The Sun.
London, England, 1859-03-17 00:00:00

LORD _ELGIN AT SHANGHAI.

-SHANGHAI, JAN. 18.
' On Monday, the 17th inst., a numerous body of
the representatives of the English and Indian firms
at Shanghai waited on his Excellency the Earl of
Elgin at the British Embassy, by appointment, to
present a complimentary address on his Lordship's
successful career in the North of China.
His Excellency was attended by his suite, com-
prising Messieurs L. Oliphant, G. H. Fitz-Roy, N.
Jocelyn, T. F. Wade (Interpreter), and Dr. Saun-
ders,R.N. There were also present Captain Sherard.
Osborn, R.N., C. 8., Commander Bythesea, R.N.,
Mr. D. B. Robertson, Her Majesty's Consul ; Mr.
F. Harvey, Her Majesty's Vice-Consul, Mr. H. N.
Lay, &c.
Mr. W. H. Vacher, Chairman of the Shanghai
British Chamber of Commerce, read the address as
follows :

Shanghai, Jan. 13.
"My Lord,—We beg to express our great satisfaction in
being able to welcome your Lord Ship on your return a
second time to this port, after comparatively brief, but in
both instances, most fertile periods of absence, and before
your lordship's final departure from this coast we beg to
offer our respectful but sincere congratulations on the
successful issue of the important negotiations in which your
Lordship has been engaged, and the valuable results which
have been obtained through your lordship's enterprising
exertions in this part of the world.
" The advantages likely to arise from the treaties recently
concluded with this Government, and with the long and
jealously closed country of Japan, may not for some time
be fully apparent, but the greatly extended privileges and
large additional concessions obtained from both countries,
by opening up an improved and rapidly expandinc, field to
Western commerce and enterprise, and by more fully ex-
tending to the Chinese and Japanese the advantages of a
closer acquaintance with the civilisation and knowledge of
the West, will, if faithfully carried out, lead to most im-
portant benefits, as well to foreign relations with these
countries, as to their inhabitants, and with these advan-
tages, which sooner or later cannot fail to result, your lord-
ship's name and mission must long and honourably be
associated.
" In conclusion, we beg to express our hearty interest in
your lordship's eminently useful and honourable efforts for
the extension of civilisation and commerce, and we earnestly
hope that your lordship may long be spared to pursue the
same high and successful career.
" We are, my Lord,
" Your most obedient humble servants.
(Here follow signatures.)
" To his Excellency the Right Hon. the Earl of Elgin
and Kincardine, K.T., G.C.8., her Majesty's High
Commissioner and Minister Plenipotentiary to the
Court of Pekin."
His Excellency then made the following re-
ply :

