CHAPTER IX.

SHANGHAI.

Shanghai -- Importance of its situation -- Consul Balfour -- Germ of municipal institutions -- The foreign settlements -- Confidence and civility of the natives -- Alcock appointed consul, 1846 -- Excursions into the country -- Their limitations -- Responsibilities of consuls.

Of the four new ports, Shanghai, by far the most important, had been fortunate in the selection of its first consul. This was Captain George Balfour of the Madras Artillery, who, like a wise master-builder, laid the foundations of what is now one of the greatest emporia in the world. Captain Balfour had managed the beginnings of the settlement so judiciously that the merchants enjoyed the fullest facilities for prosecuting their business, while the consul maintained good relations with the native authorities and no hostile feeling existed between the foreign and native communities. The circumstances of the place were favourable to all this: the foreign residents were not, as at Canton, confined to a narrow space; they had abundance of elbow-room and perfect freedom of movement in the surrounding district, which was well provided with footpaths and an excellent system of waterways. The people of that part of the country are of a peaceable and rather timid disposition. Altogether, a healthy condition of things had grown up, there seemed to be no grievance felt on either side, while the material prosperity of the natives rapidly increased as a result of a great and expanding foreign trade, to which they had never been accustomed. The regulation of business accommodation and residence was very simple and worked automatically. A certain area, ample for every purpose that could be foreseen, was set apart by the Chinese Government for the residence of foreigners, the location having been indicated by Sir Henry Pottinger on his way from Nanking after the signing of the treaty. The rights of the native proprietors were in no way interfered with, the merchants and others who desired to settle were at liberty to deal with the natives for the purchase of building lots, and as the prices paid were so much above the normal value of the land there was no essential difficulty in effecting purchases. But there being so many interested parties, several years elapsed before the whole area had passed into the possession of foreign occupants. The land remained the property of the Crown, held under perpetual lease, subject only to a small ground-rent, which was collected through the consulates, as at this day. Roads were gradually marked out and jetties for boats were built on the river frontage, and what is now a municipal council served by a large secretarial staff and an imposing body of police, and handling a budget amounting to £130,000, came into existence under the modest title of a "Committee for Roads and Jetties." In the beginning there seems to have been an idea of forming separate reservations of land for the subjects of the three treaty Powers--Great Britain, France, and the United States; but the exigencies of business soon effaced the theoretical distinction as between England and America, whose separate ideal settlements were merged for all practical purposes into one cosmopolitan colony, in which the Powers coming later on the scene enjoyed the same rights as the original pioneers.

To ground thus wisely prepared Mr Alcock succeeded in the autumn of 1846. His four months at Amoy and eighteen at Foochow were only preparatory for the real work which lay before him in the consulate at Shanghai, whither he carried in his train the interpreter Parkes, with whom he had grown accustomed to work so efficiently. Shanghai by this time was already realising the position assigned to it by nature as a great commercial port, and the resident community, 120 Europeans all told, was already forming itself into that novel kind of republic which is so flourishing to-day, while its commercial interests were such as to give its members weight in the administration of their own affairs as well as in matters of public policy.

The level country round Shanghai was, as we have said, very favourable for excursions by land and water, affording tourists and sportsmen congenial recreation. The district was in those days remarkably well stocked with game. Pheasants of the "ring-necked" variety, now so predominant in English preserves, abounded close up to the city wall, and were sometimes found in the gardens of the foreign residents. Snipe, quail, and wildfowl were plentiful in their season, the last named in great variety. All classes of the foreign community took advantage of the freedom of locomotion which they enjoyed. Newly arrived missionaries, no less than newly arrived sportsmen, were encouraged by the ease and safety with which they could prosecute their vocation in the towns and villages accessible from Shanghai. Within the radius authorised by treaty the foreigners soon became familiar objects in a district which is reckoned to support a population as dense as that of Belgium. Not only did friendly relations exist, but a wonderful degree of confidence was established between the natives and foreign tourists. It was not the custom in those days for foreigners to carry money, the only coinage available being of a clumsy and non-portable character. They paid their way by "chits" or orders upon their comprador, and it was not uncommon for them in those early days to pay for supplies during their excursions into the interior by a few hieroglyphics pencilled on a scrap of paper, which the confiding peasant accepted in perfect good faith, and with so little apprehension that sometimes a considerable interval would elapse before presentation of these primitive cheques--until, perhaps, the holder had occasion to make a journey to Shanghai.

But although the foreigner in his proper costume moved freely within the prescribed area, it was considered hazardous to venture beyond these limits. It was also, of course, a nominal contravention of the treaty, for the consequences of which the traveller must take the whole risk. Those, therefore--and they were exceedingly few--who could not repress the desire to penetrate into the interior adopted as a disguise the costume of the natives. It was thus that Fortune made his explorations into the tea districts of China. The notion that either difficulty or danger attended these distant excursions gradually disappeared, and about the year 1855 sportsmen and travellers began to explore the forbidden country without any disguise at all, to the great amusement of the populace, and to the profit of the priests of the temples where they found accommodation.

The consular authorities occupied a peculiar and highly responsible position in China. Their nationals being exempt from native jurisdiction, and subject only to the laws of their own country, promulgated, interpreted, and, when occasion arose, executed, by the consul, that functionary was morally answerable to the people and the Government of China for the good behaviour of his countrymen. On the other hand, it was his primary duty to defend them against all aggression of the Chinese. Between these two opposite duties the consul needed all the discretion, courage, and good judgment that he could command; and it was but natural that individual temperament or the pressure of local circumstances should cause diversity in the mode in which the consuls interpreted their instructions and balanced the different claims of their public duty. As has been said before, Captain Balfour had shown himself most judicious in all his arrangements for the protection and advancement of his countrymen in Shanghai. Foreseeing, notwithstanding the peaceable disposition of the natives, that risks might attend unfettered intercourse with the interior, he had thought it prudent to restrict the rambles of British subjects to the limits of a twenty-four hours' journey from Shanghai,--a limit which coincided with curious exactness with the "thirty-mile radius" of defence against the rebels which was laid down by Admiral Hope eighteen years later.

