperial commission for
the enlistment and control of militia, were persisting in acts
of war. After the tactics of 1856 and 1857, when Yeh was
in power, the native servants were called home from Hong
Kong, and the supplies of that colony cut lioff by semi-
official committees estabished in the adjacent districts. Sol-
diers of tho Canton garrison were kidnapped and assassin-
ated. A proclamation, under Hwang's seal, offered a high
reward for Mr. Park( s's head.

Even so late as the 22d August Hwang had supported the
special committee in its war-taxation, on the ground that
though a Treaty had been concluded at Tien-tsin, ho know
not its conditions, and that it was as necessary as ever to be
ready for banditti.

I see no reason to doubt, when we read the Emperor's
decree of the 21st October, in which he rejects the com-
missioners' censure of Hwang and the committee, that the
court was encouraging the latter to persevere in their at-
tempt to expel th:, allies from Canton, where by treaty they
were to remain till the indemnity agreed to was paid.
The commissioners arrived at last on the 6th of October.

They had been duly apprised of the dissatisfaction occa-
sioned by the tardiness of their movements ; and having
first apologized in a private note for not visiting Lord Elgin
until the ostensible business of their mission—the tariff re-
vision—was en train, they dispatched an official letter, in a
most conciliatory strain, to beg Lord Elgin to appoint de-
puties who might meet their own for the revision of the
tariff. The officers they named were Wang, the Commis-
sioner of Finance, chief civilian of the province, and Sish,
for the three years previous Ta autae, or Intendant
at Shanghae, one of the few Chinese I have met who, not-
withstanding much ignorance and prejudice still remain-
ing, really appreciat9s the power and probity of the foreigner,
or who appear soberly to contemplate, without abatement
of pride in their own country, the possibility of utilising
barbarian ability to her advantage. He had been named
to the commissioners by Lord Elgin at Tien-tsin.
Lord Elgin. met their proposals by demandiug, first,
an acknowledgment of two letters, written early in Sep-
tember,eonf
poteuhageche;h distanceat they ebyeeenfxrcnounsioge
odetieiaklt
Pekin; his
s
iWang'sh
complaining of proceedings in the south, and still
unnoticed.
lr pacifica° iumn a
thats
hostile attitude as not being assured of our intentions and
ivgonlTunohr aetniele.crreedeopnityotlpwi
re
oa grounds
England, France, AMerica, and Russia.
It does not appear for all that
was promised on the sub-
ject, that even this meagre notice,:which
promulgated
none
of the conditions of the peace, was ever published'elsewhere
At Canton, indeed, the High Committee's Mklitia con-.
firmed to annoy the foreign garrison until January, when
one_ of their positions at ;Shek-tsin was destroyed. The

garrison were then made to patrol the neighbourhood, the
result of which measure was a speedy restoration of order.
The commissioners' overtures did not yet satisfy Lord
Elgin. He took them to task for having allowed near four
months to elapse without making known the existence of a
treaty ; and he demaanded the removal of Hwang, and the
dissolution ofthe Imperial committee before he could con-
sent to go into the tariff at all. This line of action of course
greatly perplexed the commissioners. As Chinese statesmen
they would be slow to comprehend why the barbarian
should postpone commercial considerations to any other
and they hastened to soothe him accordingly. They had
already, they said, denounced Hwang, and would again
denounce him, praying the Emperor, at the same time,
to withdraw their powers from the Committee. Lord
Elgin, on this, engaged if they would promise to
communicate to him the Imperial rescript to their me-
morial, to commence the discussion of the tariff, and this
promise given, named Mr. Oliphant and myself as his
deputies.
Up to this time they had not breathed a word regarding
the real matter of their mission. They were doubtless in
much embarrassment as to the mode of introducing it; and
the opinions of Ho, who drew his inspiration from Wang
and Sich, the two chiefs of his provincial staff, both able,
and intimately lies, had, I feel satisfied, in no way dimi-
nished their difficulty in approaching the retractation of a
treaty concession.
At length, on the 22d October, reassured by the favour-
able progress of the tariff and its concomitants, they, with
tvident delicacy,and diffidence, declared the true object of
their coming. Moralising briefly on the end of negotiations,
they pointed out that those at Tien-•tsin were conducted so
completely under pressure of an armed force as to leave no
place for deliberation ; the Emperor had, accordingly,
specially commissioned them to come to Shan,;hae, " ear-
nestly to press a matter which would be to the advan-
tage of both parties." Among the conditions extorted
there were some of real injury to China, which there bad
been no opportunity of explaining; of these they name one
only—the residence, in permanence, of a British Minister
at Pekin. As the Queen of England has an option, by
treaty, they beg her Majesty may be prayed to decide that
the Minister shall only visit Pekin en occasions. They avow
that this condition is most irksome to China, and in Chinese
fashion they strive to show how irksome it will be to us. A
rude and numerous Tartar soldiery ; the unacquaintance of
metropolitan officials with foreign affairs ; the temper of
the population—these are the dangers which should incline
us to forego this ono—to us usol.ss, and, for the reasons
enumerated, perilous—privilege; the more readily to forego
it, as, on the other hand, we are gainers to a considerable
extent in the many which we should still retain.

