The term "Eastern question" has come to mean the political complications arising from the presence of the Turkish empire in Europe. The expression might much more appropriately be applied to the serious difficulties that have for the last year and a half existed between the governments of England and China, and which have, as it now appears, been brought to a reasonably satisfactory conclusion. These difficulties sprang out of the murder of an English subject, Augustus Raymond Margary by name, who was travelling in an official capacity in a remote part of the Chinese empire. They were still further complicated by an almost simultaneous attack upon a British exploring expedition that had just crossed the Chinese frontier from Burmah, with the intention of surveying and opening up to trade an overland route between that country and the Middle Kingdom. To understand the matter it will be necessary to give a brief recapitulation of some events that went before.
The vast importance of establishing an overland trade route between India and China will be seen by a glance at the map. It has been the unrealized dream of generations of India and China merchants. "The trade route of the future" it has been called; and when we consider the vast marts of commerce that such a highway would bring in direct contact, it is impossible to think the name thus enthusiastically given an exaggeration. An overland passage between China and Burmah has long been known and made use of by the native merchants of these countries. From time immemorial it has served as a highway for invading armies or peaceful caravans. How highly the two governments appreciated its importance to the commercial prosperity of their respective subjects is shown by the clause in a treaty concluded by them in 1769, which stipulated that the "gold and silver road" between the two countries should always be kept open. European travellers in Eastern lands, from the ubiquitous Marco Polo down, have also done their best to call attention to it. It may therefore seem somewhat strange that England, the commercial interest of whose Indian empire would be most directly promoted by the opening up of this new channel of trade, should have gone so long without paying much official attention to the matter. Recent events, however, have proved, what was probably foreseen by those whose business it was to study up the subject, that there were grave practical difficulties to be overcome before the plan could be successfully carried out.
In the first place it was necessary to secure the consent of both the Burmese and Chinese governments—a task of almost insurmountable difficulty because of the natural dislike of these two powers to share with another the trade monopoly they had heretofore exclusively enjoyed. Then again there lies between the civilizations of India and China a broad tract of wild and mountainous country, inhabited by a mongrel race of savages, known as Shans and Kakhyens, who, while nominally owing allegiance to one or the other of their more civilized neighbors, practically find their chief support in levying blackmail on all people passing through their territory.
To fit out an exploring expedition strong enough to defy the attacks of the savages, and yet small enough not to convey the idea of an invasion, was, therefore, a work requiring much patience and diplomacy. At length, however, in 1867, the British Government in India succeeded in gaining the consent of the King of Burmah to the passage through his dominions of a mission combining the necessary strength and limits. Under the command of Major Slade, this little army made its way safely through the debatable land of the Kakhyens and Shans, and, entering the province of Yunnan, penetrated as far into the Chinese empire as the city of Momien. But here its further progress was checked.
Yunnan was at the moment in the very crisis of a rebellion against the imperial government. The population of the province is largely Mohammedan. How the religion of the Prophet first obtained so firm a foothold there is still for antiquaries to discover. A semi-historical legend says that the germs of the faith were planted by a colony of Arabs who settled in the country more than a thousand years ago. However this may be, it is certain that the first Mohammedans were not Chinese. By intermarriage, propagation, and adoption, they slowly but steadily communicated their belief to the original inhabitants, until, at the time of which we are writing, more than a tenth of the ten million inhabitants were fanatical Mussulmans. To the mixed race that embrace this creed the general name of Panthays has been given, though for what reason is not known.
In 1855 the Panthays, oppressed, it is said, by the Chinese officials, rose up in rebellion against the imperial government. Led by an obscure Chinese follower of Mohammed, called Tu-win-tsen, the insurrection grew rapidly in extent and success. One imperial city after the other fell into the hands of the rebels, until the entire western section of the province was in their possession and organized as a separate and independent nation, under the sovereignty of Tu-win-tsen, who had in the mean while assumed the more euphonious title of Sultan Soleiman.
It was when Soleiman had attained the height of his glory that Major Slade's party entered Yunnan, and it was with him as the governor de facto that the British commander entered into negotiations. Such a proceeding, though it may have been necessary, was fatal to the further progress of the expedition. The Chinese authorities naturally refused to pass on a party that had, however innocently, entered into friendly relations with its rebellious subjects. Major Slade had the good sense to understand this. The mission retraced its steps into Burmah, and the exploration of the "trade route of the future" was indefinitely postponed.
The visit of the English party to Momien was the signal for a rapid downfall of Soleiman's power. The imperial government, seriously alarmed at the practical recognition of the rebels' independence by an outside power, now put forth all its might to reëstablish its authority. It was successful.
Under the energetic command of one Li-sieh-tai, a famous general who had once himself been a rebel, the Chinese armies wrested back the country, foot by foot, to its former governors. In 1872 Tali-fu, the last and most important stronghold of the rebellion, was closely invested. After a desperate resistance, it was obliged to open its gates.
The end of Soleiman was dramatic in the extreme. He was told that his followers should be spared if he himself would surrender. He agreed to the terms, and, after administering a dose of poison to himself, his three wives and five children, he mounted his chair, and was borne to the camp of his enemies, where he arrived a corpse sitting erect, the imperial turban on his head and the keys of his capital clasped tightly in his hand. His head, preserved in honey, was sent to Peking. The imperial troops poured into Tali-fu. A general massacre occurred. Those Mohammedans that were not slaughtered fled to the mountains, where they still continued to keep up a guerilla warfare. But the rebellion was practically at an end, and by 1874 the authority of the central government was firmly established throughout the province.