I. THE TSINGPU AFFAIR.

Attack on three missionaries -- Redress extorted by Consul Alcock -- Its lasting effect.

Affairs in Shanghai had followed a placid and uneventful course until an incident occurred which brought into sudden activity the latent forces of disorder. Within little more than a year after the arrival of Mr Alcock at his new post an outrage was perpetrated on the persons of three English missionaries, which led to the first and the last important struggle between the British and Chinese authorities in Shanghai. The assailants of Messrs Medhurst, Lockhart, and Muirhead, the three missionaries concerned, were not the peaceably disposed natives of the place, but the discharged crews of the Government grain-junks, who had been cast adrift by the officials and left to shift for themselves after the manner of disbanded soldiers. The attack took place at a small walled town called Tsingpu, within the authorised radius, and the three Englishmen came very near losing their lives. Mr Alcock lost not a moment in demanding full redress from the Chinese authorities, who instinctively sheltered themselves under the old evasive pleas which had proved so effective at Canton. It happened that the highest local official, the Taotai, had had experience of the southern port, and, entirely unaware that he was confronted in Shanghai with a man of very different calibre from any he had encountered before, he brought out all the rusty weapons of the Canton armoury, in sure and certain hope of reducing the consul's demands to nullity. Evasion being exhausted, intimidation was tried, and the consul and his interpreter were threatened with the vengeance of an outraged people, quite in the Canton manner. But intimidation was the very worst tactics to try on two Englishmen of the stamp of Alcock and Parkes, and when that card had been played the Chinese game was up.

The situation was one of those critical ones that test moral stamina, that discriminate crucially between a man and a copying-machine. It was also one which illuminated, as by an electric flash, the pivotal point of all our relations with China then as now, for the principle never grows old. It is therefore important to set forth the part played by the responsible officer, the support he obtained, the risks he ran, and the effective results of his action. An absolutely unprovoked murderous outrage had been perpetrated on three Englishmen; the Chinese authorities refused redress with insolence and evasion; acquiescence in the denial of justice would have been as fatal to future good relations at Shanghai as it had been in the previous decade in Canton. What was the official charged with the protection of his countrymen to do? He had no instructions except to conciliate the Chinese; there was no telegraph to England; communication even with the chief superintendent of trade at Hongkong, 850 miles off, was dependent on chance sailing vessels. Delay was equivalent to surrender. Now or never was the peremptory alternative presented to the consul, who, taking his official life in his hands, had to decide and act on his own personal responsibility. Had time allowed of an exchange of views with the plenipotentiary in Hongkong, we know for certain that nothing would have been done, for the first announcement of Mr Alcock's strong measures filled Mr Bonham (who had just succeeded Sir John Davis) with genuine alarm.

Considering the instructions [he wrote] with which you have been furnished from the Foreign Office, dated December 18, 1846, and the limited power and duties of a consul, I cannot but express my regret that you should have taken the steps you have seen fit to do without previous reference to her Majesty's plenipotentiary, as undoubtedly, under the peremptory orders recently received from her Majesty's Government, I should not have considered myself warranted in sanctioning, &c., &c.

Fortunately for the consul and for the peaceful development of British trade, one of Palmerston's specific instructions had been obeyed in Shanghai. There was a British ship of war in port, the 10-gun brig Childers, and, what was of still more importance, a real British _man_ on board of her, Commander Pitman, who shared to the full the Consul's responsibility for what was done.

The measures adopted by Consul Alcock--when negotiation was exhausted--were to announce to the Chinese authorities that, until satisfaction had been obtained, no duties should be paid on cargo imported or exported in British ships: furthermore, that the great junk fleet of 1400 sail, laden and ready for sea with the tribute rice for Peking, should not be allowed to leave the port. The Childers, moored in the stream below the junk anchorage, was in a position to make this a most effective blockade. The rage of the Taotai rose to fever heat, and it was then he threatened, and no doubt attempted to inflame the populace and the whole vagabond class. The Taotai ordered some of the rice-laden junks to proceed; but though there were fifty war-junks to guard them, the masters dared not attempt to pass the ideal barrier thrown across the river by the resolute Captain Pitman.

The outrage took place on the 8th of March. On the 13th the consul presented an ultimatum to the Taotai giving him forty-eight hours to produce the criminals. This being disregarded, the measures above referred to were enforced, with the full approval, it may be mentioned, of the consuls of the two other treaty Powers. At the same time Vice-Consul Robertson, with Parkes for interpreter, was despatched to Nanking on board her Majesty's ship Espiègle to lay the whole case before the viceroy of Kiangnan. The matter was there promptly attended to, full redress was ordered, and the culprits punished exactly three weeks after the assault. The embargo on the rice-junks was removed, and affairs resumed their normal course.[15] The effect of this lesson has never been effaced, harmony having prevailed between British and Chinese officials and people in Shanghai and the province from that day to this.

The circumstances were of course very unusual which placed such ready means of bloodless coercion in the hands of the British consul. The fortuitous coincidence of the time of the outrage with the period of departure of the grain fleet placed a weapon in the consul's hands which of itself would have eventually brought the Chinese to terms, should the matter in the mean time not have been taken out of the hands of the consul and dealt with from Hongkong by the plenipotentiary, whose views have been given above. So soon as the detention of the grain fleet became known to the Government of Peking, orders of a very drastic nature would undoubtedly have been despatched to the viceroy of the province, and both he and his subordinate would have been made answerable for their incompetence in imperilling the supply of rice for the Government. But the pressure was doubly intensified by the appearance of a foreign ship of war under the walls of Nanking. Six years had not elapsed since a similar demonstration had brought the Government to its knees, and to have allowed such an invasion a second time would have drawn down the imperial wrath on the luckless provincial authorities. For Nanking differs from the other provincial capitals, such as Canton and Foochow, inasmuch as it is near the strategic centre of the empire, commanding the main artery of communication with the interior of the country, at the point of intersection of the Yangtze river by the famous Imperial Canal which connects the capital with the richest region in the Yangtze valley. A blockade of the sea-going grain fleet with a simultaneous blockade of these inland waters, so easily effected, would have throttled China. The viceroy, who sent a report on the transaction to the throne by special express, explained away his own hasty action by saying "that the appearance of the barbarian chiefs at the provincial city may have caused anxiety in the sacred breast."

