CHAPTER IV
FOREIGN RELATIONS OF CHINA
It is impossible to study any Chinese question and ignore the relations of China with foreign powers. They are always curious and generally unique. Certainly any one who goes to China for the purpose of studying the mission question cannot but be struck at the extraordinary treaty rights possessed by missionaries. In most countries the teacher of religion has no peculiar rights. He is, alas! more often bullied than favoured by the modern State, even if that State should profess itself well inclined towards religion. Therefore one would naturally expect in China, where Christianity is reputed to be disliked, that those who teach it would have to contend with every form of disability that a hostile State could inflict.
A feeling of marvel comes over the mind when one realises that in this land of contradictions the persecuted missionary enjoys quite peculiar privileges. The ordinary foreigner cannot, for instance, travel in China except by the courtesy of the Government—a courtesy, indeed, which is never refused; but a missionary may travel freely. The ordinary foreigner has no right to stay in any town in China with the exception of the treaty ports; a missionary may stay where he likes. The ordinary man cannot buy land; the missionary has a right to purchase land for the purpose of teaching Christianity.
So it came about, when we were in China, that His Majesty's Consul, with all the might of England at his back, was unable to buy a suitable site to erect a house where he could bring his wife. He was living in a temple, and temples in China are not very comfortable. I should explain to the uninitiated that every Buddhist temple has guest-rooms attached to it—Chinese rooms largely composed of wooden screens; and these temples are let out as residences by a people whose faith has less hold upon their affections than their purse. Now, ladies are not as a rule prepared to live in a house with paper partitions in a climate where the winters are extremely cold; so the Consul asked a missionary to buy a piece of land on which he could erect a suitable house, and he had almost succeeded when the Chinese Government found out that the land was not to be used for missionary purposes and refused to allow the sale. This does seem a strange situation when one remembers that had that Consul resigned his appointment and joined a missionary body, he could have bought the land and settled his wife comfortably in four solid stone walls, but because he was England's representative and not a missionary he had to shiver between wood and paper screens, and this in a country which is supposed to hate missionaries.
The explanation of this curious situation is really twofold. First, the hatred that the official bears for the missionary is not of such an intense character as to induce him to offer a very strenuous resistance to the missionaries who desire to buy land; and secondly, missionaries have peculiar and special rights secured to them by a series of treaties among the most curious in the history of diplomacy.
In 1844 the Americans got by treaty a right to the free exercise of the Christian religion in the open ports. This right, sufficiently remarkable in itself, has often been stipulated by a State for its own nationals resident in a foreign country, but I doubt if it has ever before been known for a country to insist on the right of preaching a religion to somebody else's citizens. This was obviously an interference of the sovereign rights of China.
It was pushed even further in 1860. The French and English had just completed the sack of the "Summer Palace," and whatever the justice or the injustice of the war may have been, China had tasted her first great lesson of humiliation from the hand of Western powers, and was in no condition to resist any of their demands. The English and the French made treaties, most of them concerned with commercial and military matters with which it is not necessary to trouble the reader, and the French had a condition which was quite reasonable, that the Chinese should restore all the buildings that had been destroyed in the late troubles; the wording of the clause was so vague that it could be made to apply, and did apply, to any building which had been destroyed at any previous time in the history of China, but the most remarkable part of the clause needs further explanation. The French had as their interpreter a very able Jesuit, Père Delamarre, and as the French Minister could not read Chinese, he had to trust his interpreter with regard to the Chinese version, and this man inserted into the treaty two other provisions, one securing that Christians should have a right to the free exercise of their religion all over China, and the other that French missionaries should have the right to rent land in all the provinces in the empire and to buy and construct houses. When this pious fraud was discovered, the French Minister thought it would do no good to denounce his interpreter, and therefore the treaty was treated by the French as binding and never questioned by the Chinese; the other powers profited by it under the "most favoured nation" clause.
The Roman Catholics a few years later pushed the wording of this treaty to its uttermost. Their missions had been at work for 150 years or more, and they could prove a great number of confiscations which had to be made good by the Chinese. Just at that time in France Napoleon III. was trying to establish a doubtful title by the help of the Pope, and it was his policy to push in every way the interests of the Roman Catholics. China had felt the weight of European armies and she was unable to resist these claims, and so it came about that the very country which now is the centre of free thought was the means of forcing Christianity upon the Chinese through fear of her armed power.
