The Sun.
London, England, 1857-12-29 00:00:00

DEXEMBER 29, iBNI

every city, and rural police walk up and dewnethe banks
of every canal. China, always has been and always mutt
be a country of frequent revolutions, secret societies,
and powerful robbers. In all for-Der times, whenever
some great event lights up for a moment the historic
gloom in which the common people live and suffer, we
find all these influences strongly working. Chinese so-
ciety then comes out like that of a drop of stagnant
water seen through a micro Tope. Water lions are de-
vouring the smaller ugly things, which in their turn are
feeding upon the still smaller fry, and thus downwards
to infinity. In 1224 years China, so famed in the West
for the solidity of her institutions, has undergone
15 changes of dynasty. So ancient is this curse of
turmoil tnat the oldest known vase, attributed by Chi-
nese writers to a period long before the birth of Christ,
bears upon it as an inscription an aspiration for " Ten
thousand years' rest from violence and troubles." The
founder of the Ming dynasty in 1368 was a servant at a
Buddhist monastery, who joined a vagrant band of ma-
rauders. Whenever anything occurs of historic import.
ance we always find that some bandit had a hand in it.
The land was always full of them. When the Tartars
possessed themselves of China one of these bandit chiefs
had just possessed himself of Pekin, and the last of the
Ming race had just hung himself. In 1635 the interior
contained eight separate rebel armies, each wish its
leader, its set of grievances, and its appetite for plunder.
It was a pirate who drove the Dutch out of Formosa ;
the son of a "celebrated pirate" who helped the Can-
tonese to defend their city against the Tartars ; and it
is a pirate who the other day destroyed the Portuguese
piratical fleet at Ningpo. In all ages and at all times
China has been coasted by pirates and traversed by
bands of robbers.
When I was at Ningpo I used to watch these house-
less vagabonds. There was a large colony of them
always located in a huge ruinous square tower over the
Salt Gate. In early morning I used to sit upon one of
the two guns of Ningpo and look through the broken
walls upon the filthy scenes within that tower. There
was always a store of stolen dogs tied up, and one of
these was killed for the morning meal. Then they sepa-
rated for the day, to return at what hour of night I know
not, for I took care not to make one of that party after
dark. There was no police to keep them in order ; but,
probably, if tbeir depredations • had become quite insuf-
ferehle the Taoutai would have called out a certain num-
ber of soldiers and exterminated them, or the tradesmen
would have banded together and destroyed them.
In such a country the merchant must make up his
mind to run some risk ; but still this rebellion is some-
thing more than a normal element of Chinese society.
It is not a general insecurity It is a positive stoppage.
It is an aneurism in the great artery of China. It is a
stoppage of the Yang-tae-kiang.
It the rebels bad taken Pekin and changed the dy-
nasty it had been a matter of no importance to us. It
they had taken Kwangtung we might have treated with
them. But they have located themselves in a position
where they can do us nothing but positive mischief.
They do not move. They neither grow into a power, nor
sink into a rabble. So far as appearances show, the siege
of Nankin may last for 10 years longer. The rumour of
to-day is contradicted by the not more certain intelli•
gence of to-morrow. Nothing is certain, except that so
long as the people inside can get food, and so long as the
army outside get their pay, nothing will be done.
But something must be done in the interest of com-
merce. All the British Navy could ride in that deep wide
river which rolls by Nankin. There are two convenient
islands there—the Gold and Silver Islands—which might
be garrisoned by the treaty Powers for the protection of
neutral vessels until these troubles are over, and the pre-
sence of a couple of steamers, such as the Inflexible and
the Fury, with a gunboat or two, to act as runners
higher up, would not be too great a price to pay for se-
curity upon the great trunk road of China. I don't think
there would be any objection urged at Pekin against this
course, and as to the rebels, Mr. Medhurst, who is now
in England, and who made some reports to the Govern-
ment on the subject, can tell you if he pleases, what
manner of men they are, and what title they have to our
sympathies.
4. The fourth and most emphatic reason given for the
very gradual increase in the sale of British produce is the
large protective duties levied at the Custom-houses.
I came out to China strongly imbued with the convic-
tion, so universal in England, that the inland Custom-
houses shut in our British produce within a narrow area
of coast country. I found the same belief prevalent in
Hong Kong and shared by our English officials.
Mr. Rutherford Alcock, who in 1843 made some
inquiries in reference to these inland or transit duties
as. they bear upon the commerce of Shanghai, could
only discover that they were constantly alleged as a
sense of delay and difficulty in bringing the produce to
that port, and that they had been found a serious impe-
diment to the ready circulation of our goods beyond
Soochow, so much eo that the tea merchant would at
once get zid of the longcloths he had taken in exchange,
and incur a loss of 20 or 30 per cent., rather than incur
the delay, trouble, and risk of endeavouring to ca:ry
them with bins into the interior. "In truth," he re-
marks, " the port of Shanghai is only open to trade so
far as the inner cordon of Custom-houses are permeable
and allow ingress to our goods."
No doubt the Custom-houses of Hangchow, known as
the Tehein Swan, aid of Soochow, two of the largest
trading cities in the empire, are so placed as to be
capaele of intercepting nearly the whole of the imports
and exports of Shanghai, with the exception of silk,
upon which are accumulated on its arrival at that port
tee triple duties of the Talkie the Taeping, and the
Kan Custom-houses. This is the chain it would have
had to pass bad its destination been Canton ; and the
triple duties are consolidated at Shanghai in order that
the barbarians may gain nettling by having a new ship-
ping port nearer to the raw produce.
This arrangement was in accordance with the edict
published in toe Pekin Gazette in September, 1844 :
"The amount of fixed duties to be sent to the capital
by the Canton maritime • Custom-house was 899,064
taels ; and besides a surplus of about 1,000 to 40,000
taels. However, since now the trade will be carried on
at the other four ports, the receipts at Canton will fall
short of that sum, and therefore Foochow and the other
ports must, after having realized their respective quotas,
make up the deficit at Canton.
But inasmach as the trade of Shanghai was for the
last six months 14,990,0001., and as Shanghai alone
now hturns to the Chinese treasury more than two
miilious of taels, all difficulty on tnis score has ceased.
Again, the edict of 1844 provides tha.—
" The duty on raw silk, now fixed at ten taels per
picul, is less than it was formerly, and the five ports
being now open merchants will go with this article to
the nearest market. But they must make up the loss of
the transit duties, which otherwise would have been paid
if they had proceeded to Canton in whatsoever port they
sell their cargo."
I have now examined the four reasons usually given in
England for the unsatisfactory condition of our export
trade to China. They whose interest in the subject or
whose great patience has enabled them to accompany roe
in this investigation, will, I hope, agree in my conclu-
sion that these causes are insufficient to account for the
effect in the magnitude in which we tee them. I now
proceed to point out some other causes which, I think,
exercise a more important influence.
I must divide these reasons also into four classes. 1.
Teat we are beaten by fair competition in the Chinese
markets. 2. Ignorance of British manufacturers as to
the requirements of China. 2. That British exports are
an unpopular branch of commerce with British mer-
chants. 4. That the country is not open to our merchan.
disc.
Three of these reasons will, I fear, not be popular
either in England or in China. I must defend them as
shortly as I can in the order in which I have propounded
them.
Ist. You are beaten by fair competition in the Chi-
nsee markets.
The Americans beat you in drills and sheetings. Ai