The verdict of the Home Government on the episode was substantially the same as that on Sir John Davis's brilliant expedition on the Canton river the year before: "Gratified with your success, but don't do it again;" in other words, "Do it at your peril, leaving us to applaud or repudiate according to the event." Perhaps it would be more just to say that there were then, as always, conflicting views in the British Cabinet, the apparent vacillations of the Government depending a good deal on which of its members happened, for the moment, to have the parole,--whether the Foreign Secretary, the Colonial Secretary, or other Minister indited the despatch.

Commenting some years later on the general question of our relations with China, Mr Alcock wrote as follows: "A salutary dread of the immediate consequences of violence offered to British subjects, certainty of its creating greater trouble and danger to the native authorities personally than even the most vigorous efforts to protect the foreigners and seize their assailants will entail, seems to be the best and only protection in this country for Englishmen." Palmerston himself could not have laid down the law and common-sense of the case with greater precision.

II. REBELLION.

Taiping rebellion -- Rebel occupation of Shanghai -- Encroachment of investing force on foreign settlement -- Driven off by Anglo-American forces -- The French quarrel with insurgents -- Consequent enlargement of French concession -- The assumption of self-government by the Anglo-American community -- Exemplary conduct of Chinese authorities after their defeat -- French belligerency -- Difficult question of neutrality -- Treatment of native refugees.

Affairs went smoothly and prosperously in Shanghai for another five years, when the greatest calamity that has visited China in modern times cast its shadow on the province and on the city. The appalling ravages of the Taiping rebellion, which, originating in the southern province of Kwangsi, followed the great trade-routes to the Yangtze-kiang and down the course of that stream, leaving absolute desolation in its wake, reached the southern capital, Nanking, on March 8, 1853. The city was paralysed, and surrendered on the 19th, apparently without a struggle; the whole Tartar garrison, numbering 20,000, were put ruthlessly to the sword, not a soul being spared. The whole country, officials and people alike, was thrown into a state of abject fear. The ease with which such Government forces as there were succumbed to the onslaught of the rebel hordes may very well have prompted the rowdy element, which exists more or less everywhere, to make raids on their own account. Such a band, belonging as was supposed to certain secret societies, but without any connection with the main body of the Taipings, who were at the time applying fire and sword to the populous towns on the Yangtze, surprised and captured the walled city of Shanghai. "The news," says an eyewitness, "came like thunder from a clear sky;" there was no thought of the city being in danger either from within or without. The people were panic-stricken at first, but fear with them seemed near akin to criminality, and the scene enacted was what was repeated thousands of times and over a wide area--one of general pillage and destruction. "Several hundred of the usually innocent and simple country-folk--who must have scented their prey as the eagle does the carcass, for as yet it was early morning--fell upon the custom-house, whence they carried off chairs, tables, windows, doors, everything that was portable, leaving the floor littered with books and papers, which were being kicked about and trodden on in a most unceremonious way."

For a period of eighteen months, beginning in September 1853 and ending in February 1855, these rebels held possession of the city. It took a little time before the authorities were able to gather any force to expel them. But they did commence a species of siege which ultimately succeeded in its object. There would be no interest in tracing its progress. What we have to note is the effect which the interregnum produced on the relations between the foreign officials and community and the Chinese.

The first was of a very remarkable character, being nothing less than an armed collision between such foreign forces as could be mustered and the imperialist troops who were investing the city. The Chinese soldiers were in camp at a short distance outside of the foreign settlement, which was exempt from the operations of the war. But the discipline of Chinese troops is never very efficient, and unruly stragglers from the camps kept the foreigners in the settlement in constant hot water. It became, in fact, dangerous for them to take their recreation in the open ground at the back of the settlement, which was used as a racecourse. Immunity from reprisals produced its invariable result, and the aggressions of the soldiery became more persistent and better organised. The foreigners were at last driven to retaliate in their own defence. After a formidable inroad of the Chinese troops, the three treaty consuls met hastily and decided on sending a demand to the Chinese general for the withdrawal of all his soldiers from the vicinity of the settlement, failing which, his position would be attacked at four o'clock the same afternoon by all the available foreign forces. These were, marines and bluejackets from her Britannic Majesty's ships Encounter and Grecian, marines and sailors from the United States ship Plymouth, some sailors from the merchant ships in port, and about 200 of the residents as infantry volunteers. The English force was commanded by Captain O'Callaghan, who was accompanied by Consul Alcock; the Americans were led by Captain Kelley, who was accompanied by Consul Murphy; while the volunteers were commanded by Vice-Consul Wade, subsequently her Majesty's Minister to China. The attack on the Chinese position was completely successful; indeed there was apparently very little resistance, a circumstance which was attributed by Mr Wetmore, who was in the action from beginning to end, to the uncovenanted co-operation of the rebels within the city. It was, nevertheless, according to him, writing nearly forty years after, "a hazardous, if not a reckless, undertaking."

Her Majesty's Government, in a despatch from the Foreign Office dated June 16, "entirely approved of Mr Alcock's proceedings, and they considered that he displayed great courage and judgment in circumstances of no ordinary difficulty"; while the British community unanimously conveyed their warmest thanks to Consul Alcock, Vice-Consul Wade, and the naval officers concerned, for "saving their lives and property from the most imminent jeopardy." And they add that "any symptoms of hesitation and timid policy would inevitably have led to serious consequences and far greater loss of life."