Can you be surprised at the answer I got when I asked a Chinese statesman, who I knew was sympathetic with the teaching of Christianity, why China, who had always professed, and to a very great extent had practised tolerance, should persecute Christianity? His reply was, the Chinese did not hate Christianity, and were indeed tolerant of missions, but they still disliked them, because Christianity is the religion of the military races, and they had a historical tradition that the advance of Christianity was connected with war.
This bad reputation has been intensified by the action of the Germans. No reasonable man can condemn the Germans for wishing to enlarge and develop their trade. We can understand the patriotic German saying that it was the duty of Germany to establish good government in Shantung, but it is very hard to understand how any one can defend the taking of Kiauchau on the ground that certain German missionaries had been murdered. The taking of Kiauchau by the Germans has completed the work begun by the French. Christianity and the foreign relations of China are inextricably mixed up, and every Chinaman, believed till lately that Christianity was the religion which has led foreign nations to enter his land. "First the missionary, then the trader, lastly the gunboat," has been too often the order of advance. I am happy to be able to say that the Americans and the English have made great efforts to dissociate themselves from this evil, and have tried to avoid any appearance of such a connection. I was told that in Shansi, owing to the indemnity for the murders of missionaries being retained to China and spent on founding a University instead of being accepted by the missions, Protestant missions are very popular. "You have only to say you are an English clergyman," said my Chinese informant, "and every door will be open to you."
The present aspect of foreign affairs has tended to destroy the unfortunate connection between Christianity and foreign aggression. The two great powers whose armies have met in Manchuria have neither of them any interest in missions. Russia has never had any missions in China. She forbade them, I understand, because they were likely to embroil her in unnecessary wars. Japan, of course, has none. The Germans, who made the murder of missionaries the reason of aggression, have not many missionaries in China belonging to their nationality. China, therefore, is coming to look upon Christianity as not quite so dangerous a thing as it seemed when it was essentially the religion of the French and of the English whose armies and navies then held China in fear. Still the political situation cannot but have great interest to the missionary. Even while he rejoices that the foreign relations of China and his work are not so intimately connected as they used to be, he must ask himself, what will the result to my work be, if in the great world struggle Japan or Russia should dominate? At present he fears Japan more than Russia; and his fears are shared, but for other reasons, by the Chinese.
The wildest and most ambitious schemes are accredited to Japan, I cannot say with how much truth. Her purse is empty, but she has far more courage and skill in war than most nations. If she possessed even one part of China she might add to her wealth to such an extent that no race could dare to oppose her, while if she governed China, her armies, supported by the wealth of that mighty empire, might threaten the stability of Europe. She is reported to have two regiments working as private individuals in Fukien, and to be prepared to seize the province in case of any disorder. The fact that there are many Japanese in the province, and that all the Japanese are trained soldiers, gives some cloak to this suggestion. The Fukienese speak a different dialect to the rest of China, and they have a natural geographical frontier, which would enable the Japanese to maintain themselves there if they were once established.
Again, the recent events have shown that they are preparing to exercise sovereign rights over Chinese territory in Manchuria. On the other hand, Russia is arming; she is double-tracking the railway from St. Petersburg to Irkutsk, and she is getting ready again for a struggle in Manchuria; the gossip among the officers there is that there is to be a war; the Russians do not for a moment regard themselves as defeated; they think of the late campaign merely as an "unfortunate incident."