Shanghai, in 1856, the imports were 221,716 pieces o,
American drills, against 8,745 English ; and 14,420 of
American sheetings, against 1,240 English. The reason
given for this is, that in these heavy goods the labour is
in small proportion to the cast of the raw material, and
the producer of the raw material must have the advan-
tage. This may be so; I only chronicle the fact that we
are beaten by fair competition.
In woollen goods you sustain a close rivalry with the
Germans and Russians. At Hongkong itself I found the
table-covers were almost universally of German manufac-
ture. At Ningpo I examined a great many pieces of
cloth of different manufactures. There was a low quality
cloth of Leeds manufacture, which was 1,437 cash, or
about Bs., a-yard ; a Saxony superfine, also of low quality
and also of Leeds manufacture, 1,767 cash, or about
108. 6J., a-yard. These were a yard and a half wide.
There was a narrower English cloth of better quality
and substance (extra superfine) which was 2,965 cash, or
about 18s., a-yard. But there was also a strong thick
Russian cloth, which was two yards wide (wanting two
inchei.), and which was sold fur 2,216 cash, or 134. 6d.
a-yard. The Russian, therefore, taking the width into
consideration, was about 3s. a-yard dearer than the worst
of the English, about the same as the English second
best, and not much more than one-half the price of the
best English quality.
The Chinaman prefers the best English, but he cannot
afford it, and buys it in small quantities. Next that he
prefers the Russian, for it is stout and serviceable, and
he says in his native idiom, although it " hairs "
roughens, easier than the best English, it does not do
so so soon as the interior English articles. The great
bulk of the cloth sold to the Chinese, therefore, is Rus-
sian.
If we are undersold it is of no use to cry out ; there
is an end of the matter. If Leeds cannot send thick ser-
viceable cloth to China cheaper than Russia can, and if
Manchester cannot make cotton cloth of a given quality
cheaper than the old woman at the door of a Chinese
cottage can, we may as well shut up shop. Manchester
and Leads ought not to be beaten in any. of these matters
and that they are is I believe simply the result of igno-
rance at home of Chinese wants and habits.
2. This brings me to my second heading, which I
think, after the instances given in this paper, I need not
now labour. No doubt there are men in China who
have a knowledge of the Manchester trade, and who can
calculate fur you how much the experiment would cost
of setting up a few looms to spin narrow widths.
3. Intimately connected with the last is my third
proposition, that British exports are an unpopular
branch of commerce with British merchants in China.
Mr. Consul Thom, in a report addressed to Sir John
Davis in 1846, explains the working of the barter trade
in China, He says :
" It will be necessary to remind your Excellency that
in our immense transactions at Shanghai there are two
prices known—viz. the cash price and the barter price.
The British merchant on bartering his cottons and his
woollens gets a higher nominal price for them than he
would get were he to sell them at the cash price of the
day. On the other band, the teaman or silkman just
adds an equivalent accretion to the price of his silk or
tea, and so the account is balanced.
"Thus, if a manufacturer were to ship a parcel of Brig

