Opium Wars (1839-1843, 1856-1860), two wars fought between Great Britain and China in which Western powers gained significant commercial privileges and territory. The Opium Wars began when the Chinese government tried to stop the illegal importation of opium by British merchants.
The First Opium War started in 1839 when the Chinese government confiscated opium warehouses in Guangzhou (Canton). Britain responded by sending an expedition of warships to the city in February 1840. The British won a quick victory and the conflict was ended by the Treaty of Nanking (Nanjing) on August 29, 1842. By this treaty, and a supplementary one signed on October 8, 1843, China was forced to pay a large indemnity, open five ports to British trade and residence, and cede Hong Kong to Great Britain. The treaty also gave British citizens in China the right to be tried in British courts. Other Western powers demanded, and were granted, similar privileges.
In October 1856, Guangzhou police boarded the British ship Arrow and charged its crew with smuggling. Eager to gain more trading rights, the British used the incident to launch another offensive, precipitating the Second Opium War. British forces, aided by the French, won another quick military victory in 1857. When the Chinese government refused to ratify the Treaty of Tientsin, which had been signed in 1858, the hostilities resumed. In 1860, after British and French troops had occupied Beijing and burned the Summer Palace, the Chinese agreed to ratify the treaty. The treaty opened additional trading ports, allowed foreign emissaries to reside in Beijing, admitted Christian missionaries into China, and opened travel to the Chinese interior. Later negotiations legalized the importation of opium.



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Letter to Queen Victoria
By Lin Zexu
The Chinese emperor appointed Lin Zexu (1785-1850) as a special commissioner to end the illegal opium trade with Western nations. In addition to other tactics, Commissioner Lin wrote this letter directly to Queen Victoria, asking her to halt the activities of the East India Company, the principal supplier of opium. The letter, which was written in Chinese, contains terms that were traditional in Chinese diplomacy but were offensive to Westerners-for example, references to non-Chinese as "barbarians" and to Queen Victoria as "King". Queen Victoria ignored the letter. In 1839 the British Parliament authorized military action against the Chinese for their acts against the East India Company, beginning the so-called Opium Wars.
We find that your country is sixty or seventy thousand li from China. Yet there are barbarian ships that strive to come here for trade for the purpose of making a great profit. The wealth of China is used to profit the barbarians. That is to say, the great profit made by barbarians is all taken from the rightful share of China. By what right do they then in return use the poisonous drug to injure the Chinese people? Even though the barbarians may not necessarily intend to do us harm, yet in coveting profit to an extreme, they have no regard for injuring others. Let us ask, where is your conscience? I have heard that the smoking of opium is very strictly forbidden by your country; that is because the harm caused by opium is clearly understood. Since it is not permitted to do harm to your own country, then even less should you let it be passed on to the harm of other countries-how much less to China! Of all that China exports to foreign countries, there is not a single thing which is not beneficial to people; they are of benefit when eaten, or of benefit when used, or of benefit when resold: all are beneficial. Is there a single article from China which has done any harm to foreign countries? Take tea and rhubarb, for example; the foreign countries cannot get along for a single day without them. If China cuts off these benefits with no sympathy for those who are to suffer, then what can the barbarians rely upon to keep themselves alive? Moreover the woolens, camlets, and longells [i.e., textiles] of foreign countries cannot be woven unless they obtain Chinese silk. If China, again, cuts off this beneficial export, what profit can the barbarians expect to make? As for other foodstuffs, beginning with candy, ginger, cinnamon, and so forth, and articles for use, beginning with silk, satin, chinaware, and so on, all the things that must be had by foreign countries are innumerable. On the other hand, articles coming from the outside to China can only be used as toys. We can take them or get along without them. Since they are not needed by China, what difficulty would there be if we closed the frontier and stopped the trade? Nevertheless our Celestial Court lets tea, silk, and other goods be shipped without limit and circulated everywhere without begrudging it in the slightest. This is for no other reason but to share the benefit with the people of the whole world.

The goods from China carried away by your country not only supply your own consumption and use, but also can be divided up and sold to other countries, producing a triple profit. Even if you do not sell opium, you still have this threefold profit. How can you bear to go further, selling products injurious to others in order to fulfill your insatiable desire?

