Following the same train of reflection, he gives examples of the drastic manner in which the Russians asserted their prerogatives on the road, which we do not quote, as they were probably exceptional cases.
The never-failing courtesy of the Manchus rises superior to such unpleasant encounters. An example of this was related to the writer by a member of the British Legation. In riding through a narrow place, narrowed probably by the cesspool occupying more than its fair share of the street, he met the cortège of a grandee at a spot where it seemed impossible to pass, and it looked as if the solitary horseman must turn back. As he thought of doing so he observed the occupant of the sedan call a halt and direct his bearers to make room for the stranger. Observing closely the features of him who showed so much consideration for a foreigner, the Englishman was pleased, some time afterwards, to recognise in him Prince Ch'ing, who succeeded Prince Kung as President of the Tsungli-Yamên in 1884.
The lives of the foreign residents were by no means confined within the four walls of the city. The environs without fences or trespass notices make charming excursion-grounds for riding-parties. For longer expeditions there are the never-failing attractions of the Ming Tombs, the Great Wall, the passes into Mongolia, and various other distant points. The city is beautifully situated in the centre of a mountain crescent, whose nearest point is thirteen miles distant. The first object of quest when the Legations had been established was a sanatorium or summer retreat—for the thermometer reaches 100 Fahr. in June—and the Western Hills were explored. Some of the most beautiful spots there are occupied by Buddhist temples or monasteries, whose builders have shown as nice a taste in the selection of their sites as their brethren the monks of the West have always done. These religious houses, laid out with a view to the accommodation of pilgrims and strangers, are regularly used by Chinese grandees as health-resorts or shelters from political storms. The Russian mission, while it was alone in Peking, had set the example twenty years before of resorting to the hill temples in the dog-days. Arrangements with the priests for the occupation of certain portions of one of the temples were soon made by Mr Parkes, who was on a visit to the capital, and ever since 1861 official Peking, with one notable exception, has on the approach of summer migrated bodily from the oppressive atmosphere of the great city to the exhilarating air of the Western Hills. The social life of the city was reproduced at the temples, but in a less conventional form, every one residing there being considered on a holiday. The country round offered many temptations to excursions, and amateurs of geology, botany, and natural history were never at a loss for something to interest them in their rambles among the hills. Residence so far from town brought the foreigners into friendly contact also with their rustic neighbours, whose innate good qualities, moderation, contentment, and kindliness were displayed in a very favourable light.
But the sojourn at the hills also brought the foreigner into occasional contact with Chinese of high rank, who welcomed such opportunities of showing civility to the strangers. At other times disagreeable collisions with the retainers of a great personage were experienced. So popular were the temples of the Western Hills as a summer resort that they were always full, and consequently disputes about accommodation were liable to occur, especially when some grasping priest would let the same premises to two different occupants, leaving them, or rather their servants, to fight for the possession.
III. THE FOREIGN CUSTOMS UNDER THE PEKING CONVENTION.
Centralised in Peking—Encouraged by British Ministers—Assumed imperial form after the treaties of 1858—Extension to all the ports—Original international basis becomes purely Chinese—Shows capacity for larger functions than collection of duties—Becomes a diplomatic auxiliary—British Government leans upon it—The Chinese faithfully served by it—Interpreter of the intentions of the foreign Governments—Inspector-General gains influence over British Minister—Pleases Board of Trade—And maintains confidential relations with British Government—While remaining faithful to China—Services rendered by the Customs to all commercial nations.
It was a source of unmixed satisfaction to Sir Rutherford Alcock, on assuming office in Peking, to find the maritime customs, the bantling of Shanghai, firmly established in the capital and gathering strength and influence. As its functions pertained exclusively to trade, Sir Frederick Bruce had been originally of opinion that the inspector-general should be located in the commercial centre, Shanghai, and he took exception to the institution being domiciled in Peking, where trade was expressly excluded by treaty. Sir Frederick, however, soon saw reason to modify his views. When it began to appear to him that the customs might prove a convenient auxiliary to the diplomacy of the treaty Powers, he cultivated the institution and encouraged it to occult activity in the political sphere. Sir Frederick Bruce's interests in the fortunes of the customs, however, could never be so ardent as that of its parent, Sir Rutherford Alcock, and its monthly nurse, Mr Wade. The presence of these two in the British Legation afforded a fresh guarantee of the prosperity of the customs, which they were both well satisfied to see in the competent hands of Mr Hart. For as the institution was a creation without precedent, the form of its development must be largely influenced by the personal qualities of its head. Whatever character it might have assumed under its original inspector-general, Lay, it could hardly have been the same service that has grown and spread under the directing hand of Sir Robert Hart. It is impossible to dissociate the Chinese customs as it stands from the vigorous self-sustained intellect that has moulded and still controls it, for it is assuredly not such a going concern as can be made over to any new head without the risk of changes more or less organic.
The story of the first decade of the maritime customs was told clearly, briefly, and modestly in a monograph which Mr Hart prepared for Mr Bruce in 1864, published as a Blue Book of thirteen pages (No. 1, 1865). Up to the date of the Tientsin treaty of 1858 the operations of the foreign collectorate were confined to the single port of Shanghai, the inspectors holding the appointment from the governor-general at Nanking, who was Imperial Commissioner for Foreign Trade. The new treaty gave the foreign Powers an interest in the Chinese customs which they did not possess before, because the war indemnities were to be paid by instalments out of the collections of duty, so that during the time when these payments were being made the maintenance of the machinery for collecting the duties was a matter of international concern. The new treaty also provided for a uniform system of duty collection for all the trading-ports; and then the institution assumed an imperial and dropped its provincial character, the inspector-general receiving his commission from the Central Government.
Considering that the mission of the foreign customs was to subvert time-honoured native systems, it was received with surprising graciousness at most of the trading centres. The first port to which the new system was extended was Canton, the leader in welcoming its advent there being the hoppo, the one functionary in the empire whose privileges seemed to be most directly threatened by the new-comer. By one of those anomalies which are so common and yet so inexplicable in Chinese affairs, arrangements for opening the office in Canton were carried on without interruption during the hostilities of 1859. Patience, tact, and resolution were nevertheless required to overcome the innumerable difficulties of detail incidental to substituting rigorous inspection and remorseless collection for the chaos of unaccountability which had previously reigned unchallenged. A very few years, however, served to reduce all obstruction, and to bring trader and official, foreigner and Chinese, into working harmony.
For the first time in history a true account was rendered to the Imperial Government, accompanied by a substantial revenue on which it could depend. Naturally the agency, though foreign, which yielded such tangible fruit, commended itself to the statesmen of the capital, who frankly recognised, as did the provincial authorities themselves, that the result obtained was wholly beyond the competence of any native organisation. Though, therefore, the customs service was essentially of a provisional, stop-gap character, it had on that very account a surer guarantee of permanence than could have been derived from any paper covenant by which the Chinese Government could have been bound, for that would have provoked disputation and evasion. The spasmodic attempt to formalise the service on a basis of international obligation which was made in 1898 was perhaps the first thing that really imperilled its constitution. In its origin, indeed, the foreign customs had been international, the three treaty Powers being each represented on the inspectorate; but with the expansion in 1858 this character was abandoned, and the customs became a purely Chinese concern operated by foreign employees, the staff being selected from among all nations indiscriminately, according to personal merit.