THE CHINA TRADE.
THE destruction of opium, worth between two and three millions sterling, which was going on at the rate of 300 chests daily when the last accounts left Canton, proves the Chinese Government quite in earnest in their declared intention to stop the trade, and to pre- vent the consumption of foreign opium in China—if they can. The reason assigned for this proceeding, is a care for the subjects of the empire, sanatory and moral. Now it may be true that this is merely a make-believe ; and that opium, used in modeiation, is not more hurtful to the user than wine, whisky, or other "medicines for the mind." An ingenious correspondent of the Colonial Gazette, two or three months ago, endeavoured, and we thought with considerable success, to make out that any peculiar reproba- tion of opium above all other stimulants was unfair ; that the " thunder of the law" or the pulpit might with equal justice be burled upon gin, old port, or the liquor of which a London coal- heaver commonly imbibes six quarts daily. Moreover, he showed that the opium-poppy is largely cultivated by the Chinese them- selves, on their own soil ; and that the Celestial authorities had winked at the foreign smuggling-trade in opium, until it had be- come very large and valuable. But really these considerations are beside the main questions— the right of the Chinese Government to exclude opium, and the consequences of' its effectual prohibition on the commerce of this country and of British India with China. The Spectator has never subscribed to the doctrine, that because the Chinese Govern- ment may assign false Motives for the execution of laws long in abeyance, those laws may be trampled on by foreigners, or the exac- tion of the penalty for infringing them made the subject of national quarrel. An enactment secretly made and suddenly enforced, to the injury of British subjects in a foreign country, would be a fair ground of complaint against the government of that country ; but the prohibition of the opium-trade in China was notorious, and the parties engaged in it were warned by repeated edicts of the risk incurred in its prosecution. Were opium as nutritive as wheat,. or as harmless as rice, the question of right to prevent its importation would remain untouched. And suppose, as the writer in August last, already alluded to, did suppose, that the Emperor was in- fluenced by the desire of certain owners of poppy-land in China to secure a monopoly : what then ? Could a government which sup- ports and a country which tolerates cora-laws pretend that such a policy is contrary to international law ? No, no ; the perfect right of the Chinese authorities, as between China and foreign states, to prohibit opium, will not bear disputing about ; while the wisdom of their conduct in this matter—even supposing the object were to derive a revenue from home-grown opium—is at least as clear as that of the British Legislature, which forbids the growth of tobacco in Ireland in order to secure the tax on tobacco imported.
On the preliminary question of right, then, we are out of court : what follows ? Must our despoiled countrymen submit to what has befallen them, in silent acquiescence; and not only so, but abandon as hopeless all their cherished projects of extended commerce with the most numerous people, and for commerce one of the most favourable countries, in the world ? In a word, how can the trading relations of Englishmen with the Chinese be restored, enlarged, and rendered less riskful ? This interesting question is opened, and discussed dispassionately in its various bearings, in the last number of the Colonial Gazette. The demands on our space forbid the transference of that elaborate paper to the columns of the Spectator, and mere abridgment is unsatisflictory; but we shall give some indications of points, and an extract or two.
