The palace of the Viceroy was naturally the chief objective point of all foreigners and especially of officials upon their arrival in port. Occasions frequently occurred when Mr. Gouverneur was compelled to go through the formality of requesting an interview with this high official. These audiences were always promptly granted and were conducted with a great amount of pomp and ceremony very dear to the inhabitants of "far Cathay," but exceedingly tiresome to others. Some distance from us, and in another quarter of the city, was a large building called Examination Hall, used by the natives exclusively in connection with the civil service of the government. It was divided into small rooms, each of which was large enough to accommodate only one person, and in these the young men of that locality who were aspirants for governmental positions were locked each year while they wrote their test examination papers. The hall accommodated ten thousand students and the time of examination was regarded by the Chinese as a critical period in a young man's life, as his chances of future success largely depended upon the ability displayed in his papers. These were carefully read by a board of examiners, and official positions were assigned to those who excelled in the examination. Intelligence was regarded as the chief condition of executive favor and, although personal influence naturally had its weight, its exercise did not seem to be as prevalent in China as elsewhere. It may not be flattering to the pride of other nations, but the fact remains that the civil service of China was the forerunner of the reforms instituted in countries which we are accustomed to regard as much more enlightened in governmental polity.
While we were in China, the seas were infested with a formidable band of native pirates that had committed depredations for many years. One day two rival factions dropped anchor at the same time in the Min River, directly opposite Foo Chow, and opened a brisk fire upon each other. Many of the foreigners became much alarmed, as projectiles were flying around at a lively rate. One of these which had entered the house of an American missionary was brought to the Consulate, and Mr. Gouverneur was urged to take some action. The natives of China were at times a turbulent people who seemed glad for an excuse to stir up the community and, in consequence of this battle of the sea-robbers, a mob formed in Foo Chow which threatened disastrous results. The only foreign vessel in the harbor was a United States man-of-war, the Adams, under the command of James F. Schenck, subsequently a Rear Admiral in our Navy. Only a few days previous the British ships had departed for the mouth of the Peiho River, for the purpose of forcing opium upon the poor Chinese at the cannon's mouth. The city authorities were requested to use their influence in quelling the riots but seemed unequal to the emergency. This state of affairs continued for several days, when one morning the Taotai (mayor), preceded by men beating gongs and followed by a large retinue, arrived at the Consulate and requested protection for the city. Upon a similar occasion during the previous summer, when a number of British warships were in port, these belligerent pirates received summary treatment by having their anchor cables cut, thus causing them to float down the river.
Upon Mr. Gouverneur's request the Adams sent a detachment of marines on shore. It was quartered around the Consulate and its presence quickly had the desired moral effect upon all parties, and proved a source of great relief to both foreign and native residents. Later all apprehension was removed by the speedy departure of the unwelcome marauders. Meanwhile the Consulate had received many valuables, deposited there for safety. The morning following the departure of the ships we noticed a large number of boxes in our courtyard and also several sheep tied to the flag-staff. For a time we could not understand the meaning of this queer collection and were compelled to assign it to the usual incomprehensibilities of Chinese life. Mr. Gouverneur went in search of our interpreter, hoping that he could explain the situation, but to our surprise he had fled. We learned that he stood in great awe of the pirates and feared their vengeance if he told all he knew about them. Mr. Milne, the British interpreter, finally came to our rescue. It seems that the sheep and boxes were parting gifts—"Kumshaws," as the Chinese term them—from the pirates to the American and British Consuls and Mr. Milne.