Looking back to the Tein-tsin period, we call to mind
that the commissioners, although committed in their
letter of the 11th June, 1858, to the declaration, that
to a Minister's permanent residence there was properly
no objection," and to the proposition that, the recent
collision considered, the Minister had better live at Tien-
isin—an official residence being assigned him at Pekin—
had attempted on the 21st Jane to recede from these
proposals.

They had, they said, received a decree, desiring them to
do their best to persuade Lord Elgin to give up this invi-
dious privilege, " the north being cold and excessively
dusty" also with it the right to open Chin-kiang, the right

to circulate ingthe interior before the people should have
been duly warned, the right to navigate the Great River,
by which we should drive the Chinese out of the field.

On all these points they again made a fight at their con-

ference with Mr. Bruce on the 24th Juno. On the eveniag
of the 25th they made a last effort, through Count Poutia-
tine and Mr. Reed, to dissuade Lord Elgin fron.), insisting
on the residence of a Minister, and the right of British
merchants to circulate in the interior, pleading that, unless
his lordship gave way on those points, their lives would be
forfeited.

Lord Elgin standing firm, they urged, even on the morn-

ing of the 26th itself, a modification of the text, by yhich
the Minister might be authorised to be constantly in resi-
dence at Pekin, instead of entitled to reside there, without
moving, a change which, as liberty of his movements is

secured in another article, was adopted.
Those, with the addition of the surrender of
Canton, are the questions on which, according to
the Canton letter, the Emperor instructed the

Commissioners to stand out, and it is upon these I gather,

from their letters of the 27th and 28th May, the Commis-

sioners would have engaged Mr. Bruce in discussion, had
he accorded the interview they proposed. They had, withal,

another end to gain.
Lord Elgin met their request of the 22d October by an
emphatic declaration that it lay not with him to abate one
tittle of the Treaty. He pointed out the real object and
advantages of diplomatic relations as established in Europe,
_ _

and briefly adverting to past misunderstandings between

our countries, expressed his doubt that the Imperial Go-
vernment could provide guarantees for the maintaining of
_ _

peace, equivalent to that supplied by thepresence of a Afini-

star at Pekin.

The Commissioners, on the 28th October, admit that our
Minister's right to permanent residence is incontestable, but
the exercise of it will humiliate China in the eyes of her

subjects. They, therefore, again pray Lord Elgin to move
the Queen to use the option the Treaty leaves her Majesty
in their favour, and there is no satisfactory arrangement
they are not ready to make.
Lord Elgin undertook to submit the correspondence to
her Majesty's Government, and to recommend that if her
Majesty's Minister were preperly received next year, and
full effect given to the Treaty in all other particulars, the
Minister should be directed to choose aresidence elsewhere,

and to visit the capital either periodically or when business

_
required it.
The tariff negotiations were now brought to a close, and
Lord Elgin announced his intention► to proceed up the Yang-
tze, to see what ports it would eventually be desirable to
open.

Tho commissioners acquiesced with a good grace, pro-
mised to send an officer to wait on his lordship, and to ad-

vise the authorities of the provinces he would- have to tra-

verse of his approach.

