Serious conferences then ensued between the British and Chinese plenipotentiaries within the river, at a point known as the Second Bar. The blockade was nevertheless maintained, so that a French corvette which arrived to watch the course of events was unable to enter the river. Captain Elliot, however, invited her commander to accompany him and "assist" at his interview with Kishen. In the meanwhile the conciliatory attitude of the Chinese commissioner was severely denounced from the throne, and while these conferences were proceeding, messengers of war were on their way from Peking charged with nothing less than the extermination of the barbarians. Kishen was degraded, and instead of peaceable negotiations, a proclamation was placarded on the walls of Canton offering $50,000 each for the heads of the British plenipotentiary and the commodore.
After the expiration of this one-sided truce open hostilities were re-entered upon. The Bogue forts had to be once more captured, and the British flag re-hoisted. That accomplished, the blockade of the river was raised. This somewhat remarkable step was no doubt due to the overmastering anxiety shown throughout by Captain Elliot for the immediate resumption of trade, he having learnt in the Company's school to place the current season's business above every other consideration. It appears certain that the quite disproportionate value attached by him to this one object obscured his perspective, if indeed it did not vitiate his whole policy. Trading vessels were permitted to proceed up-river, but under the peculiar reservation that the stakes, chains, and barriers placed by the Chinese to obstruct navigation should first be removed. The fleet, nevertheless, had still to fight its way up to Canton, Captain Elliot meanwhile never ceasing to make overtures of peace to the Chinese. There were truces and suspensions of hostilities, all of the same nature, binding only on one side, and such a medley of peace and war as seemed rather to belong to the middle ages than to the nineteenth century. Trade was pushed on all the more briskly for the general fear that the duration of peace was likely to be brief; and as both parties were alike interested in getting the season's produce shipped, the Chinese authorities were not ill-pleased to see commerce thus carried on while they employed the interval in hurrying forward their grand preparations for the crushing of the invading force. Hostilities were suspended by an agreement on March 20, 1841, and Captain Elliot, after residing some time in the foreign factory, where he had opportunities of sounding the disposition of the new commissioners, declared himself perfectly satisfied with their "assurances of good faith," which he repeated in the same public manner a fortnight later—that is, a month after the suspension of hostilities. On leaving the Canton factory Captain Elliot, strong in the faith he professed, urged on the senior naval officer the propriety of moving his ships away from the city in order to show our peaceful disposition, the guard of marines which had been stationed for the protection of the factories to be at the same time withdrawn.
The mercantile community by no means participated in the confidence of the plenipotentiary, nor, as we have said, did the naval commanders. Indeed so little satisfied were they with the turn of affairs, that Sir Gordon Bremer left in a Company's steamer for Calcutta to lay the situation before the Governor-General of India.[10] This occurred in the middle of April. In the beginning of May troops were seen pouring into the forts near the city. An immense number of fire-rafts in preparation to burn the fleet could not be concealed, while placards of a most menacing character were posted about the city walls. Captain Elliot, whether he was shaken in his belief in the pacific assurances of the Chinese authorities or not, returned to the scene, on board the Nemesis, on the 10th of May, and it is said that, in order to show the Chinese that he still believed in their good faith, he was accompanied on this one occasion by his wife, probably the first European woman who had set foot in Canton.
Several weeks more elapsed before the British plenipotentiary allowed himself to be finally disillusioned. Then he issued a proclamation to the merchants warning them to be prepared to leave the factories at a moment's notice, while the inevitable Nemesis was moved close up for the protection of the foreign community generally. The Chinese had employed the greatest ingenuity in masking their warlike preparations, and even at the last, when they saw that concealment was no longer possible, they attempted to allay the apprehensions of the foreigners by issuing an edict in order "to calm the feelings of the merchants and to tranquillise commercial business,"—their object being, as it was confidently alleged, to take the whole community by surprise and completely annihilate them.
H.M. SHIPS IMOGEN AND ANDROMACHE PASSING BOCCA TIGRIS BATTERIES.
Although thus attempting to lull the foreigners, the Chinese authorities had previously warned the natives, through the elders, to remove their families and effects from the neighbourhood of the river. On the very day after the soothing proclamation, May 21, the signal for the renewal of the war was given by the launching of a number of ingeniously contrived fire-rafts, which were dropped down by the tide upon the English vessels with the design of burning them at their anchors. This scheme failed in its object, partly from miscalculation,—only ten or twelve out of about a hundred being ignited,—and partly from the intrepidity of the British officers and seamen in grappling with those they could reach in their boats, and towing them out of their intended course. Indeed the destructive effects of these elaborate engines were turned on the Chinese themselves, some of the rafts taking the ground close to the city and setting fire to the suburbs. This fiasco was followed on the one side by an attack on the forts and the destruction of a very large fleet of war-junks, and on the other by the demolition and pillage of the foreign factories, not however without some curious discrimination.
The attack on Canton was now undertaken in earnest. On the 26th May the heights in rear of the city had been captured and were held in force, so that the whole Chinese position was completely commanded. Everything was ready for the assault, which would have been a bloodless affair, an elevation just within the wall affording a military vantage-ground from which the whole city could have been dominated without the least risk by a very small force. At this critical moment Captain Elliot appeared to stay the hand of Sir Hugh Gough and Commodore Senhouse, the commanders of the military and naval forces respectively. Captain Elliot had, in fact, granted a truce in order to discuss, not the terms of peace with China, but merely the conditions on which the British forces should retire from Canton. The principal of these were that the city should be evacuated by all the Chinese and Manchu troops, estimated at 45,000, over whom the authorities proved that they had perfect control; and that the authorities should pay the ransom of $6,000,000, in consideration of which all the river forts were to be restored to the Chinese, under the proviso that the forts below Whampoa were not to be rearmed until the final conclusion of peace. From first to last 1200 pieces of cannon had been captured or destroyed in these river forts, which would in any case have taken some time to replace.
The incident which closed this transaction having an important bearing upon future events, it merits particular attention. Two days after the agreement was concluded the armed Braves of the city and locality began to assemble in great numbers on the heights threatening the British position, and they even advanced to the attack. Fighting ensued, which lasted two days, during which the Chinese force was constantly augmenting, and, though more than once dispersed by the British, it was only to reassemble in greater numbers and renew the attack. Thus the ransoming of the city seemed to be but the beginning of strife. At length the British commander insisted upon the prefect of Canton going out to the Braves and causing them to disperse, after which the British force re-embarked. The incident left on the minds of the Cantonese the conviction that they were invincible, for they took to themselves the whole credit of expelling the barbarians.[11] This belief was destined to bear much bitter fruit in after-days.