A Period Of
Eighteen Months Elapsed Before The Details Of This Momentous Agreement
Became Known.
On the return of Li Hung Chang to Pekin, he not only failed
to recover the viceroyship of Chihli, but he found his relations with the
Emperor Kwangsu quite as unsatisfactory as they had been after his return
from Shimonoseki.
He was restored, indeed, to a seat on the Tsungli Yamen,
or Board of Foreign Affairs, but, for twelve months, it seemed as if,
despite the support of the Empress-dowager Tsi An, his influence would
never revive.
The two years that followed the Shimonoseki Treaty gave a breathing spell
to China, and should have been devoted to energetic reforms in the
military and naval administration. As a matter of fact, nothing had been
accomplished, when, in 1897, a blow fell which brought the Middle Kingdom
face to face with the prospect of immediate partition. In November of that
year, without any preliminary notice or warning to the Pekin government,
two German men-of-war entered the harbor of Kiao Chou, and ordered the
commandant to give up the place in reparation for the murder of two German
missionaries in the province of Shantung. Germany refused to evacuate Kiao
Chou unless due reparation should be made for the outrage on the
missionaries, and unless, further, China would cede to her the exclusive
right to construct railways and work mines throughout the extensive and
populous province of Shantung. This, of course, was equivalent to the
demarcation of a sphere of influence. For a time, the Pekin government
showed itself recalcitrant, but, in January, 1898, it consented to lease
Kiao Chou to Germany for ninety-nine years, and to make the required
additional concession of exclusive rights in Shantung. Russia, on her
part, did not wait long after the German seizure of Kiao Chou, to put
forward her claim for compensation on account of the services rendered in
the matter of the revision of the Shimonoseki Treaty. The terms of the
Cassini agreement were now gradually revealed. In December, 1897, the St.
Petersburg government announced that the Chinese had given permission to
the Russian fleet to winter at Port Arthur; in February, 1898, Russia
added Talienwan to Port Arthur, but essayed to disarm criticism by
declaring that the first-named port would be opened to the ships of all
the great powers like other ports on the Chinese mainland. This promise
was subsequently qualified, and on March 27 a convention was signed at
Pekin giving the Russians the "usufruct" of Port Arthur and Talienwan,
which, practically, meant that Russia had obtained those harbors
unconditionally, and for an indefinite period. France, on her part,
obtained possession of the port of Kwangchowfoo, which is the best outlet
to the sea for the trade of the southern province of Kwangsi; she also
secured a promise that the island of Hainan should not be ceded to any
other power; and, finally, she gained a recognition of her claim, first
advanced in 1895, to a prior right to control the commercial development
of the province of Yunnan. This claim is as reasonable as that put forward
by Germany with reference to the province of Shantung, but it is
incompatible with the northeastward development of British Burmah. While
these acts, which, virtually, amounted to mutilations of the Middle
Kingdom, were being committed by Germany, Russia and France, England
undertook to assert the principle of the "open door," the principle,
namely, that, whatever territorial concessions might be made by the Pekin
government, no nation could be deprived of its treaty rights in the ports
ceded. That is to say, American citizens, British subjects, or the
subjects of any other power which has a treaty with China containing "the
most favored nation" clause, must be allowed to enjoy precisely the same
rights in Talienwan, Kiao Chou and Kwangchowfoo as they would have enjoyed
had not those places been surrendered to Russia, Germany and France
respectively. This principle could only have been enforced by war, in
which England would have needed the assistance of Japan; but Japan was not
yet ready to engage in a contest, for the reason that she still had to
receive $60,000,000 of the war indemnity due from China, and because the
war vessels which she had ordered to be constructed in foreign shipyards
were not yet sufficiently near completion. Being thus constrained to
abandon the hope of maintaining its treaty rights in the ceded parts of
China, the British Foreign Office changed its ground and fell back on the
policy of exacting an equivalent for the advantages gained by Russia,
Germany and France. In the pursuance of this policy it obtained Wei-hai-
Wei, which, as we have said, is one of the two keys to the Gulf of
Pechihli. It is, however, very inferior to Port Arthur; only by the
expenditure of a large sum of money could it be made a naval fortress of
high rank, and, even then, it would require a large garrison for its
protection. This was not all that England gained, however; she secured a
promise from the Pekin government that the valley of the Yangstekiang
should never be alienated to any foreign power except Great Britain. The
limits of the valley, nevertheless, were not defined, and the Pekin
authorities have acted on the hypothesis that the covenant against
alienation did not debar them from giving commercial and industrial
privileges within the basin to the subjects of European powers other than
England. The right to build, for instance, a railway from Pekin to
Hangchow has been conferred upon a syndicate nominally Belgian, in which,
however, it is understood that Russia is deeply interested. On the other
hand, in spite of protests from St. Petersburg, the privilege of extending
to Newchwang in Manchuria the railway which already extends some distance
in a northeasterly direction from Tientsin, has been secured by a British
corporation.
In September, 1898, a palace revolution occurred at Pekin. For some time,
the Emperor Kwangsu had been known to be under the influence of a highly
intelligent and progressive Cantonese named Kang Yu Wei.
Enter page number
PreviousNext
Page 180 of 188
Words from 182529 to 183551
of 191255