This was partly in fulfilment of their under taking to make
any satisfactory arrangement, partly, I feel sure, from
words that fell from the Judge, in the hope that we should
have a profitable collision with the insurgents at Nankin.
At Hankow we found a proclamation announcing that the
English, French, and American nations were come to look
at the place, but not to trade, so the people need not be
alarmed. There was not, it is scarcely necessary to observe,
any signs of alarm, except that produced by the
official runners and such persons, ;Vho at first insisted
on forming our escort, and in that capacity unne-
cessarily thrashed the crowds that assembled round us, and
used every effort to prevent the tradespeople from taking
our money. The people themselves were here, as through-
out the whole 600 miles of our journey, civil, inoffensive,
and eager for trade.

I regard the policy of the Government in this to have
been the same it has long adopted at Canton—to promote
an aversion to foreign intercourse among the people, and
to impress on foreigners that the people are hostile and
hard to control. The doctrine finds its place, as we have
seen, among the arguments against a Minister's residence
at Pekin.

On his return to Shanghae in January, Lord Elgin found
the news from Canton still far from satisfactory. Just as
he was about to start for Hankow, the commissioners had
mooted the question of that city's rendition, and the
payment of the indemnity, but had received no positive
answer as to the course his lordship proposed to take.
They had also requested us, by letter, to adopt the same
arrangement as the French. They had writ t.tn, besides, a cir-
cular to the British, French, and American ministers, regard-
ing the future issue of pessports, and various other points
which would be raised under the new treaties. Lastly,
they prayed for some settlement of the duties owing under
the provisional system adopted during the occupation of
Shanghao by the rebels in 1853 and 1854.
These letters had been sent in but a day or two before

Lord Elgin's departure, and he, consequently, had delayed
replying to them until his return. On receipt of the
Canton intelligence, ho recommenced correspondence by an
inquiry whether the promised decree removing llwang
had been obtained. The commissioners sent him a
decree of the 21st October, acknowledging their denuncia-
tion of Hwang, "for conduct calculated to produce mis-
chief ;" defending him, however, as having acted on the
offensive only until the Treaty was concluded ; defending
the committee as simply engaged in keeping the peace;
and concluding with the observation that it would be for
the Emperor himself to deal with Hwang should he have
committed himself since the treaty was signed.
Tho commissioners must have received this rebuff before
Lord Elgin left Shanghae, but were doubtless in no haste to
show how their advice had been relished by their master.
Before their reply had reached him, Lord Elgin had
answered their circular of the 7th Nov. I need notice but
two items of his answer. He undertook most readily to
guarantee that every precaution would be taken to prevent
the abuse of the passport system by British subjects. At
the close of his letter, he replied to their remark that

their queries had been put by reason of their ignorance of
foreign affairs, by observing that the most evident remedy
of this defect would be, in sending a Chinese Legation to
England.

The commissioners rejoined at length, but noticeably
about passports, which, they observed, the consuls would
have to apply for to the Chinese authorities, to whom they
must be, in due time, surrendered to be cancelled.
This was on the 14th. On the same day, Lord Elgin had
written to express his serious dissatisfaction at Hwang's
continuance in office. He would now call on the commis-
sioners to settle the indemnity in strict accordance with the
provisions of the s7parate article, or, as instructed by her
Majesty's Government, he would eject the Chinese autho-
rities from Canton.
A very crestfallen answer fullowed from the commission-
ers. They had done their best. The Emperor alone could
decide. The Canton question they had not had time to
settle since Lord Elgin's return.
On the 20th of January, Lord Elgin, having received
news of the Shek-tsing affair, wrote again. He reviewed
I his correspondence with the commissioners since their ar-
rival in October. He was now convinced that Canton was
to them a question of ultra vires ; he should, therefore,
desire our executive there to act with vigour, and when the
1 ratifications were exchanged, the Emperor should be asked