But the most important development in Russian policy is the proposed railway across Mongolia which will give Russia an entrance to the west of China and into Peking. It is hard to see how, if an advance were made along that line, Japan could in any way resist Russia; the whole breadth of China would lie between them. Meanwhile the Germans of the east have perfected a railway system which converts Kiauchau from being an out-of-the-way place which no one cared about, to a door into the very heart of China. In commercial circles in China it is reported that the Commandant of the Tientsin garrison suggested that the object of the building of the German Fleet was not so much to conquer England as to ensure that Germany should be able to maintain her position in the Far East and make full use of Kiauchau as a way by which her armies might enter China. When one looks at the map and sees how China is surrounded by these powers, and how they are pressing upon her, one realises why the Chinese are feeling that Western education is an absolute necessity, and that if they are to maintain their independence they must understand the arts of war. A great Viceroy was reported to have said that he frankly expected China to be conquered, and to learn from her conquerors the Western arts which would in turn enable her to dominate the West; for this has been her history in the past, that may be her history in the future, and I think that the nations, who propose to conquer her, will do wisely if they consider what might be the result of her influence on them.
China is trying to defend herself by building a navy and creating an army. The navy is rather an opéra bouffe concern; every now and then she talks of having ships; the representatives of all the shipbuilders of the world fly to Peking and try in every way to induce China to buy a fleet which they offer to provide at the very shortest notice, but at present she has none. She has, as a practical step, created a training school of officers. It consists only of some 140 men, and is taught by two British officers lent her by our navy. They said that there was the greatest difficulty in getting the Chinese to be practical; they induced the Government at last to put an old ship at their disposal. For a long time this was refused, and when it was granted it was regarded as a most wonderful and original departure. The Chinese way of training naval officers would have been to have instructed them on literary subjects, and to encourage them to write essays and poems on the sea. To take them out on the Yangtsze in a ship and actually to show them how a ship was managed, was a wholly new idea, but one of which they approve under the impulse of the modern fashion of doing things in accordance with Western traditions.
As to the army, its exterior is certainly not prepossessing; far and away the most efficient part of it has been created by Yuan-Shi-Kei in Manchuria, and the Chinese are very anxious to show it to the passing traveller. Both times when we passed through Manchuria, on every station were armed guards, and in one case they were inspected by a General who was travelling in our train. He was saluted by the officers in charge in Chinese fashion, which is a modified form of a kow-tow, and consists to all intents and purposes of a curtsey. It had a distinctly funny appearance to see the officers in charge of the guards curtseying as we steamed into the stations. Down at Nanking the army was far less smart—in fact, it had the appearance of being a very disorderly rabble; I understand when the Empress died it was regarded as such a danger that those in authority put the broad Yangtsze between them and a possible mutiny.
The real danger to China as regards foreign relations is that her bad finance or her own want of discipline may bring about a state of internal disorder which may compel the interference of foreign powers. Last year this nearly did happen. Two regiments mutinied and seized a town on the Yangtsze; they stopped all communications with the outside world, and to all intents and purposes were in a fair way to commence a rebellion. Close by them were several other regiments who might be expected to throw in their lot with them, and the position was very critical. The missionaries inside the town were in fear of their lives, and with difficulty managed to communicate with the British Consul and to tell him of their plight. He ordered a gunboat to go down, and the presence of the gunboat intimidated the mutineers. At the same time the Governor of the city showed remarkable courage in going round the town pacifying the mob. The authorities were able to move in two other regiments, who had no sympathy with the mutiny. The mutineers were disarmed and the incident closed. But such an incident may occur at any moment. The condition of the country is such that anywhere a rising may occur, and the fire once alight may be hard to extinguish; the result of the conflagration must be that the powers must enter to secure the safety of their nationals.
Altogether poor China is in a dangerous position in regard to her foreign relations; all round her echoes the cry, "You must reform or disappear." Every railway that is made, every loan that is floated, every trade that is opened up, bring to China increased responsibilities in her foreign relations. If she by her good government and readiness to reform can show that she is able to maintain order in her own land, and to give to foreigners an equal security to that they have in any other country, her empire may endure for many hundred years; but if she be found wanting at the present time and the corruption of her officials renders her unable to maintain order in her country or to fulfil her financial obligations, a new phase in Chinese history will be reached, which will, I believe, be of extraordinary danger to Europe; China will yield to the military might of the West only to rise again to dominate those who dominated her.
The missionary who looks at these dark clouds which surround China, the land of his adoption, feels that there is only one course to take, namely, the course that he is taking, to try and build up in China a high tone of morality, founded on religion, which may enable her to accept necessary reforms and to put herself abreast of other nations.