We have further learned that in London, the capital of your honorable rule, and in Scotland (Sigelan), Ireland (Ailun), and other places, originally no opium has been produced. Only in several places of India under your control such as Bengal, Madras, Bombay, Patna, Benares, and Malwa has opium been planted from hill to hill, and ponds have been opened for its manufacture. For months and years work is continued in order to accumulate the poison. The obnoxious odor ascends, irritating Heaven and frightening the spirits. Indeed you, O King, can eradicate the opium plant in these places, hoe over the fields entirely, and sow in its stead the five grains [i.e., millet, barley, wheat, etc.]. Anyone who dares again attempt to plant and manufacture opium should be severely punished. This will really be a great, benevolent government policy that will increase the common weal and get rid of evil. For this, Heaven must support you and the spirits must bring you good fortune, prolonging your old age and extending your descendants. All will depend on this act �

Now we have set up regulations governing the Chinese people. He who sells opium shall receive the death penalty and he who smokes it also the death penalty. Now consider this: if the barbarians do not bring opium, then how can the Chinese people resell it, and how can they smoke it? The fact is that the wicked barbarians beguile the Chinese people into a death trap. How then can we grant life only to these barbarians? He who takes the life of even one person still has to atone for it with his own life; yet is the harm done by opium limited to the taking of one life only? Therefore in the new regulations, in regard to those barbarians who bring opium to China, the penalty is fixed at decapitation or strangulation. This is what is called getting rid of a harmful thing on behalf of mankind.

Moreover we have found that in the middle of the second month of this year [April 9] Consul [Superintendent] Elliot of your nation, because the opium prohibition law was very stern and severe, petitioned for an extension of the time limit. He requested a limit of five months for India and its adjacent harbors and related territories, and ten months for England proper, after which they would act in conformity with the new regulations. Now we, the commissioner and others, have memorialized and have received the extraordinary Celestial grace of His Majesty the Emperor, who has redoubled his consideration and compassion. All those who within the period of the coming one year (from England) or six months (from India) bring opium to China by mistake, but who voluntarily confess and completely surrender their opium, shall be exempt from their punishment. After this limit of time, if there are still those who bring opium to China then they will plainly have committed a willful violation and shall at once be executed according to law, with absolutely no clemency or pardon. This may be called the height of kindness and the perfection of justice.

Our Celestial Dynasty rules over and supervises the myriad states, and surely possesses unfathomable spiritual dignity. Yet the Emperor cannot bear to execute people without having first tried to reform them by instruction. Therefore he especially promulgates these fixed regulations. The barbarian merchants of your country, if they wish to do business for a prolonged period, are required to obey our statutes respectfully and to cut off permanently the source of opium. They must by no means try to test the effectiveness of the law with their lives. May you, O King, check your wicked and sift out your vicious people before they come to China, in order to guarantee the peace of your nation, to show further the sincerity of your politeness and submissiveness, and to let the two countries enjoy together the blessings of peace.

Boxer Rebellion, Chinese nationalist uprising against foreigners, the representatives of alien powers, and Chinese Christians in 1900. Expulsion of all foreigners from China was the ultimate objective of the uprising. In 1899 a secret society of Chinese called the Yihe Quan (Righteous and Harmonious Fists), known by Westerners as Boxers because of their martial arts rituals which they believed made them invulnerable to bullets, began a campaign of terror against Christian missionaries in the north-eastern provinces. Although the Boxers were officially denounced, they were secretly supported by many of the royal court, including the dowager empress Cixi. Economic and political exploitation of China by various Western powers and Japan and humiliating military defeats inflicted by Great Britain in the Opium Wars (1839-1842, 1856-1860) and by Japan in the Sino-Japanese War (1894-1895) were the main causes of Chinese resentment, as well as general economic depression.
The terrorist activities of the Boxer society gradually increased during 1899, with Boxer bands attacking Christians on sight. When these bands entered the Chinese capital Beijing, the foreign powers dispatched a small relief column from Tianjin to secure their interests and citizens in the capital. On June 13 Cixi ordered imperial troops to turn back this column, and the ensuing crisis culminated on June 18, 1900, in a general anti-foreign uprising in Beijing. Many foreigners and others took refuge in the part of the city where the foreign legations were located; the area was placed under siege by the rebels. A larger relief expedition consisting of British, French, Japanese, Russian, German, and American troops relieved the besieged quarter and occupied Beijing on August 14, 1900. Cixi and her court fled to Xi'an. The relief forces retained possession of the city, looting and punishing anti-foreign action, until a peace treaty was signed on September 7, 1901. By the terms of the treaty the Chinese were required to pay, over a period of 40 years, a vast indemnity. Other treaty provisions included commercial concessions and the right to station foreign troops to guard the legations in Beijing and to maintain a clear corridor from Beijing to the coast. Despite efforts by the United States to stop further territorial encroachment, Russia extended its sphere of influence in Manchuria during the rebellion, a policy which culminated in the Russo-Japanese War (1904-1905).
Some governments, notably Great Britain and the United States, tried to mitigate the indemnity payments by using them to finance scholarships for Chinese students. In China, the defeat further discredited the ruling Qing dynasty and accelerated political developments towards revolution.
This article from National Geographic magazine discusses the Boxer Rebellion in China, which occurred in June 1900. Because the article was written soon after the event occurred, it should be treated as a historical document, valuable less for the information it gives regarding the event than for what it implies about attitudes in the United States towards China and the uprising. The spelling and language used reflect the conventions and prejudices of the era in which the article was written.