At first we had no idea what the boxes contained, and Mr. Gouverneur sought the advice of William Sloane, the head of the Hong of Russell and Company, who had long been a resident of China, as to what should be done with this strange consignment. He strongly urged that, as a matter of policy, they be accepted and the British Consul, Walter H. Medhurst, agreed with him. The medley collection was accordingly divided into three groups and some coolies were engaged to convey to the English Consul and Mr. Milne their respective shares. The sheep took the lead, and it was indeed a curious procession that we watched from our windows as we breathed a sigh of relief over the departure of this "embarrassment of riches," and commenced to plan for the disposal of our own share. A few minutes later I chanced to glance out of the window when, to my utter dismay, I saw the procession so recently en route to the British Consulate reenter our courtyard. We were informed that Medhurst had weakened and refused to receive his share of the "Kumshaws." Mr. Gouverneur was much annoyed by such vacillating conduct and immediately notified the British Consul in emphatic language that if he refused to accept the piratical gifts he would regard it as a personal matter. This had the desired effect and a second time the procession wended its way to the British Consulate. The boxes proved to contain hams, rock candy, dates and other provisions which we immediately sent to the American missionaries, while the sheep were given to Mr. Sloane to do with them whatever he pleased. We found this gentleman throughout our Chinese life to be a man of superior judgment and an agreeable companion. After a long and successful career in the East, he died in China just on the eve of his embarkation for America. He never married and many years later I had the pleasure of becoming acquainted with his brother, Samuel Sloane, the railroad magnate, at Garrison's-on-the-Hudson; and, owing to our agreeable association with his brother, both Mr. and Mrs. Sloane always welcomed me with great cordiality.
I have already referred to Commander (afterwards Rear Admiral) James F. Schenck, U.S.N. Our association with him in Foo Chow was highly agreeable. He was our frequent guest at the Consulate and we soon discovered in him a man of rare wit; indeed, I have understood that fifty years ago he was considered the most clever raconteur in the Navy. Commander Schenck's Executive Officer on the Adams was Lieutenant James J. Waddell, whom we regarded as a pleasing and congenial guest. Subsequent to his life in Eastern waters, his career was unusually interesting. He was a native of North Carolina and, resigning his commission in the United States service at the opening of the Civil War, subsequently entered the Confederate Navy, where he was finally assigned to the command of the celebrated cruiser Shenandoah. This ship, formerly the British merchantman Sea King, was bought in England for £45,000 by James D. Bulloch, the Naval Agent of the Southern Confederacy in Great Britain, to take the place of the Alabama, which had been sunk by the Kearsarge in June, 1864. She left London in the fall of the same year and fitted out as an armed cruiser off Madeira. She then went to Australia and, after cruising in various parts of the Pacific, sailed for Behring Sea and the Arctic Ocean, where she met with remarkable success in her depredations upon Northern shipping. She captured thirty-eight vessels, mostly whalers, and the actual losses inflicted by her were only sixty thousand dollars less than those charged to the Alabama. Captain Waddell first heard of the downfall of the Confederacy when off the coast of Lower California on the 2d of August, 1865—between three and four months after the event—and, as he had captured in that interval about a dozen ships and realized that his acts might be regarded as piratical, he sailed for England where, early in November, he surrendered the Shenandoah to the British government. She was turned over to the United States, was subsequently sold to the Sultan of Zanzibar and was lost in 1879 in the Indian Ocean. She was the only ship that carried the flag of the Confederacy around the world. In December, 1861, Captain Waddell married a daughter of James Iglehart of Annapolis, and died in that city a number of years ago.
The American Consulate was the rendezvous of all Naval officers who came into port, and I recall with gratification Lieutenant John J. B. Walbach, a son of Colonel John DeBarth Walbach, a well-known officer of the Army, Dr. Philip Lansdale, Dr. Benjamin F. Gibbs, Lieutenant George M. Blodgett and Lieutenant (afterwards Rear Admiral) John C. Beaumont. The latter was frequently my guest in Washington after my return to America, and Doctors Lansdale and Gibbs I met again at the Capital, where we took pleasure in discussing our Chinese observations and experiences. While in China I also became acquainted with Captain and Mrs. Eliphalet Nott of Schenectady, the former of whom was a nephew of the venerable President Eliphalet Nott of Union College. He commanded his own vessel, the Don Quixote, and was usually accompanied on his voyages by his wife—a mode of life that impressed me as quite ideal.