It is to be remarked that the French took no part in this common defence of the settlement, in explanation of which it must be noted that they had never fallen kindly into the cosmopolitan system, but as years went on kept themselves more and more apart, expanding what was a mere consular residence until it covered two populous suburbs embracing half of the circuit of the walled city, and what began as a settlement came to be spoken of as a "concession."

In this situation it was not difficult for them to pick a quarrel on their own account with the rebels, which led to an ineffectual bombardment of the city by French ships of war moored close under the walls. Guns were then landed in the suburb, which was thereafter embraced within the limits of the French concession, the houses being demolished to give play to the artillery. A cannonade lasting many days resulted in a practical breach in the city wall, which was followed up by a combined assault by the French and the imperialist troops, with whom they had allied themselves. The attack was repulsed with severe loss to the assailants.

Among the results of these operations and of the lapse of organised government during eighteen months the most direct was perhaps the establishment of the French on the ground where their batteries had been placed. For reasons military or otherwise, a _tabula rasa_ was made of an immense populous suburb, the ground then admitting of easy occupation and the laying out of streets and roads. The area thus occupied by the French is separated from the cosmopolitan settlement of Shanghai by a tidal creek.

Results less showy, but more important in the interests of humanity and international commerce, were very soon apparent in the cosmopolitan settlement. The first of these was the assumption by the foreign community of the function of self-government and self-protection, and the foundation of that important municipality, which has established as fine a record of public service as any such body has ever done. The inroads of vagabondage and crime would, without the protective measures extemporised for the occasion, have swamped the foreign quarter and reduced it to the desolate condition of the native city. And this necessity of relying on their own strength has no doubt given to the community of Shanghai that tone of self-confidence which has characterised successive generations of them.

The effect of the collision on the relations between the foreign and Chinese authorities can hardly be understood without some explanatory words. In countries where the soldier, sudden and quick in quarrel, seeks the bubble reputation in the cannon's mouth, there is a psychological figment called military honour, which may be symbolised in various ways, as, for example, by a rag at the end of a stick for which brave men will cheerfully die. The warlike traditions which have evolved European codes of honour have no existence in China. _Revanche_, therefore, did not enter into the heads of the defeated Chinese commanders, who contented themselves with posting placards about their camps stating that "the barbarians were about to be annihilated, but that they had ransomed themselves for 300,000 taels, and that an additional 300,000 would be required." Their conduct, however, was quite exemplary during the remainder of the siege, their chief solicitude being to avoid encroaching on the foreign quarter. Whatever be the explanation, the fact is that the Chinese were on better terms with the foreign officials after than they had been before the battle of "Muddy Flat," fought on the 4th of April 1854. Within ten days they were amicably settling in concert the ground for a new camp, which would not hamper the military operations of the besiegers nor yet compromise the sanctity of the foreign settlement.

Thus there was no obstacle whatever in the way of concerting with the nearest representatives of the Government of China all those measures which were demanded by the position of neutrality assumed by the British Government between the insurgents and imperialist forces, and also for the regulation and control of the Chinese refugees, who poured into the foreign settlement to escape the rapine of savage war. The neutrality of the British representative was difficult to maintain: by force of circumstances it took a benevolent form towards the beleaguered rebels, who were dependent for their continued existence upon supplies received from and through the foreign settlement. The situation was complicated by the action of the French, who, having quarrelled with the insurgents, entered on the stage as a third belligerent. Thereupon the French authorities made a grievance of "the scandal of supplies being furnished to the declared enemies of the French in the sight and under the protection of our English guard," France being at the time allied with Great Britain in prosecuting the war in the Crimea. Consul Alcock, whose sense of propriety had already been considerably shocked by the facilities which the position of the cosmopolitan settlement afforded for conveying supplies into the city, treated the appeal of his French colleague with respect, and made it the text of a representation to the senior naval officer, urging him, if possible, to devise means in conjunction with the measures which were already being adopted in the settlement for enforcing British neutrality, so that "we may be able to give an honest answer to all three belligerents--imperialists, insurgents, and French." This policy was at the same time proclaimed by a unanimous resolution of the largest meeting of residents ever, up to that time, assembled in Shanghai.

The question of the influx of refugees seems not to have met with such a prompt solution, but that was due rather to the British plenipotentiary's caution than to the obstruction of the Chinese. In a despatch to Sir John Bowring, dated June 5, 1854, the consul thus describes the evil in question:--

As regards the strange and altogether unsatisfactory position in which we are placed by the pouring in of a large Chinese population, who have squatted down within our limits contrary to the standing edicts of their own authorities, and run up whole streets of wooden and brick tenements, giving cover to every species of vice and filth, I have only to remark that a walk through the settlement [the governor was expected on a visit] will, I am convinced, satisfy your Excellency that the evil is already too great and increasing at too rapid a rate to be overlooked. The health of foreign residents, the security of their property, and the very tenability of the place as a foreign location, alike render it imperative that a jurisdiction of some kind should be promptly and energetically asserted.

The important negotiations which, within three months, issued in the birth of the Foreign Maritime Customs, must be regarded as by far the most important outcome of the rebel episode of 1854-55.

III. THE CHINESE MARITIME CUSTOMS.

Extent and audacity of smuggling -- Alcock's determination to suppress it -- His report on the position -- Corruption of the Chinese customs service -- Efforts of the British Government to co-operate in collecting dues -- Nullified by treaties with other Powers -- Consequent injury to all foreign trade -- Unexpected solution of the difficulty during the interregnum -- Impetus given to trade by the Taiping rebellion -- Alcock with French and American consuls takes over the customs and collects all dues in trust for the Chinese Government -- Promissory notes employed -- Conditions which made it impossible to enforce payment -- Notes ultimately cancelled.

