The course and capabilities of the great waterway, and the disposition of the military forces on its banks, had been well reconnoitred by Lord Elgin himself in 1858; and the ports to be opened, which were left unnamed in the treaty, were pretty definitely indicated in the survey then made. There were to be three in all. Chinkiang, which had been recently recovered from the rebels, situated at the intersection of the Imperial Canal and the Yangtze-kiang, was definitely fixed. The two others farther up river remained to be selected.
The opening of the river was by treaty made contingent on the restoration of imperial authority on its banks; but as there was nothing more likely to accelerate that consummation than commercial traffic on the river, the Chinese Government acquiesced in the British authorities making the experiment, at their own risk as regarded possible trouble with the insurgents. The object was to "throw open the general coasting trade of the river"; and Lord Elgin, on his departure from China, left the undertaking in the hands of Admiral Hope, to whom he attached Mr Parkes, withdrawn for the occasion from his duties as commissioner in Canton.
FIRST BRITISH CONSULATE AT KOLENGSOO, AMOY, 1844.
The admiral started from Shanghai in advance of Mr Parkes, with a squadron of light-draught steamers, on February 11, 1861. He carried an exploring expedition composed of Colonel Sarel, Captain Blakiston, Mr Shereshewsky, and Dr A. Barton, whose proceedings are reported in Blakiston's 'Five Months on the Upper Yangtze'; several American missionaries; two Frenchmen, afterwards distinguished, MM. Eugène Simon and A. Dupuis, the latter proving the means of eventually giving Tongking to France; a French military attaché; Lieut.-Colonel Wolseley, D.A.Q.-M.G.; and a delegation from the Shanghai Chamber of Commerce, with several private persons. Whether the pilots presumed upon light draught and steam power, or whether the course of the river had changed so much since the previous surveys were made, the vessels got stranded, one after another, in the estuary; and as each grounded a companion was told off to stand by her, so that before they had got clear of what is known as the Langshan Crossing (the home of the famous breed of black poultry) the admiral's tender, the Coromandel, was the only vessel left in a mobile condition. Not to lose time, the admiral determined to push on in that non-combatant craft to Nanking, the rebel capital, and test the temper and intentions of the Taipings.
As the steamer slowly approached the landing-place, in bright sunshine and a still atmosphere, the batteries on the river front were crowded, but remained silent.
"What will you do, sir, if they fire?" the admiral was asked.
"Oh, I will just drop down out of range, and send and ask them what they mean by it," he replied, with deep deliberate utterance, not unlike Beaconsfield's.
An officer was sent ashore to parley, some rebel officers came on board, and the prospect of an amicable understanding appeared to be satisfactory. It was a critical juncture in the history both of the Taiping movement itself and of foreign relations with it and with China. Without exaggeration, it may be said that the proximate fate of the Taipings then lay hidden within the brain of Sir James Hope, and each occasion of contact between him and them during the next few months added its definite contribution to the data on which the momentous decision was ultimately taken. Although he had then no higher opinion of the Taipings than that they were "an organised band of robbers," the admiral was resolved to give them fair play; and since no diplomatic intercourse could be held with insurgents, he determined to take relations with them under his own supervision (March 8, 1861). "The principle I shall adopt being that in the district of country of which they hold possession the Taiping authorities must be regarded as those of the de facto Government, ... and this principle being likely to lead to the payment of double duties (to rebels and imperialists) on all trade conducted at places in their possession, I am desirous of definite instructions on the subject."