tish goods to Shanghai, with instructions that his re-
turns be made in hills, the utmost that be can expect is
that his agent shall sell his goods at the cash prie.. But
A. B.'s account of sales of goods sold for cash would be
very different from his neighbour C which had been
bartered. The particulars I am now detailing are not
well understood in England, and when such a circum-
stance happens it generally causes an unpleasant corres-
pondence bet ween. the constituent at home and the agent
out here."

aria perfectly aware that the British marefaeurere,
when the four poste were first opened, established hotesee
in China for the sole purpose of extending the sale of
their produce, and that these houses did not pay. The
profits come from tea, silk, and opium. The houses that
have this business in their hands have also, greatly,
the British exports in their hands. The British export
trade will not maintain mercantile houses. But it would
pay for travelling agents acting in immediate connexion
with the home manufacturers, who should keep their
principals at home well informed, and who should work
their operations through the established houses here.
After what I have said, you mast not wonder to hear
some of the wealthiest men of China say that we are
going on very well as we are—that the demands for free
intercourse are unjust and impolitic—and that the ut-
most we want is one or two more ports and an embassy
at Pekin. Such is not the opinion of the great body of
the mercantile community. But it is the opinion of men
who will be much listened to in England.
4, But the chief and all-sufficient reason why we are
not doing what we ought to do in China is, that China
is not open to our merchandise.
Of course there is a Spitalfields hall sort of feeling in
China, as elsewhere • and official persons, being all in
China of the good old Tory school, set their faces against
foreign goods, We have been told of Chinamen stating
they were ready to take shiploads of Manchester goods if
they could only be protected from the interference of
their own mandarins.
But this is a very minor consideration. The authori-
ties in China are strong against an individual, but utterly
powerless against a popular feeling. China in this respect
is the most democratic country in the world ; witness
the growth of the poppy, the difficulty of raising new
taxes, the immediate do venial, of an unpopular efficen
and the utter failure of the Emperor and all his oewers
at Pekin to free into circulation his debased 10-casis
piece. The evil is, teat go ode are net breught
under the eyes of the Celuatnen of the interior ci ice
A Ceinarnan is the incarnation of what some people in
England would call common sense. He has no prsje-
dices of any kind, patriotic, religions, or sentimental.
He has a strong clannish family eelti-hnese, and that is
all, You have nothing, therefore, to do but to cenvp.ce
him that you have that to sell which it would snit him
to have, and that you can sell it at a lower price than he
can get it at elsewhere. .
Convince the.people of this, and all the mandarins in
China will not stop your sales.
At present, however, you are only unon the outer
fringe of the great Chinese Empire. Y>u might have
made more of your sphere of action than you have made,
but you are nut trading with China.
All our ports, except Shanghai, are separated from the
inland waters of Cnina by a chain of mountains. IS
continuation of the Himalayas, at a much lower altitude
tracks the whole coast line of China at some distance
from theses, and passes out at the Archipelago of Chusan.
Inside those mountains lies the bulk of the Empire of
China—outside lie our trading ports.
The seaboard provinces extending southwards from
Ningpo to Canton are thus isolated from the interior,
and from the great inland routes of traffic by this barrier
or mountains, Over these mountains goods transmitted
from the interior to any of these ports must be carried.
Even in passing from Ningpo to Hangchow there must
be two transshipments of goods. Amoy and Foochow
have the same position. Canton labours under the same
disadvantages. Every piece of merchandise brought down
from or carried up to the interior, must be carried for 20
miles over a chain of mountains, and carried on men's
backs. But, then, Canton has been fostered by its mono-
poly of intercourse, a race of carrying coolies has grown
into existence, and the difficulties are reduced to their
minimum. If some strong and unreasoning power were
to declare that Southend should be the only port in the
British Islands where commerce should be carried on,
no doubt Southend would have a still longer pier, and
