Sir George Staunton, One Of The Few English Sinologues, Was
Appointed Secretary, And Several Interpreters Were Sought For And
Obtained, Not Without Difficulty.
The presents were many and valuable,
chosen with the double object of gratifying the emperor and impressing him
with the wealth and magnificence of the English sovereign.
In September,
1792 - the same month that witnessed the overthrow of the Goorkhas at
Nayakot - the embassy sailed from Portsmouth, but it did not reach the
Peiho, on which Pekin is inaccurately said to stand, until the following
August.
An honorable and exceedingly gratifying reception awaited it. The
embassador and his suite, on landing from the man-of-war, were conducted
with all ceremony and courtesy up the Peiho to Tientsin, where they
received what was called the unusual honor of a military salute. Visits
were exchanged with the Viceroy of Pechihli and some of the other high
officials, and news came down from Pekin that "the emperor had shown some
marks of great satisfaction at the news of the arrival of the English
embassador." Keen Lung happened to be residing at his summer palace at
Jehol beyond the Wall, but he sent peremptory instructions that there was
to be no delay in sending the English up to Pekin. Up to this point all
had gone well, but the anti-foreign party began to raise obstructions,
and, headed by Sund Fo, the conqueror of the Goorkhas, to advise the
emperor not to receive the embassador, and to reject all his propositions.
Whether to strengthen his case, or because he believed it to be the fact,
Sund Fo declared that the English had helped "the Goorkha robbers," and
that he had found among them "men with hats," _i.e._, Europeans, as well
as "men with turbans." As Sund Fo was the hero of the day, and also the
viceroy of the Canton province, his views carried great weight, and
they were also of unfavorable omen for the future of foreign relations.
But for this occasion the inquisitiveness of the aged emperor prevailed
over the views of the majority in his council and also over popular
prejudice. When the embassy had been detained some time at Pekin, and
after it looked as if a period of vexatious delay was to herald the
discomfiture of the mission, such positive orders were sent by Keen Lung
for the embassy to proceed to Jehol that no one dared to disobey him. Lord
Macartney proceeded to Jehol with his suite and a Chinese guard of honor,
and he accomplished the journey, about one hundred miles, in an English
carriage. The details of the journey and reception are given in Sir George
Staunton's excellent narrative; but here it may be said that the emperor
twice received the British embassador in personal audience in a tent
specially erected for the ceremony in the gardens of the palace. The
embassy then returned to Pekin, and, as the Gulf of Pechihli was frozen,
it was escorted by the land route to Canton. On this journey Lord
Macartney and his party suffered considerable inconvenience and annoyance
from the spite and animosity of the Chinese inferior officials; but
nothing serious occurred to mar what was on the whole a successful
mission. Keen Lung is said to have wished to go further, but his official
utterance was limited to the reciprocation of "the friendly sentiments of
His Britannic Majesty." His advanced age and his abdication already
contemplated left him neither the inclination nor the power to go very
closely into the question of the policy of cultivating closer relations
with the foreign people who asserted their supremacy on the sea and who
had already subjugated one great Asiatic empire. But it may at least be
said that he did nothing to make the ultimate solution of the question
more difficult, and his flattering reception of Lord Macartney's embassy
was an important and encouraging a precedent for English diplomacy with
China.
The events of internal interest in the history of the country during the
last twenty years of this reign call for some, brief notice, although they
relate to comparatively few matters that can be disentangled from the
court chronicles and official gazettes of the period. The great floods of
the Hoangho and the destruction caused thereby had been a national
calamity from the earliest period. Keen Lung, filled with the desire to
crown his reign by overcoming it, intrusted the task of dealing with this
difficulty to Count Akoui, whose laurels over the Miaotze had raised him
to the highest position in public popularity and his sovereign's
confidence. Keen Lung issued his personal instructions on the subject in
unequivocal language. He said in his edict, "My intention is that this
work should be unceasingly carried on, in order to secure for the people a
solid advantage both for the present and in the time to come. Share my
views, and in order to accomplish them, forget nothing in the carrying out
of your project, which I regard as my own, since I entirely approve of it,
and the idea which originated it was mine. For the rest, it is at my own
charge, and not at the cost of the province, that I wish all this to be
done. Let expenses not be stinted. I take upon myself the consequences,
whatever they may be." Akoui threw himself into his great task with
energy, and it is said that he succeeded in no small degree in controlling
the waters and restricting their ravages. We are ignorant of the details
of his work, but it may certainly be said that the Hoangho has done less
damage since Akoui carried out his scheme than it had effected before. The
question is still unsolved, and probably there is no undertaking in which
China would benefit more from the engineering science of Europe than this,
if the Chinese government were to seriously devote its attention to a
matter that affects many millions of people and some of the most important
provinces of the empire.
Enter page number
PreviousNext
Page 84 of 188
Words from 84582 to 85587
of 191255
