Beacon Lights of History, Volume 14: The New Era — Li Huang Chang, Part 3

THE WAR WITH FRANCE.

If the opening of Peking required a prolonged struggle, it was followed by a quarter-century of pacific intercourse.

China had at her helm a number of wise statesmen,--such as Prince Kung and Wensiang.

The Inspectorate of Customs begun under Mr. Lay took shape under the skilful management of Sir Robert Hart, and from that day to this it has proved to be a fruitful nursery of reforms, political and social.

Not only were students sent abroad for education at the instance and under the leadership of Yung Wing, but a school for interpreters was opened in the capital, which, through the influence of Sir Robert Hart, was expanded into the well-known Imperial College.

On his nomination the present writer was called to the head of it, and Wensiang proposed to convert it into a great national university by making it obligatory on the members of the Hanlin Academy, the Emperor's "Forest of Pencils," to come there for a course of instruction in science and international law.

Against this daring innovation, Wojin, a Manchu tutor of the Emperor, protested, declaring that it would be humiliating to China to have her choicest scholars sit at the feet of foreign professors.

The scheme fell through, but before many years the Emperor himself had taken up the study of the English language, and two of our students were selected to be his instructors.

One of them is at this present time (1902) Chinese minister at the Court of St. James.

Several of our students have had diplomatic missions, and one, after serving as minister abroad, is now a leading member of the Board of Foreign Affairs in Peking.

A press opened in connection with the college printed numerous text-books on international law, political economy, physics, and mathematics, translated by the president, professors, and students.

America was fortunate in the choice of the first minister whom she sent to reside at Peking.

This was Anson Burlingame, who, after doing much to encourage the Chinese in the direction of progress, was by them made the head of the first embassy which they sent to foreign nations.

His success in other countries was largely due to the sympathy with which he had been received in the United States by Secretary Seward, and to the advice and recommendations with which he was provided by that great statesman.

So deep an interest did Mr. Seward take in China that he went in person to study its condition before the close of his career.

In his visit to Peking he was accompanied by his nephew, George F. Seward, who was United States Consul at Shanghai.

The latter has since that date worthily represented our country as minister at Peking; but it may be doubted whether in that high position he ever performed an international service equal in importance to one performed during his consulship, for which he has recently received the cross of the Legion of Honor.

In laying out their new concession at Shanghai, the French had excited the hostility of the people by digging up and levelling down many of those graves that occupied so much space outside of the city walls, and where the Chinese who worshipped their ancestors were to be seen every day burning paper and heaping up the earth.

A furious mob fell on the French police, chased them from the field, and menaced the French settlement with knife and firebrand.

The consuls were appealed to for aid, but no one responded except Mr. Seward, who headed a strong force from one of our men-of-war, dispersed the mob, and secured the safety of the foreign settlement.

But for his timely intervention who knows that the French consulate would not have been reduced to ashes?

If the consulate had been burned down, a war would have been inevitable, with a chain of consequences that baffles the imagination.

In 1871 a horrid atrocity was perpetrated by Chinese at Tientsin which certainly would have led to war with France if Napoleon III.

had not at that very time been engaged in mortal combat with Germany.

The populace were made to believe that the sisters at the French hospital had been seen extracting the eyeballs from their patients to use in the manufacture of magical drugs.

They were set upon by a maddened multitude, a score or more of them slaughtered, and the buildings where they had cared for the sick and suffering turned to a heap of ruins.

Count Rocheschouart, instead of reserving the case to be settled at a later day, thought best to accept from the Chinese government an apology, with an ample sum in the way of pecuniary compensation.

That grewsome superstition has led to bloodshed in more than one part of China.

In the summer of 1885 I was called one day from the Western Hills to the Tsungli-Yamen, or Foreign Office, on business of great urgency.

On arriving, I was informed that the Chinese gunboats in the river Min had been sunk by the French the day before; that they had also destroyed the Arsenal at the mouth of the river.

"This," said the Secretary, "means war, and we desire to know how non-combatants belonging to the enemy and resident in our country are to be treated according to the rules of International Law."

While I was copying out the principles and precedents bearing on the subject, the same Secretary begged me to hasten my report, "because," said he, "the Grand Council is waiting for it to embody in an Imperial Decree."