whether things at Canton had been done with or without
his authority.
The commissioners wrote to assure him that Hwang
should now be certainly removed and 'the special com-
mittee dissolved ; but Eord Elgin, inclosing them a copy
of the letter forwarded by Mr. Parkes, announced his
intention to / roceod himself to Canton. On his return to
Shanglue in the course of six weeks, should he not find
the commissioners there, he would proccel to Pekin.
The commissioners wrote, roundly abusing Hwang and
the committee. The Emperor's decree must arrive in three
weeks. In the interim all pending questions could be dis-
cussed. They were quite competent to deal with the Can-
ton question. They prayed him to remain.
Lord Elgin was inexorable. The conditions of the Can-
ton question, he wrote, 25th of January, were specified in
the treaty. Had the Emperor chosen that the commis-
sioners should close it, he would have given them the re-
quisite powers. They had not kept faith about Canton.
They had promised months before to effect an improve-
ment there. -None had been effected. He would himself
enforce a better order of things. This done he would re-
turn to discuss whatever remained for consideration, peace-
ably or otherwise, as the Chinese Government might see fit.
Lord Elgin then departed, and on the 14th of February
the commissioners forwarded a decree, not, indeed, re-
moving Hwang from tho Governor-Generalship, but still
transferring his seal of Imperial commissioner for the
superintendence of foreign trade to Ho Kwei-taing.
This decree was, doubtless, shaped so as to save the im-
perial dignity. The Emperor would not disgrace the Go,
vernor-General (who has- since been transferred to Sze-
chuen), under pressure, and his choice of Ho, as Hwang's
substitute, he had reason to believe would soothe us.
I have gone thus at length into this section of the cor-
respondence, from October to January, to show with
what reluctance the Chinese Government took a minimum
of action against an officer notoriously corrupt, and
flagrantly tyrannical in his jurisdiction, and denounced
by the highest in the land for a course of foreign
policy prejudicial to the interests of peace. My convic-
tion is, that the Government, or, to take a hint from the
opening clause of the' Canton letter, that portion of it
which had the credit of establishing the special committee,
and authorising its operations, never abandoned the notion
of recovering Canton until their defeat at Shek-tsing, a
village near Canton, and other movements of the allied
force broke the spirit of the militia.
It is also my impression, however contradictory the

statement may appear, that the strong language held to the
commissioners by Lord Elgin throughout this period, while
it deterred them from attempting any of the changes I am
persuaded they were sent southward to effect, enabled them
at the same time to hold their own with the Emperor byre-
presenting the impossibility of retracting what he is as-
sumed to have required from people so violent and deter-
mined.

His withdrawal of the seal from Hwang was probably
balanced somewhatin the Emperor's mind by the opportu-

nity afforded him of declaring in his decree, that our ac

counts from Canton (of kidnapping. assassination' &c.)
surprised him much, as, in the " soothing and bridling" of
.. •

Foreign nations, China had never been treacherous.

Lord Elgin acknowledged the receipt of their last letter
on the 3d of March. He therein told the commissioners of

the appointment of his successor, charged with the ratified
copy of the Treaty, to be exchanged at Pekin, and of his
own immediate departure for England. He communicated
to them the consent of her Majesty's Government to make
the British Ministees residence at Pekin but occasional,
on the conditions before recited ; and, bidding them fare-
well, reminded them them that peace was only to be kept
unbroken by a strict observance of the Treaty—by a mu-
tual recognition of the equality of nations, between whom,
he took occasion to remark there could be no such relation
as that implied in the words " soothing and bridling."
The commissioners received this on the 29th of March.
They made no move north, notwithstanding; on the con-
trary, on learning Mr. Bruce's arrival, they moved from Soo-
chow, where they had spent the new year, to Shanghae.
Mr. Bruce's despatch to liweiliang, of the 16th May.
announcing his arrival, and requesting that suitable repara-
tions may be made for his reception at Tien-tsin, and his
journey to Pekin with the ratified treaties and the auto-

graph letter of her Britannic Majesty, reached the commis•
t4ioners on tho 27th, and their proceedings from this data
are deserving of close attention.

Mr. Bruce found at Shanghao, on the 6th June, three
despatches from the commissioners, the first dated the
27th May, the day on which the second admits his letter

of the 16th May had arrived ; also admits that Lord Elgin'
last letter, announcing his departure, had reached them

on the 29th March.