Certain crying evils in foreign intercourse having arrested the attention of Consul Alcock from the day of his arrival in China, he bent himself strenuously to the task of overcoming or mitigating them. They formed the subject-matter of many anxious reports to his superiors, for Mr Alcock always took both a serious and a comprehensive view of his duties. For many years there seemed little hope of a successful issue to these labours; but at last a rift in the clouds opened up the prospect of coping with at least one of them, and that was smuggling. So universal was this practice that it seemed a necessary and natural feature of all commercial dealings in China. As its roots lay deep in the Chinese character and civilisation, no stigma attached to the venality of the officials charged with the collection of the maritime revenues. Although the practice was in extent universal, it was by no means wholesale in degree, and where the facilities for evading duties were so tempting, merchants must often have been astonished at their own moderation.

Among the legends of the coast, it is true, there were certain _tours de force_ in the way of smuggling which made good topics for walnuts-and-wine conversation among a community which was rather lacking in subjects of general interest,--as of an apocryphal ship clearing from China in ballast or with coal which would mysteriously land in England a full cargo of tea, which had been taken on board without being passed through the custom-house. Conversely, a shipload of manufactured goods taken on board in England would melt on the passage to China like a cargo of ice, so far as the records in the Chinese custom-house would show. One special feat was kept alive, post-prandially, for many years as the acme of audacious smuggling. British goods were entered at the custom-house "for re-exportation," and no duty paid. The merchant packed the empty cases with silk, which was thus shipped under the original English marks, and was described as calicoes, on which a "drawback" was claimed of import duties which had never been paid at all. Such racy anecdotes belonged to the order of Rabelaisian humour which inspired the boast of a certain Lancashire manufacturer at the time when, owing to the scarcity and high price of cotton, the "filling" of shirtings with plaster of Paris and other substances to make up the required weight of the piece was raised to almost the dignity of a fine art. Complaints being made by the consumer that the cloth so compounded would not wash, this genial Lancastrian declared that for his part he would never rest satisfied until he could turn out his calicoes without any cotton in them at all.

Shanghai, of course, was the great centre of the smuggling trade. What smuggling was done at Canton, being the only other important entrepot, was on a system which was regulated by the customs authorities themselves, and the testimony of Mr Alexander Matheson before the House of Commons Committee was to the effect that their tariff was so light that it was not worth the merchant's while to smuggle. Such, however, was not the view taken by Mr Consul Alcock, who regarded the smuggling system as a very serious evil, against which he waged a relentless war. He not only compelled, as far as lay in his power, the British merchants to comply with the letter of the treaty in their dealings with the customs, but he further considered himself bound to enforce on the Chinese officials themselves the proper discharge of their duty. In these efforts to abolish irregular practices, which all deplored, many of the British merchants were only too willing to co-operate with the consul's efforts, and the Foreign Office was repeatedly moved to take some action in the reform of these abuses. The difficulties and anomalies of the situation were fully set forth by Mr Alcock in many reports made to his superior, the chief superintendent of trade, as the following extract, written in 1851, will exemplify:--

How the commercial and custom-house system of the West and the very opposite principles and practice of the East might be combined so that both should work together with the least possible friction and prejudice, was a difficult problem, no doubt, for those who had the framing of existing treaties. How even the trading operations of foreign merchants, based upon good faith and honesty, could be in any way associated with the corrupt and inept administration of the Chinese custom-house, so that the revenue of the latter alone should be liable to suffer and not the foreign trade, though apparently a simpler task, seems to have presented to the negotiators insuperable difficulties. For one or other of these problems, nevertheless, it was essential they should find some adequate solution, or whatever treaties might be signed their real mission was unfulfilled, and the basis of all future trading relations left unstable and unsatisfactory.

We cannot suppose this important fact was overlooked by the British Government, which, on the contrary, appears to have sought earnestly to meet the difficulty by undertaking in good faith to co-operate with the Chinese authorities in collecting the duties on British trade. Neither is it clear that failure would have attended such a course had not a disturbing element been speedily introduced from without for which adequate provision does not seem to have been made. We allude to the ratification of treaties with other Governments which should repudiate all obligation on this point to contribute to the protection of the Chinese revenue. It might have been supposed that the Chinese Government, having obtained so great and unquestionable an advantage from the Power they had most to fear, would scarcely have been so foolish as to throw it away upon the first occasion, yet such proved to be the fact, and some credit was taken by the United States commissioner for the omission of all co-operative clauses. Two treaties in consequence came into operation, founded upon different principles--the one subversive of the other in a very essential point. So much was this the case that no fair trial could be given to the provisions of the British treaty respecting the payment of duties, and any attempt to act upon the system contemplated in it became altogether unpracticable so soon as the alteration of our navigation laws opened our ports to foreign shipping.

We found that to secure the essential objects of these treaties as they now stand there is one thing plainly wanting and yet essential, an honest and efficient custom-house, and who does not see that this is unattainable in China? Too much or too little has been done, therefore. We should either have refused to concede a right to levy maritime duties, or obtained as the condition some better guarantee for its impartial exercise. It should have been remembered that although a foreign Power might give this right to the Emperor of China, it could not so easily give him honest and faithful servants, without which custom-house duties cannot be fairly levied. The very attempt to profit by such a right partially, and with manifestly imperfect means, could not fail to prove injurious to the trade it was the great object of the treaties to develop and protect. It is superfluous now to say that against this evil no sufficient provision was made, and the result has been perpetual and irreconcilable antagonism. From the first day the American treaty came into operation the contracting parties, Chinese and foreign, have been placed in a false position in regard to each other and to the permanent interests of both. The emperor had obtained a right he could not unaided duly exercise, and the foreign merchant was laid under a legal obligation which under such circumstances tended to make his trading privileges nugatory. The former was daily exposed to the loss of the whole or a part of a revenue to which he was by treaty legally entitled, as the price of commercial privileges to the foreigner; and the latter, in so far as he recognised his obligation to pay to such revenue, was debarred from trading with advantage or profit.

