It happened that the question had lately assumed a somewhat definite place in the agenda of the British plenipotentiary. Lord Clarendon had in 1854 instructed Sir John Bowring to take any opportunity of bringing the "city question" to a solution, and Sir John addressed a long despatch to Commissioner Yeh on the subject in April of that year. It had no effect, and was followed up a few months later by an effort in another direction. The turbulent character of the Cantonese people and the impracticable arrogance of the imperial officers who successively held office there had often prompted an appeal to Cæsar, and more than one attempt had been made in times gone by to submit the Canton grievances to the judgment of the Imperial Court. These attempts were inspired by a total misconception of the relations between the provinces and the capital. In the year 1854, however, it was decided to renew the effort to open direct communications with the Imperial Government. And circumstances seemed to promise a more favourable issue to the mission than had attended preceding ones. The time had come when a revision of the tariff and commercial articles of the treaties might be claimed, and besides the standing grievance at Canton there were sundry matters in connection with the fulfilment of the treaties which together constituted a justifying pretext for an unarmed expedition to the Peiho. The chances of a favourable reception were thought to be strengthened by the combination of the Treaty Powers. Sir John Bowring and the American Minister, Mr McLane, accordingly went together, with a competent staff of interpreters, to Tientsin, where they were soon followed by the French secretary of Legation.

High officials were appointed to treat with them, because it was feared that if some courtesy were not shown them the barbarians would return south and join the rebels, who were then threatening the southern provinces. But the net result of the mission was that it was allowed to depart in peace. Lord Elgin, commenting on the proceedings, sums up the instructions to the Chinese officials, gathered from the secret reports afterwards discovered, as, "Get rid of the barbarians," which would be an equally exhaustive rendering of all the instructions ever given to Chinese plenipotentiaries. On the occasion of this visit to the Peiho the foreign plenipotentiaries resorted, as had been done on sundry previous occasions, to the oriental custom of approaching a great man gift in hand. In the depleted condition of the imperial treasury they calculated that the recovery of the duties unpaid during the recent interregnum at Shanghai would be a tempting bait to the Peking Government. The offer, however, could not, it would appear, be intelligibly conveyed to the minds of the northern functionaries: unacquainted with commercial affairs, and misconstruing the proposal as a plea for the forgiveness of arrears, they at once conceded the sop to Cerberus, pleased to have such a convenient way of closing the mouths of the barbarians.

In December following a favourable opportunity seemed to present itself for renewing the attack on the exclusiveness of Canton. The Taiping rebels had blockaded the river, and in a "pitched battle" defeated the imperialist fleet and were actually threatening the city. In this emergency Yeh implored the aid of the English forces. Sir John Bowring thereupon proceeded to Canton with a naval force of five ships to protect the foreign factories, the presence of the squadron having at the same time the desired deterrent effect on the rebels, who withdrew their forces. Now at last the governor felt confident that the barrier to intercourse was removed, and he applied to the viceroy for an interview; but Yeh remained obdurate, refused audience as before, and with all the old contumely. Precisely the same thing had happened in the north in 1853, when the governor of Kiangsu applied through Consul Alcock to the superintendent of trade, Sir George Bonham, for the assistance of one of her Majesty's ships in defending Nanking against the expected attack of the Taipings. Divers communications of like tenor had, during several months, led up to this definite application. The appeal was most urgent, and yet in the title given to her Majesty's plenipotentiary the two important characters had been omitted, indicating that his power emanated from the ruler of an "independent sovereign state." "Such an omission," remarked Mr Alcock, "is characteristic of the race we have to deal with, for even in a time of danger to the national existence they cannot suppress their arrogance and contempt for barbarians." Arrogant and contemptuous of course they were, and yet it may perhaps be questioned whether such terms fully explain the mutilation of the plenipotentiary's official titles. Although they had been compelled by mechanical force to accord titles implying equality to foreign officials, yet in the innermost conviction of the Chinese an independent sovereign State was at that time almost unthinkable, and could only be expressed by a solecism. If, therefore, we ask how an imperial commissioner could demean himself by soliciting protection from the barbarians to whom he was denying the scantiest courtesy, we have to consider the point of view from which China had from time immemorial and without challenge regarded all the outer States. For it is the point of view that is paradoxical. To Yeh, considering barbarians merely as refractory subjects, there was no inconsistence in commanding their aid, while denying their requests. The position is analogous to that of Ultramontanes, who claim tolerance for themselves in heretical communities by a divine right which excludes the idea of reciprocity. This key to the history of foreign intercourse with China is too often forgotten.

Nothing daunted, Sir John returned to the charge in June 1855, on the occasion of the appointment of the new consul, Mr Alcock, whom he asked permission to introduce to the Imperial Commissioner. His letter was not even acknowledged for a month, and then in the usual contemptuous terms.