docks would be dug, and a harbour would he made, and
Southend would cease to be the uninteresting spot it
now is. Canton bas been a Southend with its suggested
monopoly. Amoy, Foochow, and Ningpo are Southends
without any monopoly.
There is a way of getting behind these hills and
into the central districts of the empire—a way wherein
the merchant may travel without toil or danger ;
where no robbers can assail him at a vantage ; where
secret imposts cannot spoil his markets—a way which
extends up to the furthest limits of the empire, and
whence convenient and innumerable ways branch forth,
reaching to every hamlet of this great central region.
The gate at which we must enter China is the mouth of
the Yang-tee-Kiang. Give us entrance there, in our
own shits, in our own steamers, and we can deposit our
goods in every great city of the interior of China.
Let us start from Shanghai, and make an imaginary
voyage up this river. With the exception of M. Hue,
no European has ever yet sailed upon its higher waters,
or has, indeed, been much above Nankin. M. flue has
added nothing to our knowledge for commercial pur-
poses ; but I have obtained access to some reports of
Chinese, who traverse the whole distance frequently with
commercial oblate, and I may be able to tell something
more of this river than is known to Englishmen.
Having threaded cosr way through the shadows
at the mouth, we are in the largest, the deepest.
and the most abundant river in the world. We pass fur
200 miles through the rich province (.1 Kiaugsn, passing
town- and anchorages less a ell known to ships of war.
We will not now linger as Chekiang, or even at Naiik
for these great cities are now nothing more than the
seared and wasted strongholds of a piratical power. All
that was beautiful in the southern capital of China—even
the famous porcelain pagoda—has been wantonly de-
stroyed. Shut in from the land by the Imperialist be-
siegers, the rebels maintain themselves by plunderingthe
rich country up and down the banks of the river, and
the Imperialists are scarcely less burdensome to the
country behind their camp. Commerce has fled from
these parts. All we can ask of these plunderers is to
let us pass in peace.
Hitherto we have been in a tidal river. Hencefor-
ward, although we must still reckon its width by miles
and its depth by tens of fathoms, our merchandise-laden
steamer must be content to labour against an unchang-
ing stream. We traverse tine rich and thickly-peopled
province of Anhui, and in our voyage of two hundred
miles through that province we find, besides a constant
succession of towns, two first-class cities at which we
may tarry awhile to display our merchandise and lighten
our cargo.
Now we reach the provinces of Hupeh and Ronan,
the former on the north, the latter on the south bank.
This Is the country of the finest teas. It is here that
the Oopak teas are grown, which, by an unnatural
route, are forced down to Canton, being borne on men's
backs across the mountains instead of sent deftly down
the stream of the great river whose banks produce them.
Here are lakes, and broad streams running into them,
and networks of canals connecting theta. But, more
than this, here, just at this spot, is the confluence of
the Yang-tse with the great river Han, which is itself
banked with large cities and heavy with commerce.
At this confluence we have a congregation of enor-
mous cities—Wuchung on the one bank, and
Hannan opposite, with immense suburbs extending
far away. The population of these cities is diffe-
rently estimated at 3,000,000 and 5,000,000 souls ;
but, what is of still greater importance, these two cities
are undoubtedly the first great emporia of Chinese com-
merce. Here is a market which may set all Manchester
spinning, all Leeds weaving, all Sheffield grinding, and
all Nottingham throwing, if we only have on board
samples of what these Celestials desiderata. It might
be worth while, if they are shy of our new goods, to
anchor a depot ship in the broad deep waters,—for we
are told there are five miles of river from shore to shore
—and accustom them to the sight of luxuries and ne-
cessaries which they may exchange for their cheap and
abundant first class teas. Surely it would be better
thus to get rid of them than to send them down the
Yuen river to the Tungting lake, than by the capital
city of Changteh, up the Siang river to the Ching dis-
trict, across the mountain on men's backs to Loh-chang,
and then down the northern river to Fatshan and
Canton, for such is the present route. What charges
must accumulate upon English goods that should try to
come up the lung devious route by which these teas