Loss to the custom-house is palpably only one of the mischiefs resulting, and injury to foreign trade is the direct consequence in a far more important degree. There may be some disposed to question this, but when no man can calculate on entering into an operation within 15 or 20 per cent of the prime cost of his merchandise before it shall leave his hands, and his next-door neighbour may gain advantage over him to this amount, while the ordinary margin of profit seldom exceeds that range, it is difficult to arrive at any other conclusion. And when we consider that the natural tendency of partial smuggling is to raise the price in the buying and to lower it in the selling market, its disastrous influence on the general prosperity of the trade must be too plain to admit of contradiction. However it may temporarily enrich a few, it must eventually impoverish many.

The British plenipotentiary may have thought that smuggling, so far as the interests of trade were concerned, would affect only the Chinese revenue: the American commissioner clearly must have concluded so, and on this supposition acted. But experience has abundantly proved such a conclusion erroneous, and based upon a partial view of the whole case.

The solution of all these difficulties, and the end of the apparently hopeless struggle to set things right, came about in a way that must have been totally unexpected by all parties. It was through the capture of Shanghai by the rebel band in 1853.

The day the city fell the functions of the custom-house ceased, but trade continued without interruption; indeed the export trade was naturally stimulated by the eagerness of the natives to convert their produce into money, and by the desire of the foreign merchants to get their purchases safely on board ship. But there was no one in a position to collect the dues. Mr Alcock, never timid when he had a case for action which satisfied his own mind, proposed to his French and American colleagues, who also never seemed to hesitate to follow his lead, a method of bridging over the interregnum of the Chinese authority and at the same time establishing for the first time the precedent of collecting full duties. The plan was that the consuls should themselves perform the functions which the Chinese officials had never performed--take a rigid account of the goods landed and shipped, and receive the amount of the duty on them, to be held in trust for the Chinese Government when it should once more be resuscitated in Shanghai. Not in coin, however, but in promissory notes payable on conditions which were complicated by the necessity of maintaining equality of treatment between the various nationalities concerned. The contingencies were, in fact, such that it would never have been possible to enforce payment of the notes, and in the end they were all cancelled and returned to the merchants, so that during the ten months between September 1853 and July 1854 there were no duties collected at all at the port of Shanghai.

IV. CREATION OF THE FOREIGN CUSTOMS.

The provisional system -- British and American ships pay full dues -- Other nations enter and clear free -- Americans follow the same course -- Alcock's strict views of neutrality -- Danger of infringing it by establishment of Government officials within the foreign colony -- Breakdown of the provisional system -- Alcock calls upon the Imperial Government -- Custom-house re-established by the Taotai Wu -- Reappearance of all abuses -- Alcock's remonstrances -- Antecedents of Wu -- He makes private arrangements and admits vessels free of dues -- Alcock allows British ships to do likewise -- Shanghai thus becomes a free port -- Alcock's efforts to meet the difficulty -- First idea of the foreign customs -- Conditions of success -- Conference with the Taotai -- Delegates appointed -- New custom-house inaugurated July 12, 1854 -- Mr H. N. Lay appointed Inspector-General -- Conditions and essential features which caused immediate and permanent success of the foreign customs.

The "provisional system," as it was called, worked smoothly for four months, but not equally, for while British and American ships paid full duties (in conditional promissory notes), those of other nationalities, having mercantile consuls, were entered and cleared exempt from all duty. One Prussian, one Hamburg, two Siamese, one Austrian, three Danish, and two Spanish--in all ten vessels--were so cleared between September and January, which was, of course, a serious injustice to the competing merchants on whose ventures full duties were levied. In vain might the British consul argue that the cargoes of these defaulting ships bore no larger a proportion to the whole trade than in normal conditions the smugglers would bear to the honest traders. The American consul, sympathising with the latter, notified on January 20, 1854, his secession from the provisional compact, to which decision he gave immediate effect by allowing two vessels, the Oneida and Science, to depart without payment or security of any kind. It was impossible after this for the British authorities to continue to lay a burden on their nationals from which competitors were thus freeing themselves, the more especially as on broader considerations their collecting duties at all for the Chinese had been, three years previously, pronounced inexpedient by the British Government. However commendable, therefore, on political and moral grounds, and however convenient as a stop-gap, the provisional system was doomed. The next move was by some means or other to procure the re-establishment of a legal Chinese custom-house.

This would have been done at an earlier period but for the strict views held by Mr Alcock on the question of neutrality between the belligerents. The soil of the foreign settlement had been declared sacred and neutral. To permit any Chinese authority to use it even for fiscal purposes seemed a violation of its neutrality. Besides, native officials exercising their functions there would have had either to protect themselves by military force, however small, or to be protected by the foreigners, in either case compromising the neutrality of the settlement. When the Chinese officials proposed as an alternative to discharge customs functions afloat in the river, the same objections presented themselves. The foreigners must in that case also have defended the revenue collectors from attack by the rebels. The customs authority therefore remained dormant.

But on the breakdown of the provisional system whereby the three treaty consuls acted as trustees for the Chinese Government, there was no alternative left between making Shanghai absolutely a free port and setting up some sort of native custom-house. As the lesser evil--to say no more--Mr Alcock chose the latter, and within three weeks of the lapse of the provisional system he had "called upon the imperial authorities to re-establish a custom-house in some convenient locality," offering at the same time to afford them the necessary facilities for working it. The custom-house was, in fact, re-established by the Taotai Wu on February 9, when the provisional system of collecting duties, a system never favoured by the British Government, was finally and officially terminated.

The reinstatement of the custom-house under the superintendency of the Taotai Wu was the signal for the prompt reappearance of all the worst irregularities in an exaggerated form.