They had remained, neverthe

Less, because his lordship had said he would return to dis-

cuss various questions, which they do not enumerate. Hir
successor, who is, of course, equally competent with him-

belt; is bound, they think, to take up the pending discus-
sion with them, and with all speed, as the day named fm

the exchange of ratifications draws near.

The second, which is dated the 28th May, acknowledging
Mr. Bruce's cf the 16th, urges that an important affair like
the exchange of ratifications cannot be hurried through as

he proposes; repeats that Lord Elgin's letters had—kept
them at Shanghae, the journey from which place to Pekin
would take two months ; none but they themselves could
represent the Chinese Government in the matter ; there
was no one to receive Mr. Bruce at Tien-tsin, and nothing
ready ; they therefore propose that Mr. Bruce instead of
waiting "up there," where he will find it very hot, should
put off his departure, and grant them an interview.

This is accompanied by another of the same date, in which
insisting again on Lord Elgin's engagement to return and
discuss various questions, they beg to enumerate those of
which he had disposed and those loft unsettled.
He had agreed, they say :-
Ist. That the coming visit to Pekin was to be exceptional ;
the Minister was not constantly to be at Pekin.

2d. That his visit to liankow was exceptional ; our move-
ments were henceforth to be in accordance with the Treaty

stipulations.
3d. That none but respectable persons were to obtain
passports, for the issue of which regulations must be de-
vised, The Canton question was not settled, and Lord
Elgin had promised to go further.

To take the last first, Lord Elgin had expressly told
the commissioners that the Canton question must be
settled, and promptly, according to the Special Article,
which prescribes payment at Canton to be arranged by
the Canton authorities. Before he left the south, Mr.
_ _

Bruce had ascertained in May that the Canton authorities
had no knowledge of this stipulation, or, if they had; were
without any instructions to give it effect.
The other three are the ever-recurring clauses of diffi-
culty ; the original modification of the first being further
modified by total omission of the conditions on which her
Majesty's Government, as the commissioners had been
duly apprised in Lord Elgin's last letter, would consent to
modify it. The other two are stated as they stand, I can
only suppose to draw from Mr. Bruce some stish ac-
quiescence in what would have been literally hard for him

to dispute, as might preclude the possibility of his sug-
gesting any arrangement for the :anticipation of the treaty
terms, the far receding extinction of the rebels, before
which no British subject can by treaty claim to enter the
region they infest. _ _

Recalling the pertinacity with which the commissioners
Lave revived their objection to our enjoyment of the privi-

leges hero adverted to, the statements in the Canton letter,
and in other quarters, of the Emperor's violent opposition to
the concession of them, when we see them now, we should
have said needlessly, reproduced once more, we can only in-
fer that some further limitations were contemplated.
A Chinese, last year my head clerk, but promoted, after

the treaty, for his supposed knowledge of foreign
affairs to a mandarinate of the fifth grade, and now
attached to Kweiliang, called twice on Mr. Lay in
the spring, first to ascertain whether we would agree
to exchange ratifications at Shanghae ; secondly, if we
would consent to proceed, overland,, thence to Pekin.
The latter, be it observed, is the time-honoured form of

introducing the periodical missions from Anam, Lewschew,
and other dependent States, into Pekin ; the form which
enables China to maintain before her subjects that show
of surveillance and patronage by which she has over sought
to negative a barbarian State's assumption of equality with
herself. The American treaty enables China to give the
United States' Minister such a reception. So long as he
does not insist on an audience, no tradition will be violated.
It does not practically secure him access to Pekin for any
diplomatic purpose.
The above proposal accepted, our circulation under pass-
ports would infallibly have been infecterl by the precedent.
No one would have travelled except under an official pF-
tection, resembling that proposed years ago by Kiying or

the neighbourhood of Canton—a protection so irksoitae
and profitless to the few who availed themselves of it,
that travelling, if it were to be under such auspices, was
soon foregone altogether.

