THE PARTITION OF CHINA

This article was published in the Asiatic Quarterly in 1898 and, short though it is, is unfortunately still worth the reading for all those likely to have any influence on the conduct of affairs in the Far East. — a. e. n. l.

The above sinister phrase has been much in men's mouths, and the heinous actions it calls up may become accomplished facts if Britain does not come forward and take the lead in averting from China the fate of Poland ; for China is politically weak through the corruption of its rulers and the unwarlike character of its people. The corruption of the mandarinate I attribute to the evil system of paying the officials nominal salaries and allowing them to farm the revenue : pay them well, in ratio of their responsibilities and of the position and staff they are called upon to maintain, and I believe this great evil that now permeates the Chinese bureaucracy would disappear. Even as it is, incorruptible mandarins are not uncommon, i.e., officials who will not take bribes and who do not collect more revenue from their districts than is actually needed for administration and remittance to headquarters ; but, human nature being what it is — if officials are allowed to tax at discretion, have no real audit of accounts, and it is merely stipulated that a certain sum must be handed over as nett revenue, the majority of men, be they Mongol or Caucasian, will not neglect the opportunity of feathering their own nests ; especially when, by the rules based upon the suspicion of their Manchu conquerors, office is held at the outside for a term of three years, and that never in the native province of the official, but in what is, to all intents and purposes, a foreign country. This impediment to good government is well known to progressive Chinese, and, as they have a brilliant object-lesson before them in the administration of the Imperial Maritime Customs — in which both the Chinese and European employes receive high fixed pay, and where there is a careful system of book-keeping so that an honest return to the Government of the revenue collected is ensured — there is reason to hope in time for a change of system.

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The Chinese are, in the view of latter-day Europe, provokingly conservative, yet hardly more so than were our own ancestors : they are an extraordinarily reasonable people, and when they once grasp a subject, action gradually results. There is a large reform party in the country, daily increasing in numbers and influence, but it takes time for new China to shake off old China : the old fossils must be given time to die out before the young men can give scope to their modernised ideas and reform the country — unless by a bloody revolution, which was tried fifty years ago and failed. Reforms too hurried lead to reaction, as we have seen in the case of the Emperor Kwang-hsii and his adviser and protege, Kang Yu-wei — the so-called " modern sage " — and as our own European history most emphatically teaches us. To supplement this general axiom, we have the fact that, by custom which in China is law, innovations of any kind can only be carried out by universal consent. In private affairs, where great changes are in discussion, the majority must convince the minority ; they cannot ride roughshod over dissidents as in Europe ; they must get their assent, which, in practice, is usually given, where the minority is small, even against their convictions, for the sake of peace and quietness. It cannot be denied that the Chinese are often foolishly suspicious of innovations, especially when offered by Europeans, whose complex motives, not confined solely to money-making as they think, they are incapable of gauging, and they are strengthened in their convictions by one of their own expressive proverbs :

"You yi, pi you hai " or — " Where there is advantage there is also disadvantage," or, " Evil lurks even in advantage."

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The second impediment to the continued independence of China is not so easily remediable as is the first ; — I allude to the unwarlike character of the people. In our present stage of civilisation, where Might is Right and Christianity nothing but an impracticable ideal, this is a fatal defect in any people, but it is specially fatal to the occupiers of a country so exceptionally rich and fertile as China. The Chinese cannot defend themselves against aggression, and will be utterly unable to do so for another century without European aid. To raise an army such as their numbers and hardy physique should render possible, strong enough to protect the country against European brute force, European organisers are absolutely necessary ; not simple drill-instructors as hitherto, but a trained European staff. This must come ere long ; the great question is. Shall this training be under the supervision of a semi-civilised corrupt bureaucracy like that of Russia, or under the guidance of liberal Powers like England and America, and I would even add Germany ?

China, in climate, resources, and population, is worth a dozen Africas to our trade, — that foreign trade by which alone we are enabled to feed our people, — and, in my opinion, is worth fighting for ; although at the same time I am convinced that, had Lord Salisbury's Government paid due attention to China in 1897, when they were warned by the publication of the Cassini convention of what was in store for British interests in China, — the country which we had opened up to the world, where two-thirds of the trade and two-thirds of the foreign population are British,— and declared plainly for the open door pohcy " even at the cost of war," the late mihtary aggressions of Russia would not have been attempted. It was what has been well called by Mr. Asquith the " infirmity of purpose and inconsistency of method of Lord Salisbury," that encouraged Russia to come on. Originally she only asked for an ice-free port on the Pacific, south of Vladivostock : to this no one had any objection : then the project was amended by a proposal to bring the terminus of the Siberian Railway to the Gulf of Pechili, for which purpose the Chinese granted a right of way through Manchuria and, in their weakness, permitted the Russians to guard the line with Cossack troops. No formal cession of the country to Russia was made ; this is not Russia's way ; a stealthy seizure of the country is made noiselessly and thus European opposition is disarmed ; meanwhile, however, Russia advanced her frontier looo miles south. This was not enough : the peninsula of the Regent's sword was ceded by China, and Port Arthur, rescued from the Japanese, nominally in the interests of China, was being fast converted into a second Sebastopol : Peking was threatened, and ail Northern China menaced by a Russian invasion as soon as the fruit should be ripe.

