The result of all this, briefly stated, was the partial effacement of the Legation and the gradual promotion of Sir Robert Hart to the first place in the confidence of the British Government. As the Foreign Office had, since the suppression of the Taiping rebellion and the death of Lord Palmerston, been most reluctant either to busy itself or to inform itself respecting affairs in China, and was, moreover, anxious to minimise the cost of the Legation in Peking, it was rather predisposed to accept volunteer assistance in the management of British interests in China. The Legation was then, as now, without any intelligence department, the cost of which was saved under the vague belief that all needful information might be obtained from the customs. Thus relegated to a secondary place, the Legation was more and more neglected by Her Majesty's Government, until at last representatives were selected at random and sent out without instructions, in blind reliance on the good offices of the Inspector-General of Customs.
Before this final stage had been reached, however, such an opportunity occurred, through the death of Sir Harry Parkes, of legitimising the irregular connection, as a death sometimes provides in certain relations of domestic life, and Sir Robert Hart was himself appointed British Minister. This step was recognised as so far appropriate to the circumstances that it conjoined responsibility with power, which had been too long divorced from each other. But just as the new Minister was about to assume his duties a hitch occurred with the Tsungli-Yamên, whose views as to the succession to the post of head of the customs not coinciding with Sir Robert Hart's, he thereupon resigned the office of British Minister and resumed his Chinese service. The incident made no difference in the confidence which Sir Robert Hart inspired in the Foreign Office, which had, in fact, drifted into a position of dependence on the inspector-general. This close relationship continued until the Japanese war in 1894, when the British Government, the victim of many illusions, found itself in a condition of bewilderment, like King Lear on the heath, quite unfurnished with the means of coping with the superior intelligence of the other European Powers.
Throughout all these years the attitude of the inspector-general towards his Chinese employers was absolutely above suspicion. He served them loyally throughout, and if the British Government imagined he was using his highly paid position under the Chinese Government in any way to promote other than Chinese interests, that was a gratuitous assumption on their part for which they alone were responsible, and for which, as for all false strategy, the inevitable penalty must be paid.
Among the important international services rendered by the foreign customs, the effective lighting of the coast deserves the first place. Next to that may be reckoned the compilation of accurate statistics of foreign trade with China, more complete perhaps than exists in any other country. The reports of the commissioners of customs at the various ports are also replete with varied and useful information concerning the commerce, industry, and agriculture, with other conditions of the life of the Chinese. Special subjects assigned to individual men are treated as exhaustively as if investigated by a Royal Commission. These valuable papers constitute a modern Chinese Repository to which there is but one drawback—its inaccessibility.
IV. EMIGRATION.
Extensive emigration of Chinese labourers in consequence of gold discoveries—Great abuses—Attempt to diminish same by international action—Tripartite treaty concluded in Peking—Not ratified by France and England—Who send out amended treaty, but negotiations never resumed by Chinese—Opposition of British colonies and the United States to Chinese emigration.
The first public question with which Sir Rutherford Alcock was called upon to deal was that of the emigration or exportation of Chinese coolies. Among the consequences of the gold discoveries of the middle of the century was a demand for human labour, which China of all countries was best able to supply. Voluntary emigration to California and Australia (the "Old" and the "New Gold Mountain") was considerable; but it did not meet the requirements of those enterprises in tropical and subtropical countries which, if not originated, were at least stirred into activity by the impulse radiating from the gold mines. The contractor was called into requisition, and Chinese were carried off in shiploads to Cuba, Peru, Chili, "where they were sold into virtual slavery" under agreements over which there was no legal supervision. Terrible abuses characterised the traffic; mutiny and massacre on the high seas were among the natural consequences. "Another coolie tragedy" was as common a newspaper heading in the 'Fifties as "another missionary outrage" in the subsequent decades of the nineteenth century.
Hongkong being the most convenient shipping port, it was natural that thence should emanate the first efforts to suppress the abuses of the traffic. The "Chinese Passengers Act" passed by the Colonial Legislature in 1855 was a well-considered step in that direction, and the establishment of responsible emigration agencies was another. Such efforts, however, could only be partially successful; for while they cleared the colony from participation in a nefarious trade, they made no impression on the trade itself. Indeed, by throwing it into the least reputable channels, the fate of the victims may even have been rendered less endurable by the restrictive measures conceived for their benefit. The Portuguese settlement of Macao remained open, and there the coolie traffic flourished exceedingly, to the pecuniary advantage of that colony and of the maternal Government, which levies an annual tribute from its Far Eastern offspring. The trade was also carried on in a more or less clandestine and irregular manner at Canton, Swatow, and other Chinese ports, under non-British flags.
For years the colonial press was filled with the horrors of the traffic. Such paragraphs as the following were continually appearing in the Hongkong newspapers:—
At Macao the coolie trade is still rampant, with all its abominations. The inquiries instituted, or said to have been instituted, by Governor Amaral, have ended in smoke. Day after day some additional iniquity comes to light in connection with this horrible traffic. Coolies kidnapped, imprisoned in barracoons, flogged to make them consent to sign the iniquitous contract that binds them to a life of slavery, marched with a strong guard to testify at the Government offices to their signature as given voluntarily and freely, half-starved, exposed to blindness and disease on board ship in transit to the place of their exile, tossed overboard, or left on some barren isle to die, if loss of sight or sickness renders them useless to their masters. Such are the grand features of the Macao coolie trade, supported by the governor in his official acts, and the semi-official paper he edits. Such are the horrors of a slave-trade worse than that of the poor African negro, which all nations ought to unite to put an end to.