The admonitions that official received from Mr Alcock on his treaty rights and on the necessity for strictness and impartial accuracy were completely thrown away. The Taotai had been formerly a merchant in Canton, under the name Samqua; and whether it was the passion for a "deal" inspired by early training, or the corruption of good manners by subsequent association with official life, or, as is most likely, a double dose of both, without the checks appropriate to either, he, the superintendent of customs, fell at once to making private bargains with individual merchants. By arrangement with him a Bremen ship, the Aristides, was allowed to enter and clear without complying with a single customs or port regulation or the payment of any dues, save what may have been paid to Wu himself by way of douceur. Two American ships and one British were dealt with in similar fashion. These facts being brought to the notice of Mr Alcock, he called the Taotai to account, and on receiving only subterfuges instead of explanation, he thenceforth allowed openly to British ships the same privileges that the Chinese authorities had voluntarily, though secretly, conferred on those who chose to make corrupt bargains with them. That is to say, Shanghai became now--from April 1854--absolutely a free port.

At last, then, there was a real _tabula rasa_ inviting a fresh experiment; and Mr Alcock immediately applied his mind to devising some new expedient to meet the difficulty. The Chinese superintendent, however willing to compound to his own advantage for the customs dues, was as little pleased with its complete abolition as the foreign authorities themselves, and he had made sundry alternative proposals, based on his experience at Canton, for the effective collection of duties. It seemed, however, that in the hands of such a facile official, or any one likely to succeed him, his remedies against smuggling were worse than the disease, and the necessity of a new departure began seriously to occupy the minds of the treaty consuls. The outcome was a novel scheme, which was mooted in a despatch to Sir John Bowring, dated May 1, 1854, in which Consul Alcock, while recognising that "the attempt will not be unaccompanied by serious difficulties," declared that he "did not relinquish all hope of success _if the collection of duties can in any way be brought under the effective control of the three treaty Powers as to the executive of the custom-house administration_."

"On any other basis," he added, "I believe every effort to benefit the Chinese revenue and at the same time protect the honest merchant must in the nature of things prove nugatory." The idea took further shape in a memorandum of suggestions drawn up by Mr Alcock on 15th June, when he stated that "the sole issue out of the difficulties by which the whole subject is beset under existing treaties is to be sought in the combination of a _foreign element of probity and vigilance with Chinese authority_."

He adds as the first condition of success the "free concurrence of the Chinese authorities" in any scheme which may be concocted, and then proposes "the association with the Chinese executive of a responsible and trustworthy foreign _inspector of customs_ as the delegate of the three treaty Powers, to be appointed by the consuls and Taotai conjointly at a liberal salary." This is put down at $6000 per annum, the whole foreign staff to cost $12,000, and various details of administration follow.

It argues well for the absence of international jealousy in those days that Mr Alcock proposed that a French gentleman of the name of Smith, in the French consular service, should be the inspector whom he and the American consul agreed to recommend to the Taotai. In a despatch to M. Edan on the 27th of June 1854 he solicited his official sanction to the appointment.

The next step was a conference where the three treaty consuls--Alcock, Murphy, and Edan--received the Taotai, who discussed with them and then adopted substantially, though with some modifications, the "suggestions" above quoted.

Instead of one delegate from the three consuls, it was decided that each was to appoint one, the three delegates then forming a "board of inspectors with a single and united action." As many questions of national and international jurisdiction were likely to arise out of the executive functions of the inspectors, provision was made for dealing with them, and as far as human ingenuity could foresee without any experience to guide, every contingency, down to the minutiæ of internal administration, was considered in the instructions given to the inspectors. The announcement of the newly-constituted Customs Board was formally made by the consuls on July 6, and the new custom-house was inaugurated on the 12th, the three inspectors being Mr T. F. Wade, British; Mr Lewis Carr, American; and M. Smith, French.

The new custom-house was an immediate success: it fulfilled every purpose for which it was created, yielding its full revenue to the Chinese Government, and putting an end to the temptations of traders to seek illicit advantages over each other. It says much for the soundness of the principles on which it was established that not only has the custom-house of 1854 survived the shock of rebellion and war, of extended treaties, of the multiplication of trading-ports from five to thirty and of treaty Powers from three to thirteen, but its roots have struck deep and its branches have spread wide over every portion of the empire, and that in spite of the opposition of powerful provincial officials, whose revenues it curtailed by diverting them into the imperial channel. The triumvirate Board under which the institution was launched was little more than nominal, the direction of the customs being a one-man power from the outset, one only of the three inspectors possessing either the knowledge, capacity, or zeal needed to infuse life into the new department.

The first English inspector, who was only lent for a time to start the new enterprise, was replaced in a few months by Mr H. N. Lay, interpreter to the consulate, who definitively retired from the British in order to enter the Chinese service, while Mr Wade returned to his vice-consular duties. The functions of the Board of Inspectors were soon consolidated in the office of Inspector-General, which was conferred upon Mr Lay, and held by him until 1863, when he was obliged to resign the service of the Chinese Government in consequence of their failure to ratify his engagements in connection with the Osborn flotilla.

It only remains to mention in this place that coincident with the establishment of the maritime customs in Shanghai came the instructions from her Majesty's Government to cancel the promissory notes, amounting to a million of dollars, which had been given by the British merchants for duties during the interregnum, the conditions attached rendering them legally invalid.

Although the organisation of the foreign customs was an expedient to meet an emergency never likely to recur, the transaction, nevertheless, forms a brief epitome of the ideal foreign relations with China, and it is useful therefore to note what were its essential features and the conditions of its creation.

_First._ The Chinese Government were reduced to helplessness and were amenable to advice.

_Second._ Corruption and laxity were inherent in their nature and ineradicable except by external force.

_Third._ The external force, to be savingly applied, must not be subversive of Chinese authority, but must supply the element in administration in which the natives are absolutely wanting, and which is so tersely summarised by Mr Alcock as "vigilance and probity."

_Fourth._ This combination of Chinese authority with foreign vigilance and probity, which has rendered the Chinese customs service a kind of miracle of reform, was capable of renovating the whole Chinese administration. Why it has not been extended into the other departments of state is only another form of lament over lost opportunities.