True enough, the next day a decree from the throne announced the outbreak of war; but it added that non-combatants belonging to the enemy would not be molested.

Two of our professors were Frenchmen, and they were both permitted to continue in charge of their classes without molestation.

Hostilities were brought to a happy conclusion by the agency of Sir Robert Hart.

One of his customs cruisers employed in the light-house service having been seized by the French, Mr. Campbell was sent to Paris to see the French President and petition for its release.

Learning that President Grévy would welcome the restoration of peace, and ascertaining what conditions would be acceptable, Sir Robert laid them before the Chinese government, putting an end to a conflict which, if suffered to go on, might have ruined the interests of more than one country.

In this war and in those peace negotiations the conduct of the Chinese was worthy of a civilized nation.

Yet the result of their experience was to make them more ready to appeal to arms in cases of difficulty.

Li's connection with this war was very real, though not conspicuous.

Changpeilun, director of the arsenal at Foochow, was his son-in-law.

Not only was Li disposed to aid him in taking revenge, he was himself building a great arsenal in the north; and it was, no doubt, owing to efficient succor from this quarter that Formosa was able to hold out against the forces of the French.

VII. WAR WITH JAPAN.

Both in its inception and in its tragic ending the notable conflict with Japan connects itself with the name of Li Hung Chang.

The Island Empire on the East had long been known to the Chinese, though until our times no regular intercourse subsisted between the two countries.

It is recorded that a fleet freighted with youth and maidens was despatched thither by the builder of the Great Wall to seek in those islands of the blest for the herb of immortality; but none of them returned.

It was to be a colony, and the flowery robe by which its object is veiled is not sufficient to hide the real aim of that ambitious potentate.

Yet, through that expedition and subsequent emigrations, a pacific conquest was effected which does honor to both nations, planting in those islands the learning of China, and blending with their native traditions the essential teachings of her ancient sages.

For centuries prior to our age of treaties, non-intercourse had been enforced on both sides,--the Japanese confining their Chinese neighbors, as they did the Dutch, to a little islet in the port of Nagasaki; and China seeing nothing of Japan except an occasional descent of Japanese pirates on her exposed sea-coast.

To America belongs the honor of opening that opulent archipelago to the commerce of the world.

Our shipwrecked sailors having been harshly treated by those islanders, a squadron was sent under Commodore Perry to Yeddo (now Tokio) in 1855, to punish them if necessary and to provide against future outrages.

With rare moderation he merely handed in a statement of his terms and sailed away to Loochoo to give them time for reflection.

Returning six months later, instead of the glove of combat he was received with the hand of friendship, and a treaty was signed which provided for the opening of three ports and the residence of an American chargé d'affaires.

In the autumn of 1859 it was my privilege to visit Yeddo in company with Mr. Ward and Commodore Tatnall.

We were entertained by Townsend Harris and shown the sights of the city of the Shoguns when it was still clothed in its mediaeval costume.

The long swaddling-garb of the natives had a semi-savage aspect, and the abject servility with which their todzies (interpreters) prostrated themselves before their officers excited a feeling of contempt.

Like the mayors of the palace in mediaeval France, the Shoguns or generals had relegated the Mikado to a single city of the interior;

while for six hundred years they had usurped the power of the Empire, practically presenting the spectacle of two Emperors, one "spiritual" (or nominal), one "temporal" (or real).

Little did we imagine that within five years the Shoguns would be swept away, and the Mikado restored to more than his ancient power.

The conflagration was kindled by a spark from our engines.

The feudal nobles, of whom there were four hundred and fifty, each a prince within his own narrow limits, were indignant that the Shogun had opened his ports to those aggressive foreigners of the West.

Raising a cry of "Kill the foreigners!"

they overturned the Shoguns and restored the Mikado.

Their fury, however, subsided when they found that the foreigner was too strong to be expelled.

A few more years saw them patriotically surrendering their feudal powers in order to make the central government strong enough to face the world.

About the same time our Western costume was adopted, and along with it the parliamentary system of Great Britain and the school system of America.

Some foreigners were shallow enough to laugh at them when they saw those little soldiers in Western uniform; and the Chinese despised them more than ever for abandoning the dress of their forefathers.

To protect themselves at once against China and Russia, the Japanese felt that the independence of Corea was to them indispensable.