THE PARTITION OF CHINA loi

Meanwhile our Government had sent two men-of-war to anchor in the harbour of Port Arthur ; they were there with the consent of the Chinese : had they been allowed to remain, Russia would have been compelled to show her hand, either by attacking our ships, which she would not have dared to do, or else, which is the probable contingency, she would have put off the seizure of the fortress to a more convenient time. But for some unaccountable reason, our Government ordered the ships to withdraw, and the Russians moved in. This retreat on our part dealt a heavy blow to our prestige in the East, and necessarily threw China into the arms of Russia as the only Power in the field that knew its own mind and must consequently be conciliated on the best terms possible by the helpless Chinese.

Mr. Chamberlain, in a well-known speech in Manchester, defended the Government, and boldly asserted that no door had been closed upon us. We have treaties with China, and under these treaties our goods have free access to Manchuria. Newchwang is a Treaty Port in Manchuria, and its Customs are under the management of Sir Robert Hart. Do the Russians respect this Treaty Port and observe the conditions under which they and the other Powers having treaty rights there are supposed to trade with it ? Only the other day, the Russians totally ignored the Newchwang Customs, and landed the cargoes of three vessels destined for Manchuria in a neighbouring bay without paying duty. This is a sample of what we have to expect in any portion of the Chinese empire occupied by Russia. Ta Lien Wan bay, in rear of Port Arthur, we had arranged with the Chinese to make an open port ; the Russians seized it, and no British subject could then land there without a Russian passport. When the new Russian navigation laws come into force, no British ships will be allowed to carry goods between two Russian ports ; hence British steamers will no longer be able to carry kerosene oil from Batoum to ports in China occupied by Russia. The import of kerosene oil into China is a large and increasing trade ; it is taking the place of all other illuminants throughout China, and forms a great field for our carrying trade, which our Government should have carefully safeguarded.

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Having let things drift in this way, the question is. What can we do to recover lost ground ? Many politicians appear to think that we should quietly accept the inevitable— that Russia is bound to annex Northern China, and we must make the best of it, i.e., we must abandon the policy of the " open door," and look for compensation elsewhere. Thus we fall back on " spheres of influence," and so have indirectly marked out the Yangtse valley as our sphere. But our Government does not appear to be prepared to ear-mark this region in any way. Russia has invaded this sphere likewise ; she has compelled the Chinese to give her a separate special concession in Hankow, and, together with France, is now in occupation of land there for which British subjects hold the title-deeds, and to which, by registry in the British Consulate Land Register years ago, they fondly imagined themselves to hold a clear title. The Lu-han railway, from Hankow to Tientsin, was built by a nominally Belgian syndicate financed by the Russo-Chinese Bank, while the nominally British, but really cosmopohtan, Hongkong and Shanghai Banking Corporation was prohibited by the Russians from holding a lien on the new railway to the treaty port of Newchwang for which they had advanced the funds to the Chinese Government.

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These and many other encroachments on our influence in China testify to the fact that, if we continue to sit idle and to drift, our opportunities for trade with the largest potential market in the world will be still more seriously curtailed. Between the two stools of the " open door " and " spheres of influence," we are bound to fall to the ground if we do not bestir ourselves ; and our Government should declare openly for one policy or the other, and then support the one selected with untiring determination. The open door all round is a true, clear policy ; it is humane, just to the Chinese, and in the interest of every nation that seeks trade and intercourse with the Chinese, with no ulterior motives of preferential advantages for itself. The nations who now hold the lion's share of the China trade are deeply interested in upholding the status quo, and it ought not to be beyond the powers of diplomacy to bring about an agreement between them to resist further aggression upon China, and to compel the Russians to keep the door open, even in Manchuria, on the terms of our treaties with China. A joint protectorate by these nations, not a political interference, but an assurance against outside aggression, should meet the case if it can be brought about. China has the seeds of reform in herself, and, if given time and an assurance of protection, will surely, if slowly, bring them to maturity ; and the wise policy is to help her to reform herself — analogous to the policy Sir Harry Parkes was allowed to pursue in Japan. But if, on the other hand, all other European nations have determined to partition China, and our pacific remonstrances are of no avail, then, I take it, it is the duty of the Government to see that Britain takes the hon's share, if only as a stake and means of bargain for the open door with rival Powers, and, farther, as a means of training the Chinese and enabhng them later on to undertake their own self-defence. Continuous attention, to ensure which a special Far East Department should be organised, appears to me the only sure means by which either of the above ends can be satisfactorily accomplished

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