de-cond.
We are only half way yet along our voyage. The river
leads us through the whole province of Hupeh ; and why
should we nut do a little business at the great cities of
Kingchow and Tebang, the walls of which we must pass?
To this city of Tchang juuks of 300 tons burden ascend
in great numbers, and the water is still deep, though the
bottom is rocky void dangerous.
A little higher up than Tchang we arrive at the town
of Kwei. We are now 900 miles from the mouth of
the Yang-tse, and here for the present our steamer mug
be content to stop, for here for the first time we meet
with rapids. When the summer sun has melted the
snows of Central Asia the trading junks shoot down the
falls, and, empty of cargo, they can be forced up them.
But if ever we are to pursue an unbroken voyage be-
yond this point John Chinaman must add one other to
his present innumerable canals, and English engineers
must teach him the secret of constructing locks.
It will not do, however, to be stopped by these rapids.
The whole basin of the Yang-tse is one vast coal-
field. From Nankin to Sz'chuen we have no difficulty in
obtaining the means of locomotion. There are markets
higher up, and thither, in a steamer to be put together
above the falls, we must go. Let us suppose this—no
great labour for us Anglo-Saxons—to have been accom-
plished. The stream is still deep and navigable. It is
crowded with junks, as M. Hue will testify. Kwei was
just upon the boundary line between Sz'chuen and
Hupeh, and Sz'ohuan is the last province of China. Be-
yond that are the snows of Thibot and the swamps of
Burmah. Sz'chuen is the finest province in all China.
" You never see an ill-dressed man from Sz'chueo," says
the Chinese proverb. "It grows more grain in one
year than it can consume in ten," says another native
authority, addicted, I fear, to exaggeration. This pro.
vince appears to produce everything ; more silk than
any other province, more and better wax and to-
bacco, grass-cloth of the finest quality, tea of the
coarsest, grain in such quantities that the supplies act
upon the distant market of Hangchow. Moreover, the
cAmate is variable, extremely hot and cold, just
suited for our woollens. My Chinese authority asserts
that they penetrate there now even through the diffi-
culties of the transit horn Canton ; and he says (I
suspect with some exaggeration), that one-half Of the
long ells and shirtings landed at Canton find their
tedious way over the hills and up the rivers to Sz'ohuen.
We must go up, therefore, above the Kwei falls, and
must pursue our voyage till we reach the confluence of
the Yang-tae with the Kialing, a river which cornea