The King had been a feudal subject to China since the days of King Solomon; and when at the instance of Japan he assumed the title of Emperor, the Chinese resolved to punish him for such insolence.

This was in 1894. The Japanese took up arms in his defence; and though they had some hard fighting, they soon made it evident that nothing but a treaty of peace could keep them out of Peking.

Li Hung Chang, who had long been Viceroy at Tientsin and who had built a northern arsenal and remodelled the Chinese army, had to confess himself beaten.

For him it was a bitter pill to be sent as a suppliant to the Court of the Mikado.

That China was beaten was not his fault.

Yet he was held responsible by his own government and departed on that humiliating mission as if with a rope about his neck.

Fortunately for him, during his mission in Japan an assassin lodged a bullet in his head, and the desire of Japan to undo the effect of that shameful act made negotiation an easy task, converting his defeat into a sort of triumph.

Happily, too, he enjoyed the counsel and assistance of J. W.

Foster, formerly United States Secretary of State.

Formosa, one of the brightest jewels in the Chinese crown, had to be handed over to Japan, and lower Manchuria would have gone with it, had not Russia, supported by Austria and Germany, compelled the Japanese to withdraw their claims.

The next turn of the kaleidoscope shows us China seeking to follow the example of Japan in throwing off the trammels of antiquated usage.

In 1898, when the tide of reform was in full swing, the Marquis Ito of Japan paid a visit to Peking, and as president of the University, I had the honor of being asked to meet him along with Li Hung Chang at a dinner given by Huyufen, mayor of the city, and the grand secretary, Sunkianai.

It was a lesson intended for them when he told us how, on his returning from England in the old feudal days, his prince asked him if anything needed to be reformed in Japan.

"Everything," he replied.

The lesson was lost on the three Chinese statesmen, progressive though they were, for China was then on the eve of a violent reaction which threatened ruin instead of progress.

VIII. WAR WITH THE WORLD.

The last summer of the century saw the forts at the mouth of the Peiho captured for the third time since the beginning of 1858. It was the opening scene in the last act of a long drama, and more imposing than any that had gone before, not in the number of assailants nor in the obstinacy of resistance, but in the fact that instead of one or two nations as hitherto, all the powers of the modern world were now combined to batter down the barriers of Chinese conservatism.

Getting possession of Tientsin, not without hard fighting, they advanced on Peking under eight national flags, against the "eight banners" of the Manchu tribes.

What was the mainspring of this tragic movement?

What unforeseen occurrence had effected a union of powers whose usual attitude is mutual jealousy or secret hostility?

In a word, it was _humanity_.

Spurning petty questions of policy, they combined their forces to extinguish a conflagration kindled by pride and superstition, which menaced the lives of all foreigners in North China.

In 1898, when the Emperor had entered on a career of progress, the Empress Dowager was appealed to by a number of her old servants to save the Empire from a young Phaeton, who was driving so fast as to be in danger of setting the world on fire.

Coming out of her luxurious retreat, ten miles from the city, where she had never ceased to keep an eye on the course of affairs, she again took possession of the throne and compelled her adopted son to ask her to "teach him how to govern."

This was the _coup d'état_.

In her earlier years she had not been opposed to progress, but now that she had returned to power at the instance of a conservative party, she entered upon a course of reaction which made a collision with foreign powers all but inevitable.

She had been justly provoked by their repeated aggressions.

Germany had seized a port in Shantung in consequence of the murder of two missionaries.

Russia at once clapped her bear's paw on Port Arthur.

Great Britain set the lion's foot on Weihaiwei; and France demanded Kwang Chan Bay, all "to maintain the balance of power."

Exasperated beyond endurance, the Empress gave notice that any further demands of the sort would be met by force of arms.

The governor of Shantung appointed by her was a Manchu by the name of Yuhien, who more than any other man is to be held responsible for the outbreak of hostilities.

He it was who called the Boxers from their hiding-places and supplied them with arms, convinced apparently of the reality of their claim to be invulnerable.

For a hundred years they had existed as a secret society under a ban of prohibition.

Now, however, they had made amends by killing German missionaries, and he hoped by their aid to expel the Germans from Shantung.

On complaint of the German Minister he was recalled; but, decorated by the hands of the Empress Dowager, he was transferred to Shansi, where later on he slaughtered all the missionaries in that province.