One day as I was passing through the streets of Foo Chow my attention was directed to a gayly-dressed woman seated in a chair decked with flowers. I was informed that she was a Chinese widow who was about to sacrifice herself upon the pyre in accordance with the custom of the country. I subsequently learned that when this woman reached the place appointed for the ceremony, she found an immense assemblage, including many mandarins and her own brother, the latter of whom had agreed to apply the torch that should launch her into eternity. The crowd, however, was disappointed, for at the last moment her courage failed her and she announced that she must return home at once as she had forgotten to feed her pig! The woman's life was saved, but the disappointment of the throng found expression in a riot which, however, was speedily quelled by the authorities.
The Chinese nation was the victim of an outrageous wrong, and the perpetrators were Americans and Englishmen whose unquenchable avarice overcame their moral convictions. I refer to the iniquitous manner in which opium was introduced into the country and subsequently sold to the natives. Large fortunes were accumulated in this way, but it was nothing more nor less than "blood money" wrung from the pockets of those who had a right to expect better things from the representatives of Christian countries. China at this time was unable to cope by force with the Western nations, but she did not renounce the right to protect herself from this outrage without a struggle. When, however, she asserted this right, as she did on a certain occasion by seizing and burning the deadly drug, she made herself liable for heavy indemnities and was compelled to abandon the unequal struggle. In consequence of this act, six hundred thousand dollars passed through Mr. Gouverneur's hands as U.S. Consul. Even in recent years the Chinese Emperor has sought to protect his subjects from the evils of opium. When I lived in China, Congo tea was cultivated around Foo Chow, but in time it was abandoned and the poppy took its place. A few years ago an edict was issued prohibiting the cultivation of this flower and I understand that tea is again a product of this region. When I resided in Foo Chow, some of the most prominent business houses were involved in the smuggling of opium, and one very large and wealthy firm—that of Jardine and Matthewson—actually employed a heavily armed gunboat to assist it in the accomplishment of this colossal outrage. It will be remembered that when Li Hung Chang, then one of the richest men in the world, visited this country a few years ago he frequently asked the wealthy men whom he met where they got their money. Whether or not he had in mind at the time the manner in which certain American and English fortunes had been accumulated in his native land does not appear; but if his question had been directed to the heads of some of the business houses in Foo Chow and elsewhere in China while I was there, it certainly would have produced, to say the least, no little embarrassment.
Poor China has suffered much from the impositions and depredations of foreigners. Pillage and theft have marked the paths of foreign invaders in a manner wholly inconsistent with the code of honorable warfare, and acts have been committed that would never be tolerated in conflicts between Western nations. It was said that the title of Comte de Pelikao was conferred by Louis Napoleon upon General Charles Montauban for having presented the Empress Eugénie with some superb black pearls taken from the Imperial Summer Palace when it was looted in 1860. At the same time and in the same manner also disappeared many almost priceless gems, costly articles of vertu, treasures in gold and silver and a wealth of ancient manuscripts; while similar outrages were ruthlessly perpetrated in the same unfortunate city only a few years ago as the closing chapter in the Boxer troubles. Unhappy China! She has felt the aggressive hand of her Western "brothers" ever since the unwilling invasion of her shores.
About this time China was the resort of many adventurous Americans, some of whom doubtless "left their country for their country's good," with a view of seeking their fortunes. We became very well acquainted with a New Yorker named Augustus Joseph Francis Harrison, a master of a craft sailing in Chinese waters. His early life had been spent in Morrisania in New York, where he had become familiar with the name of my husband's relative, Gouverneur Morris, and was thus led to seek our acquaintance. One day he came to the Consulate apparently in ill health and told us he was in a serious condition. It seems that he had employed an English physician whose violent remedies had failed to benefit him and had prompted him to declare that he had been mistaken for a horse! He begged us for shelter and we accordingly gave him a room and retained him at the Consulate as our guest. We knew but little of medical remedies, but we did the best for him we could, and in due time were delighted to see that our patient was convalescing. One day my husband and my daughter Maud visited him in his room and, as a token of gratitude, he presented to the little girl the "Pirates' God," one of his most cherished treasures—a curious idol, which is still in her possession. On the back of it he wrote the following history:—"This idol, together with the whole contents of two large pirate boats, was captured after a severe fight of three hours, they having undertaken to take us by surprise; consequently thirty or forty were killed. The rest made good their escape by jumping overboard and swimming ashore. The boats and contents, too, were sold."