, down from the north. At this confluence steeds the
great ci y Chuug-king, the second great commercial
einporiniu of (Thies. My authority states that under
the wall. o thi,,; city of Chung-king the lusty young
Yangtzu ie already as broad as the Canton river in front
of the dear departed factories, and very deep and very
rapid. You way go furthar if you rime, for there is
the Western Soochow and all the laud of poppy-bearing
Yunnan higher up. Put the stream grows rocky, and
savages from Tbib et and Burinah make the way dang,rons.
We arc getting to the vicst;.ru boendare. of Ci.ira.
Proper. We have Jene our work. We have "opeeed
up the country?' So here we will turn our steamer's
head—Znail we call her the-Yang-tae?—and rase sveitly
back, t,-,wing our junk loads of tea and silk and wax, and
satisfied, I hope, with ouriipecolative voyage. I have
said nothing of consuls or consular establishments. Tire
merchants appear to incline to the opinion that they do
not want them, and are better without them. They
say that Swatow and Woochow are growing into im-
portance without consular protection, and that the want
is not felt. I differ a little here. If you do not want
consuls to protect, you want them to restrain. We must
not allow a vagabond European population to run riot
is the internal cities of China, or we shall change the
peaceful character .of the people. Wuchang raid
Chung-king might, however, well maintain each a
consul or consular agent with extended jurisdiction,
and this would be ample for a commencement. A.
drove the carrying yinmgaitread soe at one
ofmany
consul may be a great nuiqance. A fussy consul,
not now p
ortisn out of ou
China,
petty difficulties that the Chinamen wrote and down
the up
the coast not to charter British ships. We must haven()
elutes of the Circumlocution-office in the Yang-tae,
As I hare brought our voyage so I must bring this
paper to a close, for the subject is so vast that fresh fields
open upon me more rapidly than the past have been tra-
versed. Surely you can work out for yourselves the tri-
butaries of the Yang-the and the Grand-Canal-pierced
provinces of the north and the canals of the interior.
Brad-ha .'s railway map is a blank -beet compared with
these. I have spoken already of the advantages of the
northern coast wh 31113-kin may be reached from the sea.
Give us free acctss to China ; protect us in the exercise
of our privileges until the Chinese are become acetic-
tome i ta ux aryl u ch•ntand us, and fix our duty pay.
meuts firmly aid explicitly, and everything else will
follow. The, great piracy oitfieul y on the coast will find
its own solution, kr the coaltieils will be °penal, and
sore screw steam compa y will get possession of the
coasting trade. The Custom-house euebear will disappear,
for the goods will be put down at the door of the cus-
tomer. Teas and like will be bought cheaper, for differ-
ent districts will be made to compete when we buy direct
from the producer ; and British manufacture, with
moderate energy and enterprise, will take a fair start.
I ought to say something. of the trade with Thibet
from India, but it is a lung matter, and I have not cou-
rage to ask attention to it. Dr. Campbell, the superin-
tendent of Darjeeling, who I hope has escaped these
recent dangers, understands this subject thoroughly, and
should be heard upon it before our treaty terms are
setthei.

Such are the facts and opinions .I have been able to
gather upon the British import trade into China. The
subject is too vast to be fully treated in these columns.
If I have wearied he public by saying so much, I am
dissatisfied myself at having left so much unsaid. Many
topics press upon me as I resolutely close the paper. Let
me only add that all dealing with the interior of China
is impossible unless your agents speak the language of
the people, as I have done.

LANDING OF TEE FILIBUSTERS IN

NICABAGUA.

We learn by the arrival at New York of the mail
steamer Star of the West, that on the 25th of Nov.
" General" Walker landed with 200 men on the
coast of Nicaragua, in defiance of the United States
sloop of war Saratoga, which was at hand, but the