" Gentlemen,—l sincerely thank you for these expres-
sions of good will and regard. I value them the more
because they proceed, not from fair weather friends, but
from persons who, when the future was still dark and'the
breakers ahead, encouraged me by their sympathy.
" When you did me the honour to address me in April
last I availed myself of the opportunity to indicate, in so
far as I could with propriety do so, the course which I pro-
posed to follow in the discharge of the duties of the mission
confided to me by our Sovereign. At the present time I
have no similar revelation to make. _ The special work
which I was commanded to take in hand is drawing to its
close. The promise and the performance are now alike
before you.
" Nevertheless I willingly take advantage of this, per-
haps the last occasion on which I shall meet you together,
to offer a few remarks on some matters deeply interesting
to us all.
" In the first place, then, allow me to express the satis-
faction which it gives me to find that you specify the bene-
fits which are likely to accrue to the inhabitants of these
countries themselves as among the most important of the
results to be expected from our recent treaties with China
and Japan. On this head we have no doubt incurred very
weighty responsibilities. Uninvited, and by methods not
always of the gentlest, we have broken down the barriers,
behind which these ancient nations sought to conceal from
the world without, the mysteries—perhaps, also, in the case
of China at least, the rags and rottenness of their waning
civilisations. Neither our own consciences nor the judg-
ment of mankind will acquit us if when we are asked to
what we have turned our opportunities we can only say
that we have filled our pockets from among the ruins which
we have found or made.
" An eminent French writer has observed, that it is one
of the glories of Christian civilization that it has caused the
sentiment of repentance to find a place in the hearts of na-
tions. Let us hope that it will not be by pointing this
moral—that Great Britain, when she comes to review her
connection with the furthest East, will make good her claim
to the title of a Christian nation.
" It gives me much pleasure to have it in my power to
assure you that my recent trip up the Yang-tse to Hankow
fully realised the expectations which induced me to under •
take it. I was enabled during my progress to obtain much
information respecting the political condition of the coun-
try, which will, I trust, be useful to her Majesty's Govern-
ment, and the interests of commerce will, no doubt, be ma-
terially promoted by the knowledge of the navigation of
the river acquired by the able officers of her Majesty's navy
by whom I was accompanied.
" I have long held the opinion that Shanghai was the
place where, if anywhere, it might be hoped that peaceful
negotions for the extension and development of commer-
cial relations with China might be conducted with success,
for the obvious reason that the benefits accruing to the
empire from foreign commerce and intercourse are more
manifest at Shanghai than elsewhere. With this view, at
the commencement of last year, immediately after the cap-
tore of Canton, I proposed that: Chinese plenipotentiaries
should meet me here for the amicable settlement of all
differences pending between Great Britain and China—a
proposition which, as you know, the stolid arrogance of the
Court of Pekin induced it to reject. Since the Imperial
Commissioners arrived here in October last, I have seen no
cause to change the opinion which I had previously formed
on this point. Making due allowance for the difficulties of
the position of negotiators who have to account for their
proceedings to a Government so jealous and ill-informed as
that of China, I am bound to say that I do not think I can
reasonably complain of the spirit in which I have been met
by them.
My own course has not, however, been always smooth
and free from difficulty. The navigator whose main busi-
ness it is to bring his own vessel safely to port, with flags
flying, and amid the cheers of welcoming friends, will. select
the deepest stream, and eschew to the best of his ability
both rocks and shoals. But the diplomatist, according to
my notions of duty, is rather in the position of the master
of a dredging machine. He has to open a way for the more
favoured craft that are to follow him. The most critical
places are, therefore, precisely those towards which he is
bound to steer. Among the critical places which, in my
progress as a navigator, I found in mid-channel, right
a-head of me, two were pre-eminently so—the trade in
opium, and the Qhinese Custom-house system. I had long
sincerely commisserated the false and cruel position in which
men of high honour and integrity engaged in commerce
with China are placed by the irregularities which charac-
terise the administration of the one, and the anomalous con-
ditions under which the other is carried on, and I did not
consider that the difficulties attending the removal of these
evils, and the risk of misconception to which those who un-
dertook the task must necessarily expose themselves, would
justify me in abstaining from the attempt to grapple with
them
"As regards the last-mentioned of these subjects it is
necessary that I should offer one word of explanation at
the outset in order to prevent misapprehension, not so much
here as elsewhere. It must be distinctly understood that
the modifications introduced into the new Chinese tariff in
reference to opium do not in any degree fetter or restrict
the discretion of Great Britain as regards the traffic in that
article. if the British people and the British Government
see fit to do so, they may still make it penal for a British
subject to be engaged in it, and by so doing, although they
will not probably in any material degree diminish the con-
sumption of opium in China, they will no doubt do some-
thing more or less effectual towards preventing British
subjects from being the importers. Short, however, of
this extreme measure, of, the likelihood of the adoption of
which each man may form his own opinion, I am satisfied
that the barren announcement by a foreign Government 'of
its assent to the principle that the trade in opium is illegal,
is productive of nothing but mischief, that it is a delusion
and a snare both to the Chinese and those who have com
mercial dealings with them. It is notorious that, notwith-
standing thcrclause in the treaty of Wangbai, which pro-
nounces opium to be contraband, and the strung declara-
tions of American statesmen on this head, the American
flag has been in some instances used habitually even by
British subjects to cover that traffic. In my recent dis-
cussions with the Chinese Imperial Commissioners I have
merely sought to induce them to bring the trade in opium
from the region of fiction into that of fact, and to place
within the pale of law, and therefore under its control, an
article which is now openly bought, sold, and taxed by
them beyond that pale. The effect of the change on the in-
terests of the trade itself will be, I believe, either trifling or
null. If, on the one hand, the tax to which the new tariff
subjects the importer be somewhat greater than the squeeze
now levied on the article, he will, on the other hand, be
relieved from certain charges incident to a traffic ostensibly
contraband. -
" As regards the lax and corrupt administration of the
Custom-house, I may observe that, in addition to many
other evils to which it gives rise, it bears hardly on the sub-
jects of the Treaty Powers who are amenable to certain
checks and control from which unrepresented foreigners are
free. I have endeavoured, not, I hope, altogether without
success, to impress on the Imperial Commissioners the im-
portance of establishing a Custom-house system which shall
be uniform at the several open ports, equal in its operation
on all parties, and controlled by persons of integrity and
competent knowledge-
" 'Various grievances, besides those which I have men-
tioned above, affecting British subjects in their relations
with the Chinese or with other foreigners, have been from
time to time brought to my notice by gentlemen who have
done me the favour to write to me on such topics. Some of
them may probably be met by special arrangements, whe-
ther with the Chinese authorities or with the representa-
tives of the Governments of other Powers. Others are, I
fear, inseparable from the working of the system of ex-
territoriality which Christian nations have deemed it ne-
cessary for the interests and protection of their subjects to
establish in China.
" I have now given you very frankly my opinion on
several matters, which seem to me to be important, and the
consequence is that this reply has swelled beyond the cus-
tomary dimensions of an answer to a complimentary address.
I cannot, however, close it without assuring you that I
shall always retain a pleasing recollection of Shanghai, and
of the kindness which I have experienced while I have been
sojourning among you."

•
THE MURDER NEAR NEWARK.--The culprit
Biakett, who was sentenced at Nottingham Assizes last
week to be hanged for the murder of William Watmoro at
Barnby-in-the-Willows, has been respited during her
11190iesty's pleasure.
The second large stone dock at Chatham is ordered
to be cleared out, as it is required immediately for the ad-
mission of the Severn, which is to be lengthened in mid-
ships for engine-room, as she is to be fitted up for a screw
steam ship. It is reported she will be made 16 feet longer ;
she is to go into dock on Monday next.
THE DUNMOW FLITCH.—This ancient custom
will be carried cut this year at Dunmow in all its inte-
grity, most likely on Wednesday in Whitsun week. The
claimants are to be J. N. Hawkins, Esq., and Ann Sophia,
his wife, of Undy, Monmouthshire. Mr. Hawkins has
lauded property at Undy. John Wilson and Elizabeth
Mary, his wife. Mr. Wilson is a retired sergeant from the
15th Hussars and resides at Thorpe, in Surrey. Joseph
James Tickner and Elizabeth, his wife. Mr. Tickner is a
builder, and resides in the Westminster-bridge-road, Lam-
beth,and is a descendant of a Dunmow family.