_Fifth._ That the system was established on the broadest cosmopolitan basis.

V. MR ALCOCK'S DEPARTURE FROM SHANGHAI.

Promoted to Canton -- Impression he had made upon the European colony of Shanghai -- Their confidence in his integrity and ability -- His domestic life -- First literary work -- Condition of affairs at Canton -- Difficulties and obstructions -- Alcock leaves for home before the outbreak of 1856.

With these distinguished services Mr Alcock's career in Shanghai was brought to a close. He was promoted to the senior consulate at Canton, but he remained long enough in his northern post to see the city of Shanghai once more in possession of the constituted authorities and the restoration of peace in the vicinity of the port. Being practically starved out, the insurgents set fire to the city and made the best escape they could during the night, which happened to be the last night of the Chinese year, 17th February 1855. Some may have escaped, but the greater part fell into the hands of their enemies, and for weeks afterwards many a ghastly trophy in the neighbourhood attested the ruthless treatment which the fugitives received, recalling the realistic picture in a certain epitaph of Villon.

On his departure from Shanghai in April of that year Mr Alcock received a flattering testimonial from the British residents, who were cordially joined by both French and Americans. This compliment had the special value of being practically unanimous, while yet by no means undiscriminating. As a curious characteristic of the social relations of the community at that time, it may be mentioned that the document was presented in two parts, substantially the same, but differently worded. The explanation of the dual presentation is to be found in the etiquette which was commonly observed between the Montagues and the Capulets of the period, it being considered a point of honour that neither should follow the signature of the other; hence the two leading members of the community had each to head a separate list.

It was impossible for an officer of such strict views and such an uncompromising character to live for eight years in the midst of an independent population whom he had to treat as his subjects without provoking occasional resentment, and creating friction in carrying out the details of his administration. Moreover, his public acts were of too decisive a quality to commend themselves to universal approval. Yet, frankly recognising all this, the memorialists state, "In whatever degree as individuals we may have approved or dissented from any of your acts of public policy, we are all ready to do justice to the singleness of purpose and sense of public duty under which you have uniformly acted. We believe that you have throughout held in view your conscientious convictions of what was right and just, and that no undue external influence has at any time operated to divert you from them." In fact, the Shanghai community--_quorum pars fui_--were proud of their consul, and looked up to him as soldiers do to a commander in whom they have absolute confidence. They felt themselves ennobled by contact with a character _sans peur et sans reproche_. Above all, he represented before the Chinese authorities the dignity of his country in a manner which has rarely been equalled, and gratitude for that patriotic service would of itself have covered a multitude of sins. The feeling of respect so generated reconciled the residents to that which in another man might have been held to savour of coldness, for in social life he was reserved, if not somewhat haughty in his bearing,--partly no doubt from temperament, but chiefly from absorption in the duties and responsibilities of his office, in researches into all the matters which concerned his work, and in the study of subjects which were congenial to his mind. It may also be said, without reflection on either party, that those robust recreations which engrossed the leisure of younger men--and the community was very young--were not of a kind with which the consul had much personal sympathy. His own distractions were more of a literary and reflective order. He did not unbend to gain popularity.

His domestic life left him nothing to desire in the way of society. To his wife he was most devoted, and to her he addressed, in half soliloquy, a series of thoughts on religious subjects which reveal more than anything the deep earnestness of his nature. When this loving helpmeet was snatched from his side in March 1853, the calm exterior was little disturbed; but having to face that immense gap in his life, he was thrown more than ever on his mental resources. His isolation was the more keenly felt when he was relieved from the heavy demand which the affairs of Shanghai had made on his energies, and it was in the comparative leisure of Canton that he composed his first serious political contribution to periodical literature, an outlet for his thoughts which proved such an attraction to him to the end of his life. His first essay was an article in the 'Bombay Quarterly Review' on "The Chinese Empire and its Destinies," published in October 1855. It was soon followed by a second, entitled "The Chinese Empire and its Foreign Relations," a paper which fills no less than seventy-eight pages of the 'Review.' The two together form an able disquisition on the state of China which has not become obsolete by lapse of time.

It was during the same period also that he composed that series of short essays which were published anonymously under the title of 'Life's Problems.' Instead of attempting any appreciation of that little volume, we prefer to quote the impression it made on one reader many years afterwards. In a letter of Dora Greenwell, published in her Memoirs, she says: "I have met with a friend, a book that seems to take my whole rational nature along with it. I have seen no such book now or at any former time; and it is a book I have often longed for, yet never hoped for--a book contemplating _life_ as it is in a Christian spirit, yet from the natural standpoint."

The consulate in Canton during the year that Mr Alcock occupied the post presented nothing of sensational interest. There was a superficial lull there, the lull before the storm which burst in October 1856, after Mr Alcock had left for home on his first well-earned furlough. The chronic obstruction to business and the old difficulties in communicating with the Chinese authorities formed the burden of his reports to his chief, Sir John Bowring. The question of direct intercourse and of access to the city, which had been put off from time to time, was still unsettled. The definitive postponement of the treaty right of entry till 1849 had not rendered the solution of it one whit easier. On the contrary, the concession had only served to confirm the Chinese officials and people in their determination to resist the claim for ever. On the accession of Lord Palmerston to the Premiership in 1855 the dormant claim was revived, and Sir John Bowring was instructed by the Government to obtain unrestricted intercourse with the native authorities and the full exercise of the right of admission to all the cities which were opened to trade, Canton included. To repeated applications of this tenor the Viceroy Yeh replied by the traditional evasions, thus laying the train for the explosion which soon followed.

Mr Alcock being personally severed from the chain of events which led to the outbreak of hostilities in the autumn of 1856, it will be convenient here to suspend the narrative and glance at some of those general questions which form the subject-matter of our relations with China.

FOOTNOTE:

[15] See this whole transaction described in his characteristic manner by De Quincey in his brochure on China, originally published in Titan, 1857.