This is, of course, speculation ; nor is it more when I de-
dare my belief that the commissioners rather hoped than
expected that we should halt at Shanghae, as they proposed,
within three weeks of the day we were by Treaty to be at
Pekin. They were, I imagine, acting under orders to try
everything that might prevent our visit to the capital.
On receiving Mr. Bruce's peremptory reply of the Bth of
June, followed by his supplementary note of the 11th, the
commissioners laid down their arms. His letter of the Sth,

Ley wrote, had been sent to the Emperor, who would receive
- -

it in some nine days. They had moved him to send a high offi-
cer to Tien-tsin to meet Mr. Bruce, whom they recommended
to leave his ships of war outside the bar, and proceed in light
marching order to Pekin. They cannot themselves take
steam as Mr. Bruce proposes, as the Emperor has has not
authorised them to do so, but in obedience to his Majesty's
commands (when received does not appear), they will go
north with all speed. The suggestions respecting the an-
chorage of his squadron is brought in, as it were, casually :

" The commissioners would wish," &c. There is no hint
that the route by the Tien-tsiu River is condamnee, or that
theattempt to ascend it will be opposed.
Yet they must have known that opposition was immi-
nent. The high authority, cited before, assured my in-
formant that so certain was he of a collision, that be should
keep himself out of the way. The Court, he said, was not
disabused of its invincibility, nor would it be without
another defeat. It was for all that not to 3 proud to
be treacherous, as we have found to our cost.
Admiral Hope bailed lefore the commis-

- -----
sion ers' last letter Wia received, . but his first pro-
ceedings, it is worthy of observation, actually filled the
measure of their requirement. He approached the bar on
the 17th, with only one steamer and two gunboats, and the
officer sent in to communicate with the forts crossed the
bar in a ship's gig.
On the 20th, finding that the people on the spot, who
maintained, as on the former day, that they had closed the
passage of the liver without the orders of Government, had
not, as they had promised, removed, but, on the contrary,
had greatly multiplied the obstacles in the way of a free pas-
sage, he gave notice to the Intendant of Tien-tsin that his
squadron would remain at the mouth of the river while Mr.
Bruce was at Pekin; he, therefore, wishes his men to land
to purchase supplies. The Intendent only opposes their
landing lest they should lose themselves in winding paths,
amongst the camps and field-works which, he says, abound
along the way between Ta-koo and Tien-tsin. He says no-
thing of the Government's objection to leave the river open,
and ho does say that the defences he alludes to are not to our
address.

• All this while n 1 official, the militia and peasantry on
shore affirm, is near the spot. Mr. Ward, the American
Minister, is told the same story by the same people on the
evening of the 24th; the batteries :appear deserted until
the following forenoon, when, as the foremost gun boa*
according to notice given the previ um evening by Admiral
Hope, attempts to pass the booms, they pour forth a fire from
70 guns, which for strength and direction is without precedent
in our annals of Chinese warfare. Still no official appears
at Taku. On the other hand, Hang, the Governor-General
of the province, does send a letter to Mr. Bruce, from a
point some ten miles up the coast. It is dated the 23d, but
does not reach him till the 25th.
Now Mr. Bruce's letter of the 9th, which had electrified
the commissionrs, was to reach Pekin in nine days—say
before the 20th. We know, by experience, that communi-
cations between Taku and Pekin do hot take more than 24
hours. The Court, if it were prepared to disavow the host tile
act of the
,Taku garrison, must have forgotten that it could,
hardly, under the circumstances, plead ignorance of the
great danger of a collision between the large force it had
placed, months before, at Taku, and a foreign squadron
which had now been waiting since the 16th to have the
river opened fur the British Minister's admission. If it were
bona fide intent on the preservation of peace, why should no
official have presented himself to the Admiral at Taku or
why should the only move of the character of a pacific
overture been made at the eleventh hour, ,by a circuitous
route and with a want of alacrity at nrst'sfght inexplicable?
For the despatch had been the best part of two days coming
ten miles.

It invites Mr. Bruce to wait for the arrival of liweiliang
and his colleague, promising him that when he, Hang,
shall have moved to the southward the garrison and arma-
ment of the positicn from which he writes, he will come out
to welcome him to the place, Peh-tang• Ho by name, a port,
if it deserve the designation, which the Americans found
in a few days was doubtfully accessible even to a ship's
boat.

