Smuggling is also carried on to some extent. As this, however, affects the vital interests of the salt merchants, they show great vigilance in investigating and reporting to the authorities any instances that may come within their knowledge, and for this purpose fit up and maintain several small vessels which keep up a constant watch against contraband proceedings.
There are a multiplicity of fees and charges which prove very onerous to the merchants. [Here follows a list of forty-seven separate fees, dues, and charges, amounting to 15,300 taels, or about £5000 sterling, on 900,000 lb. weight, or about one-eighth of a penny per lb.]
END OF THE FIRST VOLUME.
PRINTED BY WILLIAM BLACKWOOD AND SONS.
FOOTNOTES:
[1] He dropped the "John" so early in life that he was never known by it.
[2] The only valuable consideration he received for these labours was bestowed some years later, when his entry into the service of the Foreign Office was ante-dated to 1840, so as to include the period of the Peninsular commissions.
[3] These were a syndicate appointed by the Chinese Government to conduct the foreign trade and be responsible to the Government for the proceedings of the foreign merchants.
[4] Bits of Old China. Kegan Paul.
[5] When he visited Macao later in the year 1839—after the events—there were public demonstrations in his honour, whether prompted by public respect for his despotic power or approval of the use he had just made of it, or merely a recognition of his previously established reputation, may very well remain an open question.