" A third view of the case will lea(l us to suppose that the Celestial autho- rities have been influenced, as commonly happens in human affairs, by mixed motives. But whether their object is to put an end to British dominion in China, or to the opium trade, or to both, the obstacles to a restoration of foreign commercial intercourse appear equally formidable. All experience teaches that submission even to a just exercise of' force by such a power as the Chinese government, is the sure forerunner of unjust violence whenever op- portunity serves. If we should yield obedience to the recent anti-opium edicts,—if we shouli abstain from demanding compensation for the losses of our merchants and retribution fur alleged injury and insult to the subjects and officers of the British Crown,—still more, if we should withdraw from China the dominion which we have there established, and strictly confine our relations with the Chinese to such commercial intercourse as their laws may per- mit,—in that case assuredly it would be vain to hope for any but a very limited, impeded, riskful, and precarious trade. On the other hand, some propose to try the efficacy of force. That would scarcely be an experiment ; for the result may be assumed. Judging by all accounts of the Chinese government, and especially by all the occasions on which they have conic into violent contact with a foreign power, including their contests with the pirates who recently in- fested the Imperial shores, no doubt can be entertained. that England possesses the means of exacting almost whatever she might require from them. But the right and the policy of a recourse to violence are very ditTercut questions. Supposing that we had this right—which may lie altogether denied without reference to any but European ideas of international justice—still the hope- licy of exercising it is obvious. Even mere threats from the British Govern- ment, though couched, as no doubt they would be, in the form of a demand for redress of grievances, would, if their object were the particular advantage of British traders in China, be viewed with jealousy by several European govern- ments, and still more by that of the United States. Let it be supposed, how- ever, that, disregarding the jealousy of other nations, we had compelled the rulers of China to establish our trade there on a satisfactory footing, would not the Dutch, the Russians, the French, and above all the Americans, de- mand, each nation for itself, as with equal facility they all might obtain, simi- lar concessions from the feeble Mandarins? Such demands, on the part of some at least of those governments, would, it seems hardly doubtful, be the consequence of the successful use of force or threats by the British govern- ment. Thus the weakness of the Chinese government would be exposed to its own subjects and to foreign nations. Other exposures of the same kind could not but ensue. Foreigners of all nations would enter China, and farther expose to the people not the weakness only but the badness also of the Celes- tial rule. Next, the foreigners of each nation, having obtained some footing in China, would, if we are to conjecture from all experience, seek to obtain privileges; each party striving to gain more than its rivals, and to injure them as much as possible. -When we reflect also that each party of ffireign- ers in China would be so far removed from the control of its own government as to act almost without responsibility, there is reason to conclude that the rivalry among those foreign adventurers would not be confined to trade, but would extend, as soon as it bad been shown that the Mandarins were unable to resist aggression, to interference between the people and their masters—to the excitement of revolt and civil war—and finally to territorial acquisition. In this way contests must arise between some of those bodies of foreign ads venturers; and by degrees, probably, each party would inlist its distant go- vernment in the quarrel, until at length the miserable government of China being dissolved, or rather dissolving, as soon as its weakness had been made conspicuous, China would become, as Hindostan has been in modern time, a theatre of war for foreign nations. Through the smoke of the first shot which one imagines to be tired by the English in the Bocea Tigris, is seen the Ce- lestial Empire crumbling to pieces—the foreground of a long vista of focretiugit encroachment, rividity, rapine, and bloodshed. But we are drawing a pire which will never be realized. The increased benevolence and the more lively sense of moral justice which prevail in these days, forbid that China should run the course of India. Force will not be tried. If we have no trade with the Chinese but that which is maintained by arms, we shall have none at all. Feither in submission nor in violence is there the least prospect of establishing permanent and satisfactory commercial relations with this singular country."* In considering what should be done in order to found a regular and safe commerce with China, it is necessary, first, to ascertain what are the real obstacles to the existence of such relations now. The notion that a sensitive regard to the morals of their subjects influenced the Tartar Sovereigns of China to stop a very profitable trade, which for many years they had tacitly encouraged, and which was once on the point of being sanctioned by an Imperial edict, may safely be dismissed. It was not a holy horror of opium, but a political fear of foreigners, which drove the Government at Pekin to proceedings certain to interrupt, if not to terminate, the inter- course of the conquerors of India with the Chinese. The paper in the Colonial Gazette reminds us that the "Act to regulate the Trade to China and India," passed in 1833, established a British authority within the dominions of the Emperor of China, in the shape of a Commissioner empowered to impose penalties, forfeiture, and mtprisonments, and to levy certain duties on tonnage and goods for the maintenance of this authority, and to defray the expenses of such commission within the Chinese dominions. " Human ingenuity could not have devised a measure more calculated to alarm the ruling class in China; nor is there in the world a govern- ment, save that of Japan, to whom such treatment by a foreign * Colonial Gazette, Wednesday, 30th October; article "How to Restore, Improve, and Extend the Foreign Trade of China."
been the custom of the Chinese Government to state the true reasons for their acts, it is highly probable that the law autho "
rime this imperium in imperio—this commencement, as it must appear
woulA have been assigned as the motive for measures which re. strieted, and might altogether prevent, the access of these ambitious Europeans.