I feel satisfied that, our object considered, the fulfilment
of the treaty, not in the letter but in the spirit, we should
make a mistake in approaching the capital otherwise than
by its recognised highway. Ido not see that the Ameri-
cans can refuse to proceed to Pekin by Peh-tang-Ho, or by
any less desirable route ; Article V of their Treaty im-
posing on them almost all the restrictions which it is the
very aim of our Articles 111 and IV to withstand. The
American.3linister may visit Pekin once a year, with 20
people for a suite; he is ,to give intimation of his ap-
proach through the Board of Rites ; and is to complete his
business without necessary delay; he will be held, as I
have before hinted by the Government and people of
China, at precisely the same 'value as a Lewchewan or
Siamese Envoy. This, some will say, is of little conse-
quence. It is at least of this much, that little attention
will be raid to the representations of an officer who takes
so low a place, and it is only by insuring the attention which
must be yielded when the question of equality is no longer in
dispute, that wecau hope fora peaceable settlement of mis-
understanding with a people whose bigotry, arrogance, and
insincerity are kept in check only by their fears.
To close observations which have greatly outrun their
intended length, I am persuaded that ita aversion to con-
ede, even limited by the three privileges so often alluded
to, is what has betrayed the Chinese Government into an
let of war, which, with its usual pusillanimity, it was pr e-
pared to disavow had its forces suffered defeat. It has never
accepted the changes forced upon it—the novelty, in the
sense in which Western nations unLrstand it. It was
ready, more suo, to fend off those without fighting, and the
-3ommissioners were, I make no doubt, to detain us at
Shanghae under ono pretext or another, until the year was
so far spent that we might be induced, in our greed for
commercial advantages, to accept an 'exchange of ratifica-
tions at Shanghae. Foreign relations, which in Chinese
are simply synonomous with a Superintendence of Trade,
would then have been handed over to Ho, whose "sooth-
ing and bridling," we are evidently assumed to prefer, and
the great gain of the Treaty, the one means of preventing
tacal misunderstandings, viz., the right of appeal to the
central Government against the acts of its subordinates,
would, in default of precedent, have been as much in abey-
ance as though it had never been concluded.

Diplomacy failing, the Government still veiled its readi-
ness for war—possibly from doubt in its powers, perhaps in
the hope of taking us completely unawares.
_ _

Mr. Hart's interesting memorandum on Sungkolin-sin's
temper and arrangements, together with Mr. Morgan's in -
f9rmatton on the -same head, are more or less corroborated
by the junkmen who lay off the Peiho, lamenting 0, ievously
the interruplion of their trade.

it must be noted in qualification of Sunko-lin-sin's prow-
ess, and of the court's resolution, that his victory was not
adopted by the Government for some four or five days ; at
the end of which time the forts first showed the flags of five
out of the eight banners under which the Tartar force is
enrolled.

Since my return to Shanghae I have learned that many
Chineses ascribe the collision altogether to Sungko-lin-sin,
and entirely acquit the Emperor. They represent him as
unable to restrain the Mongols, who, on learning that the
Emperor was decidedly opposed to overt hostility, declared
that, at all events, they would not admit the barbarian by
way of Tien -tsin. The statement is very possibly the truth
—it corresponds, more or less, with the report brought by
M. Mouly from Pekin. It would consist perfectly with the
timid treachery of the Chinese Government that, having
placed its responsibility, as it hoped, a courert. by with-
drawing its official presence from the scene, it should bide
the issue of a course which, if unsuccessful, it was thus
armed to condemn; and with the short-sightedness which,
in my opinion, distinguishes its policy, that it should over-
look the more terrible consequence of a success such as that
it has obtained.
(Signed) THOMAS WADE, Chinese Secretary.

ROYAL STRAND THEATRE.
Lessee and Directress, Miss Swanborough
THIS EVENING, THE GOOSE WITH THE GOLDEN
EGGS.
After which THE GREAT RUSSIAN BEAR ; or, An-
other Retreat frotn Moscow:

Followed by
_ THE VERY LATEST EDITION OF THE
LADY OF LYONS.

Commence at 7 o'clock.