Too numerous railway and mining concessions, preliminary works commenced simultaneously in a great number of localities, without sufficient regard for the superstitions of the natives, the invasion by foreign engineers and foremen with overbearing manners, could not but irritate the Chinese, and prepare the ground for agitators and agents of the secret societies and (unemployed) literati who swarm everywhere. The violent action of Germany at Kiao-chau, followed by the seizure of many points on the coast by the other Powers, readily induced the Court and literati to believe that the Foreign Powers intended to partition China, and treat her as a conquered country.
The governing classes among the Chinese have little patriotism, as we understand it, but they tremble for their salaries and privileges, and, in common with the populace, they beheld with horror the prospective violation of their ancient customs. They could not therefore be expected to repress with any energy disturbances with whose authors they were in cordial sympathy. Again, the dynasty of foreign origin which reigns in China is now worn out and tottering; it knows that any concession made to the foreigner will be turned to its disadvantage, that the best means of recovering prestige is to pose as the enemy of the Western civilization; it has even to fear that any great opposition on its part to popular prejudice may one day lead to its being swept away.
What wonder, then, that under the rule of the old Dowager Empress—an energetic Sovereign, perhaps, but ignorant, like the harem recluse she is, and, moreover, passionate, like most women—the Court viewed benignly the organization known as the I-ho-chuan, almost literally, ‘League of Patriots,’ which we call ‘Boxers,’ who first spread themselves over Shan-tung, where the foreigners had displayed the greatest brutality and tactlessness! The creatures of the Empress, narrow-minded and brutal Manchu princes, mandarins of an ultra-reactionary type, who, having never been brought into contact with Europeans, are ignorant of the latter’s strength—all these people whom the Palace revolution in September, 1898, exalted to power, and who exercise it without control since the exile of Li Hung-chang to his distant Viceroyalty of Canton, have not learned how to observe the precautions which at one time guided that wily old fox.
Imperial edicts have favoured the Boxers, ‘those loyal subjects who cultivate athletics for the protection of their families, and who bind together different villages for the purpose of mutual protection.’ In this association, affiliated with other secret societies, it was sought to discover a prop for the dynasty both at home and abroad. Arms were procured from Europe, intended either for the rebels or the regular army, and then, as always happens with feeble Governments in times of trouble, it was found impossible to stem the torrent so easily let loose, and increasing violence soon got the upper hand. The Empress even appears to have been overwhelmed by factions more reactionary and fanatical than herself—factions at whose head stands Prince Tuan, father of the recently adopted heir-presumptive.
Such is the genesis of the present crisis. What are to be the consequences? They would be very grave if the chiefs of the movement hostile to foreigners removed the present Emperor to some distant place, and refused to negotiate on anything like reasonable terms, or if, leaving him in the hands of the Europeans, they should raise a competitor against him. The Emperor, whose accession to the Celestial throne is, in any case, according to Chinese ideas, irregular, and who has exasperated the mandarins by his attempts at reform, would thus run a great risk of being considered a usurper, both in the eyes of the people and the literati. What could the Powers do in such a case? We hardly dare dream of such a laborious, costly, and deadly undertaking as would be an expedition five or six hundred miles from the coast into the heart of a country like China, devoid of good means of transport, and where a large European army would find existence difficult. Besides, in the midst of complete anarchy and civil war, the Powers, whose union is already so unstable, would be forced to interfere, with the risk of irreparable disputes arising between them all at the finish.
Even if the Court should come to terms and no competition for the Empire arise, the situation in China will none the less present great difficulties. The installation in Peking of an Emperor surrounded by councillors approved by the West and watched by a foreign garrison, which would be the most desirable end of the present acute crisis, would not suffice to restore order throughout the Empire. All the elements of agitation are now at boiling-point, and it is even to be feared that ere the allies are able to act vigorously on the offensive, the anti-foreign movement will have gained ground in the provinces. The prestige of the Manchu dynasty, greatly damaged already, will be still further lowered when the Emperor is exhibited as the puppet of the West. Ambitious aspirants of all sorts, Chinese patriots inimical to both Manchu and foreigner, even legitimate representatives of the ancient Ming Dynasty, will all of them seek to profit by this state of things, and, fishing in troubled waters, cause thereby a general recrudescence of insurrection, fomented by the secret societies. Will the Chinese Government succeed in repressing them by its own forces? This is not at all certain, and in that case will Europe charge herself with all the political, military, and financial risks involved in the exercise of such an avocation and become the police of China?
It will perhaps be said that if the Manchu Dynasty can no longer maintain itself, it may be best to leave it to its fate and allow it to be replaced by another. A new, popular, and strong Government would then appear upon the scene, which would find it easier to observe the engagements imposed upon it.[[6]]
But apart from the fact that this new Government might perhaps be very hostile to foreigners and difficult to bring to reason, the Manchus are not yet stripped of all power, and their overthrow would not be effected without a devastating civil war, lasting probably many years. Europe is now too much interested in China to encourage such a catastrophe.
On the other hand, nobody desires the partition of the Celestial Empire. To begin with, the chief eventual rivals are not ready: Russia has not completed her Trans-Siberian Railway; England is hampered with her interminable war in South Africa; the United States, with a large portion of its population opposed to outside extension, insists that no part of the Middle Kingdom shall be closed to them—in other words, that it shall not be dismembered; Japan has not completed her armaments; her finances require careful attention, and she feels, besides, that she cannot act alone. France has every reason for averting a partition, in which her share (the provinces adjoining Tongking) would be a very poor one; and finally, the present insurrectionary movement should prove to the world—including Germany, who took so indiscreet an initiative at Kiao-chau—that it would not be easy to govern the Celestials after European methods, and that the mere task of establishing order in a large colony carved out of China might be beyond the strength even of the European Powers.
This being the case, the only policy possible for all countries is to abandon for the present their personal aims, and to endeavour in unison to patch up the Manchu system. To depart from this line of action is to proceed to disaster. But the Powers will have to display some wisdom for a few years to come if this bolstering process is to have the least chance of success. The Court and the populace of the capital should be given a not-easily-forgotten lesson: let the instigators of the proposed murders of the ministers be delivered up and made to pay for their cowardly conduct; if necessary, even let their bodies be left unburied, which, in the eyes of the Chinese, is the most terrible of all punishments; let the old Empress be exiled if it should appear necessary to remove her from power. But after all this is done, let the legal order of succession be respected. While putting pressure on the Court to appoint moderate or even slightly progressive men to the head of affairs, avoid a too direct and a too evident interference in the selection of rulers, which would be perilously inadvisable. On the one hand, the Powers would soon cease to act in unison, each considering such and such a grand mandarin more or less its friend and such another its enemy; and on the other hand, the men chosen would lose all authority, as they would be looked upon as agents of the foreigners. Against this, it is absolutely indispensable that Peking and Tien-tsin should be occupied during several years by a strong garrison, otherwise it will be said that the foreign soldiery have departed through fear, and that the permanent fortification of Ta-ku should be forbidden.