The evening telegraph. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1864-1918, 1869-09-02
THE CHINESE TREATY.

FfNui me hnNiJu insi.
There has been a degree of mystery about
the ministry to China ever since Mr.. Bur-
hngames resignation to accept the lead Of
the Chinese Embassy Mr. J. Ross Browne
had received the appointment of American
Minister, but was hardly arrived out when
Hon. w. A. Howard, of Michigan. was APP
pointed by President Grant to supersede
him. Mr.. Howard declined the place on the
ground of business engagements at home.
Meantime Mr.. Browne returned to the Pacific
coast, and soon afteuward we receive accounts
of his speeches. and IF at least one letter from
his hand that tends % throw serious discredit
upon the whole character of Mr.. Burlingame's
mission, and to create the very impression
concerning the respect due Chinese authority
at home which best suits the views of Eng
lish and French resident merchants AS Mr..
Browne is now in the country, having de-
cared his unwillin mess to return to Pekin
even if requested, 1t is within his power to
explain the circumstances which now throw "A
cloud over his diplomatic career.
That the trouble at Pekin over the Bur-
lingame Embassy treaty is the fruit of English
and French influence occurs to every one on
the instant The specific, object of the Bur-
lingame mission to the United States, Bel
GUM, Denmark, France, Great Britain, Hol-
land, Italy, North Germany, Prussia, Spain,
and Sweden, was to procure for the central
government of China that formal recognition
from leading foreign powers which would at
once put an end to The petty provincial com
phcations which En- dish and French mer-
chants sedulously encouraged. II has been
the interested habit of the latter to bring
their complaints against the Governors of the
provinces, and to seek reparatiOn of them for
alleged wrongs, declining to recognize any
other or higher authority. They had a de-
hberate motive for !his; their object was to
lndlanlZe the empire by commercially inva-
ding 1t by separate Provinces settling their
differences only with the petty Governors,
and thus by ignoring the Pekin Government,
disintegrating the empire. The entering
wedge of this plot was a commercial, and
therefore AN apparently peaceful one, but the
understanding was that their governments
were ready to sustain their claims as soon as
they could work up cases of alleged outrage
We see almost the same spirit operating in
! the Sandwich Islands, the offspring of the
! purest jealousy of the United States and OF a
determination to oyerrun all the foreign coun-
tries possible.
Mr. Burlingame fortunately persuaded the
Imperial Government at Peliin that if the
! Chinese Empire could once be brought within
the pale of international law, through the
establishment of an equal and advantageous
treaty with foreign powers, il would be posi-
BILE to make a final end of this scheme of
invasion under the guise Of commerce. Such
treaty was concluded with our Government
| first as befitted the circumstances He had
next TO run the gauntlet of England and
| France, in which he manifested marked skill
and ability as n diplomatist, and ended with
triumphantly carrying his point. The rest Of
his task, with such momentum as he has now
secured for it in public favor, will be com
paratively easy. And Just at the high tide of
his success, seeing that it is sure to devote
their own selfish schemes to destruction. il is
not singular that the English and French mer-
chants in China should have made the most
strenuous exertions both to procure the re-
lection of the treaty by the Pekin govern
ment, and to throw discredit upon the char
acter of the embassy itself. They likewise
practised refinement of revenge in having
it go abroad that it is the treaty with the
United States which is rejected, thereby seek
ing to affix stigma on the accredited head of
the embassy as well as on the general autho-
rity under which it acted.
In working Mr.. Browne, the immediate
successor of Mr.. Burlingame, into their pro-
ject, they shrewdly found an instrument al
ready inclined to their own views. He left the
Pacific coast to enter upon his duties as Min
lister with all the California prejudices against
the Chinese strong upon him. If he has gone
SO reprehensibly ont of his way in making a
reply to the address of British merchants at
Shanghai, as to gratuitously denounce the
policy OF MIR. Burlingame, the reason of his
sudden recall will be at once apparent, and
tne necessity for a personal vindcation of
ms conduct very urgent. For he must know
~ "e1l as M RTlinSame does, and eppre;i