If it is true, as none will dispute, that British connexions with China are valuable chiefly, if not entirely, for the sake of eon. merce,—and if it is also true, as is highly probable, that the jealousy of the Chinese Government is political, though morality is its cloak,—we conic at once to the practical point, how can this poll. tical jealousy be disarmed, and the valuable commerce be restored and improved ? The Colonial Gazette suggests the means. On the coast of China there are numerous habitable islands, in which the Imperial Government has no authority. They are generally occupied by pirates and a few wretched fishermen, kept in check by British and Portuguese traders, who " have induced these rob- bers to be content with an annual trihute paid to them by the Chinelo Neither the Emperor nor his ancestors, nor any of the foreign race to which he bdongs, ever conquered the islands to which we allude, or ever exercised there any species of rule. They ft?'(; a sort of 110-2nall'S-land, WM619 loccafise they want law, and order, and protection property. They are eissi, therefore, to be appropriated by any power capable of holding them. r"iil mielit be taken possession of by England without the slightest hive-
sion of the Cbinese dominions." * *
" In one of these islands the English might establish another Sinn. pore, possessing all the merits and free from the disadvantages of that com- mercial station—a secure harbour outside of Chinese jurisdiction, but still so near to the coast of China as to be within easy reach of junk-navigation. At this spot, law and order being established there, Chinese merchants would settle, as they have settled in swarms at Singapore, and in Java, and in other islands of the Indian Ocean. They would settle there for the purpose ni trading with the foreigners, who would also settle there for the purpose or trading with the Chinese settlers. To Aids spot European goods would be conveyed the sale, and Chinese products as the purchase-money of those eoode, All exchanges betwom the Chinese rend fbremers would be there decent- plished. The wares of )1anchester, Leeds, aneBirmingleon, would be intro- duced into China, by Chinese dealers only, in their own ships. Not a sinlo foreign vessel would need to enter a Chinese port ; no foreigner would need -to reside within the dominions of China ; no political relations whatever would be requisite between the Chinese gov,:rnment and foreigners. 11-e have not room for details ; nor could these be well settled without careful inquiry front per- sons practically acquainted with the China seas. But the principle trust, sufficiently explained, as well as the nature of the means of .putiing it into effect. By a measure which should. enable the people of Chma to des] with foreigners outside of the jurisdietion of their own government, the Chinos authorities would be relieved from all dread of foreign intercourse ; grounds of quarrel with foreigners would be removed ; every political motive for placing impediments on foreign commerce would be effectually destroyed. if the trailers of all countries were admitted to the proposed commercial station on perfectly equal terms with its British founders, the jealousy of other nations would be averted. And if this commercial station were well selected, not only would the foreign trade of China. be restored, but it might be improved and extended beyond. any assignable limit."
There is a precedent for the success of such a scheme as this.
A small island adjoining Formosa, lying about thirty leagues from the coast of China, was actually colonized by the Dutch in the seventeenth century, and became the scat of a commerce wonder- fully rapid in growth and of immense value. Part of the Abb6 RAYNAL'S account of this settlement is translated in the Coloniol Gazette. It became a sort of entrepot to which traders of various iiiilaiteists resorted, and whence the Chinese drew their foreign sup- " Hove than a hundred thousand Chinese, who would not submit to the [Tartar] conquerors, took refuge in Formosa. They carried thither their pe- culiar industry—i he cultivation of rice and sugar—and attracted an amerable vesselsftom thpir mother-country. The island la a short time hemme the ,entrc httercourse 1,1 sea Jacct, Siam, the Philippines, China, japan, mitt other cnuntries. .rlfter Jim; yeai it was the greatcst market in Asia."
power would have been so thoroughly rePugnant." And if it had
them of the system which wrested India from its native princes-
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