1832.] Reform in China. 257 



has, perhaps,, been perfectly unavoidable. It should be clearly under- 

 stood also, that the imperial sanction may have been obtained from the 

 gross misrepresentations of the local government only, and will therefore 

 be recalled, and the offenders punished, immediately the real facts are 

 known : whilst even the outrage itself should, but too probably, be con- 

 sidered the personal act of the foo-yuen, whose enmity to the English is 

 universally known, and who thus availed himself of the absence of his 

 superior, the viceroy Le, to inflict the recent insult. He has frequently 

 stood alone in the council in his proposal of measures of extreme severity 

 against foreigners ; and the imperious necessity of immediate vigorous 

 and energetic measures to destroy his influence, became therefore still 

 more palpably apparent. 



Such is an outline of the very unpleasant state of affairs at the date of 

 the most recent letters, in August last ; and for the next intelligence on 

 the arrival of the regular ships in March, we are unaffectedly anxious. 

 On the subject of the East India Company's monopoly of the China 

 trade, we do not at present enter, and allude to it, therefore, to make the 

 single remark, that whatever future arrangement may take place, it 

 would seem, that however we may exculpate the select committee, yet 

 so far as the Directors at home are concerned, the interests of British 

 commerce cannot be less protected, or worse managed, than at present. 

 Arguing upon the data before us, we can feel no difficulty in stating, 

 that the conduct of the select committee, in first issuing and then recal- 

 ling their notice of the threatened suspension of commercial intercourse, 

 was an error in judgment, the very mischievous effects of which are not 

 likely to be speedily remedied, since it is the unanimous opinion of all those 

 who are best acquainted with the temper and habits of the Chinese, that 

 to display any want of firmness, or on any occasion to temporize with 

 them, is the very worst policy that can be adopted. Every forbearance 

 to notice an insult on our part, has invariably led to fresh aggressions on 

 theirs ; and if, as now seems no longer doubtful, since it is so confidently 

 asserted by those who ought to know, the Company's Directors have sent 

 out instructions to their servants at Macao, to conciliate the Chinese, by 

 quietly submitting to, instead of resenting, the late unprovoked and 

 most unjustifiable outrages, we cannot but think that they have thus 

 afforded a stronger argument against the renewal of their charter, than 

 could have been advanced by the most violent of their opponents. 



The complete failure, as well as the causes of failure, of Lord Am- 

 herst's celebrated embassy of conciliation in 1816, are equally notorious, 

 and incontrovertible evidence in support of our argument, which a less 

 known anecdote, connected with that ill-starred expedition, will still 

 farther enforce. When his excellency had been left at Teen King, in 

 the Yellow Sea, on his route to the emperor, Captain (afterwards Sir 

 Murray) Maxwell was naturally anxious to avail himself of the oppor- 

 tunity to refit the Alceste frigate w r ith the stores and provisions requisite 

 after so long a voyage. These supplies were so repeatedly delayed, and 

 his renewed applications for them treated with such indifference and 

 contempt, that at length the gallant captain's patience being completely 

 exhausted, he informed the Chinese authorities, that unless the provi- 

 sions, &c. were delivered by a certain day, he would proceed up the 

 river and take what they refused to give. The day arrived, and as the 

 supplies did not, preparations were accordingly made for weighing an- 

 chor, when a Chinaman came on board and informed Captain Maxwell, 



