The Minister soon found that his efforts to placate the Chinese Government were not producing the intended effect. It was not the "casual visitor" that in any special way annoyed them, but the foreigner in all his moods and tenses, most of all Mr Bruce himself, his colleagues and their staff, medical and other, and all that they stood for. General Ignatieff had not, after all, conjured away the foreign plague, nor were the Chinese statesmen entirely reassured even as to their immunity from the military danger. In the month of April Admiral Hope, Brigadier-General Staveley, and Mr Parkes visited Peking, and were courteously received; but Prince Kung was visibly relieved, Dr Rennie tells us, when assured that the admiral was not to remain there. As for the general, his presence in the vicinity was inevitable so long as a considerable British and French force remained in garrison in Tientsin and Taku. Like the Ministers themselves, he was an unpleasant necessity to be endured as well as may be. But being thus obliged to tolerate the greater evil, it would appear to Western reasoning that an admiral more or less in an inland town need not have so greatly upset Chinese equanimity. Prince Kung, however, was not yet able to look on such matters with Western eyes. Every foreigner kept at arm's-length, no matter what his rank or condition, was a gain, as every locust destroyed is a gain to the peasant.
So when the Prussian envoy, Count Eulenberg, presented himself, the British Minister vouching for his respectability, for the purpose of making a treaty on the lines of those already made and ratified, his efforts were frustrated by every plausible device. The envoy was relegated to the most distant point at which it was deemed feasible to stay his progress—namely, Tientsin, where negotiations were vexatiously protracted during four months. The first and final sticking-point was the claim to residence in the capital, which the Chinese absolutely refused to concede. Eventually they agreed to compound for a deferred entry ten years after signature. This by haggling was finally reduced to five years, and the treaty was thereupon concluded in August 1861. The old Canton tactics were thus revived, as if nothing had happened since 1857.
As the echo of Mr Bruce, Dr Rennie's comment on the proceeding is worth noting. "Looks very like merely gaining time, in hopes that, before that period expires, all foreign residence in the capital will be at an end." Here we catch a glimpse of the fundamental truth underlying all Chinese diplomacy from first to last—the purpose, never relaxed for an instant, of some day expelling foreigners from the country. No foreigner could hope to unravel the tangle of Chinese reasoning so as to comprehend in what manner the exclusion of one State was to assist in the eviction of the representatives of four Great Powers already established in the capital; but it may be inferred from the above remark that Mr Bruce was beginning to perceive that good behaviour towards the Chinese was not the be-all and end-all of the functions of a British representative in China. There was another side. We know, in fact, though Dr Rennie does not record it, that Mr Bruce began to see the necessity of making a stand against the reactionary pressure of the Chinese; that he was resolved on bending the Ministers of the Yamên to his will—being satisfied he could do it—instead of yielding to theirs in the vain hope of gaining their confidence.
The grand desideratum had been at last obtained, access to the capital; but how different the realisation from the anticipation! There was no sovereign and no Court, only the shell of the nut without the kernel. And as diplomacy began so it continued, in successive illusions, partially dispelled, yet clung to with slow-dying hope.
At first sight, no doubt, the task of the foreign representatives seemed an easy one: they had but to lay down the law to a defeated Power, to hammer the softened metal. This course would have been as simple in fact as it was in principle had they been united, and had it been possible for them to take a simple view of their mission; but from the first their duty to their respective countries was complicated, and in varying degrees, by what they conceived to be their duty towards China. It was inevitable that the attempt to follow two lines of policy divided by such cleavage should result in a fall into the crevasse. China, in fact, was too large a subject for either the treaty Powers or their agents to grasp. She made huge demands on the humanity, the indulgence, and the protection of the Powers who had broken down her wall of seclusion, and she had nothing in kind to offer them in return—neither gratitude nor co-operation, nor even good faith. For this China could be blamed only in so far as her own welfare was hindered by her irresponsiveness, for her statesmen were not far wrong in attributing to any motive rather than pure philanthropy the obtrusive solicitude of the Western Powers. International relations even between kindred peoples are in the nature of things selfish, or worse; and the more they assume an altruistic mask the more they lie open to suspicion. In this cynical view of the attitude of her neighbours China has never wavered.
Yet it was not all illusion and Dead Sea apples. Something had been gained by diplomatic access to the capital. The elaborate insolence of the Chinese mandarin had been exchanged for the urbanity of the well-bred Manchu. It became possible to converse. Foreigners were listened to with attention, and answered with an open countenance. The change was incalculable. It recalled the days of Lord Macartney and the Emperor Kienlung, of Sir John Davis's pleasant intercourse with Kiying, and of the agreeable impression left by the Manchu statesmen who were concerned from 1841 onwards in the conduct of war or the conclusion of peace. If to the kindly personal relations which characterised the earlier years of Peking diplomacy no permanent tangible result could be definitely ascribed, who can tell what evils were staved off or calamity averted by these friendly amenities?
In order, however, to appreciate the state of affairs in Peking in 1865, it is necessary to fill the gap in our narrative by an outline of events following the ratification of the treaty of Tientsin and Convention of Peking in October 1860.
II. NEW PORTS AND OPENING OF THE YANGTZE.
Seven new coast ports—Admiral Hope's Yangtze expedition—His relations with Taiping rebels—Hankow, Kiukiang, and Chinkiang opened to trade—Panic in Hankow, and exodus of population for fear of rebels.
The new ports opened to trade—Tientsin, Newchwang, and Chefoo in the North; Swatow, and two Formosan ports; Kiungchow in Hainan—added considerably to the range of foreign commerce, and necessitated a large extension of the foreign customs and of the consular services. But the most important feature in the new arrangements was the effective opening of the river Yangtze. It was interesting, as giving access to the commercial centre of the empire; and as bringing foreigners into direct contact, possibly conflict, with the Taiping rebels. For the banks of the great river were at the time checkered with the alternate strongholds of rebels and imperialists. Trade must therefore either be carried on on sufferance from both, or be efficiently protected from the interference of either belligerent. Obviously this was a matter to be gone about discreetly.