So far, indeed, from Yeh's being mollified by the assistance indirectly accorded to him in defending the city from rebel attack, or by the succession of respectful appeals made to him by Sir John Bowring, a new campaign of aggression was inaugurated against the lives and liberties of the foreign residents in Canton. This followed the traditional course. Inflammatory placards denouncing foreigners, and holding them up to the odium of the populace, were extensively posted about the city and suburbs in the summer of 1856. These, as usual, were followed by personal attacks on isolated Englishmen found defenceless, and, following the precedents of ten years before, the outbreaks of anti-foreign feeling in Canton found their echo also in Foochow, where an American gentleman met his death in a riot which was got up there in July. So serious was the situation becoming that Mr Consul Parkes, who had succeeded Mr Alcock in June, solemnly warned the Imperial Commissioner that such acts, if not promptly discountenanced by the authorities (who of course were well known to be the instigators), must inevitably lead to deplorable consequences. The Chinese reply to this remonstrance was the outrage on the lorcha Arrow. To isolate that incident, therefore, would be wholly to miss the significance of it: it would be to mistake the match for the mine.

Those who were on the spot and familiar with antecedent events could have no doubt whatever that, in condoning the present insults, the British authorities would have invited greater and always greater, as in the days of Lin. The tone of recent despatches from the Foreign Office fortified the governor in taking a strong resolution; the clearness of Consul Parkes' view made also a deep impression on him; and yet another factor should not be altogether overlooked which contributed its share in bringing the two responsible officials to a definite decision. It was not an unknown phenomenon in public life that two functionaries whose co-operation was essential should mistrust each other. This was distinctly the case with Sir John Bowring and Sir Michael Seymour. They needed some connecting medium to make them mutually intelligible, and it was found in the influence of local public opinion. The mercantile community, which for twenty years, or as long as they had had utterance, had never wavered in the conviction that in strength alone lay their safety, were to a man for vigorous measures at Canton. And it happened that, scarcely perceived either by themselves or by the other parties concerned, they possessed a special channel for bringing the force of their views to bear on the two responsible men. Sir John Bowring had himself deplored "the enormous influence wielded by the great and opulent commercial houses" when adverse to his projects. He was now to experience that influence in another sense, without perhaps recognising it, for when the wind is fair it makes slight impression on those whose sails it fills.

Among the business houses in China two stood pre-eminent. One had a son of the plenipotentiary for partner; both were noted for their princely hospitality, especially to officers of the navy. "Those princely merchants, Dent & Co., as well as Matheson," writes Admiral Keppel in his Diary, "kept open house. They lived in palaces." One of the two buildings occupied by the former firm, "Kiying House," which some twenty years later became the Hongkong Hotel, was as good as a naval club for all ranks, while admirals and post-captains found snug anchorage within the adjoining domain of the seniors of the firm. The two great houses did not always pull together, but on this occasion their separate action, converging on a single point, was more effectual than any half-hearted combination could have been. Night after night was the question of Canton discussed with slow deliberation and accumulating emphasis in the executive and the administrative, the naval and the political, camps respectively. Conviction was imbibed with the claret and cheroots, and it was not altogether without reason that what followed has sometimes been called the "Merchants' War."

The die was cast. The great Canton bubble, the bugbear of a succession of British Governments and representatives, was at last to be pricked, though with a delay which, however regrettable at the time, perhaps conduced to greater thoroughness in the long-run. Those of our readers who desire to trace the various operations against Canton during the twelve months which followed cannot do better than consult Mr Stanley Lane-Poole's 'Life of Sir Harry Parkes,' the volume of 'Times' correspondence by that sage observer and vivacious narrator, Mr Wingrove Cooke, and the delightful sailors book recently published by Vice-Admiral Sir W. R. Kennedy. The campaign unfolded itself in a drama of surprises. The force at the admiral's disposal being too small to follow up the initial movement against the city, which gave no sign of yielding by first intention, Sir Michael Seymour had to content himself with intimating to the Viceroy Yeh that, notwithstanding his Excellency's interdict, he had, with a guard of bluejackets, visited the Viceregal Yamên; and with keeping hostilities alive by a blockade of the river while awaiting reinforcements.

The Arrow incident occurred in October. In December the foreign factories were burned by the Chinese, and the Viceroy Yeh issued proclamations offering rewards for English heads. The mercantile community retired to Hongkong, a few to the quieter retreat of Macao. The vengeance of Commissioner Yeh pursued them exactly as that of Commissioner Lin had done in 1839. Assassinations were not infrequent on the outskirts of the city of Victoria; and in January 1857 the principal baker in the colony was induced to put a sack of arsenic into his morning supply of bread, which only failed of its effect through the excess of the dose acting as an emetic.

The early portion of the year 1857 was enlivened by active operations in hunting out Chinese war-junks in the various creeks and branches of the river, commenced by Commodore Elliot and continued on a brilliant scale by Commodore H. Keppel, who arrived opportunely in the frigate Raleigh, of which he speaks with so much pride and affection in his Memoirs. That fine vessel, however, was lost on a rock approaching Macao, sinking in shallow water in the act of saluting the French flag, a war vessel of that nationality having been descried in the anchorage. The commodore and his officers and crew, thus detached, were soon accommodated with small craft good for river service, and in a very short time they made a memorable cutting-out expedition as far as the city of Fatshan, destroying formidable and well-posted fleets of war-junks in what the commodore described as "one of the prettiest boat actions recorded in naval history." Sir W. Kennedy served as a midshipman in those expeditions, and his descriptions supply a much-needed supplement to that of the Admiral of the Fleet, correcting it in some particulars and filling in the gaps in a wonderfully realistic manner. No adequate estimate can be formed of the importance of the year's operations in the Canton river without reading Admiral Kennedy's brilliant but simple story.