In Shantung he was succeeded by Yuen Shikai, a statesmanlike official, who soon compelled the Boxers to seek another arena for their operations.

Instead of creeping back to their original hiding-place they crossed the boundary and directed their march toward Peking,--on the way not merely laying waste the villages of native Christians, but tearing up the railway and killing foreigners indiscriminately.

They had made a convert of Prince Tuan, father of the heir apparent.

He it was who encouraged their advance, believing that he might make use of them to help his son to the throne.

Their numbers were swelled by multitudes who fancied that they would suffer irreparable personal loss through the introduction of railways and modern labor-saving machinery; and China can charge the losses of the last war to those misguided crowds.

Fortunately several companies of marines, amounting to four hundred and fifty men, arrived in Peking the day before the destruction of the track.

The legations were threatened, churches were burnt down, native Christians put to death, and fires set to numerous shops simply because they contained foreign goods.

Then it was that the foreign admirals captured the forts, in order to bring relief to our foreign community.

That step the Chinese Foreign Office pronounced an act of war, and ordered the legations and all other foreigners to quit the capital.

The ministers remonstrated, knowing that on the way we could not escape being butchered by Boxers.

On the 20th of June, the German Minister was killed on his way to the Foreign Office.

The legations and other foreigners at once took refuge in the British legation, previously agreed on as the best place to make a defence.

Professor James was killed while crossing a bridge near the legation.

That night we were fired on from all sides, and for eight weeks we were exposed to a daily fusillade from an enemy that counted more on reducing us by starvation than on carrying our defences by storm.

About midnight on August 13, we heard firing at the gates of the city, and knew that our deliverers were near.

The next day, scaling the walls or battering down the gates, they forced their way into the city and effected our rescue.

The day following, the Roman Catholic Cathedral was relieved,--the defence of which forms the brightest page in the history of the siege, and in the afternoon we held a solemn service of thanksgiving.

The palaces were found vacant, the Empress Dowager having fled with her entire court.

She was the same Empress who had fled from the British and French forty years before.

She was not pursued, because Prince Ching came forward to meet the foreign ministers, and he and Li Hung Chang were appointed to arrange terms of peace.

Li was Viceroy at Canton.

Had he been in his old viceroyalty at Tientsin, this Boxer war could not have occurred.

That its fury was limited to the northern belt of provinces was owing to the wisdom of Chang[5] and Liu, the great satraps of Central China who engaged to keep their provinces in order, if not attacked by foreigners.

[Footnote 5: Chang is regarded as the ablest of China's viceroys.

He published, prior to the _coup d'état_, a notable book, in which he argues that China's only hope is in the adoption of the sciences and arts of the West.

] I called on the old statesman in the summer of 1901, after the last of the treaties was signed.

He seemed to feel that his work was finished, but he still had energy enough to write a preface for my translation of Hall's "International Law," and before the end of another month his long life of restless activity had come to a close at the age of seventy-nine.

By posthumous decree, he was made a Marquis.

In the autumn the court returned to Peking, the way having been opened by Li's negotiations.

Thanks to the lessons of adversity, the Dowager has been led to favor the cause of progress.

Not only has she re-enacted the educational reforms proposed by the Emperor, but she has gone a step farther, and ordered that instead of mere literary finish, a knowledge of arts and sciences shall be required in examinations for the Civil Service.

The following words I wrote in an obituary notice, a few days after Li's death:-- "For over twenty years Earl Li has been a conspicuous patron of educational reform.

The University and other schools at Tientsin were founded by him; and he had a large share in founding the Imperial University in Peking.

During the last twenty years I have had the honor of being on intimate terms with him.

Five years ago he wrote a preface for a book of mine on Christian Psychology,--showing a freedom from prejudice very rare among Chinese officials.

"Another preface which he wrote for me is noteworthy from the fact that it is one of the last papers that came from his prolific pencil.

Having finished a translation of 'Hall's International Law' (begun before the siege), I showed it to Li Hung Chang not two weeks ago.

The old man took a deep interest in it, and returned it with a preface in which he says 'I am now near eighty; Dr. Martin is over seventy.

We are old and soon to pass away; but we both hope that coming generations will be guided by the principles of this book.'

"With all his faults--those of his time and country--Li Hung Chang was a true patriot.

For him it was a fitting task to place the keystone in the arch that commemorates China's peace with the world."