PROBLEMS IN CHINA
By James M. Hubbard
In 1724 the Emperor Yung-ching proscribed the Christian religion, which at that time had made great progress in China. Three Jesuit priests who were in Pekin addressed a petition to him, supplicating him to revoke his decree. Yung-ching summoned them to his presence, and in an argument of some length gave his reasons for his action, in which he disclaimed any disbelief in or hatred of Christianity. "You say that your law is not a false law, and I believe it. If I thought it were, what should hinder me from destroying your churches and driving you from the empire?" He closed with these words: "You wish to make the Chinese Christians, and this is what your law demands, I know very well. But what in that case would become of us? The subjects of your kings! The Christians whom you make recognize no authority but you; in times of trouble they would listen to no other voice. I know well enough that there is nothing to fear at present; but when your ships shall be coming by thousands and tens of thousands, then, indeed, we may have some disturbances."

This remarkable statement is interesting both as showing the intelligence and liberality of a Chinese ruler nearly two centuries ago, and also as being a concise statement of one of the principal causes of the present upheaval in China. Christian law demands an obedience which undermines and finally overthrows the authority of every other conflicting law. This fact the intelligent Chinese of today recognize more clearly even than did Yung-ching, and the vindication of the authority of Chinese law is the main object of the present conflict. The distinction between the two laws, the Christian and the non-Christian, leaving religious dogmas out of view, may be said to lie in the fact that Christian law demands obedience to these three principles: the right of every man, whatever his condition or station, to his life and to his property and the inviolability of a promise-the sacredness of the truth. Non-Christian law is practically a denial of the authority of these fundamental principles. It is not meant by this statement to affirm that there have not been in the past and that there are not now many men in China who are just, upright, humane, and strictly honest. It is an indisputable fact, however, that human life has little value in that country; justice is almost unknown in the courts, and there is no respect for the truth-a promise is kept only when self-interest makes it worth while. Now, a conflict is inevitable when two civilizations founded on such antagonistic principles come into close contact, and its ultimate cause will be found to be the assertion on the one hand, the denial on the other, of one or all of these principles. Here, again, there is not the slightest intention of maintaining that in all the relations of China with the western powers, when disputes have arisen, she has always been in the wrong, they always in the right; but it is meant simply that the cause or pretense of every aggressive act on the part of the powers has been either that a foreigner's life has been taken, his property alienated or destroyed, or the terms of a treaty or concession have not been faithfully observed.

The incident which was probably the immediate cause of the Boxer rising-the murder of two German missionaries by a mob-is a typical one. From the western point of view it was only just and reasonable that first the magistrate of the town or district where the outrage occurred, then the ruler of the province, and lastly the government in Pekin should be held responsible for the death of these two men. We may justly condemn the method which Germany pursued to secure reparation for the deed; but this does not alter the fact that she was right in her original contention that satisfaction should be given for the taking of the lives of her subjects, and that she would have failed in her duty if the outrage had been suffered to pass unnoticed. From the Chinese standpoint, however, nothing could seem more unreasonable, more absurd, than the demand that the governor of Shantung should be punished because two insignificant men were murdered by a mob, whose deed possibly he did not justify and could not have prevented had he so desired. This German demand would naturally seem to them the mere arbitrary exercise of power, with the ultimate purpose of conquest, not the fulfillment of a sacred duty.

Fertile in international disputes, sometimes leading to war, have been the commercial treaties concluded with the powers, and the railway, mining, and other industrial concessions granted to foreigners. There is no contention that these have always been in the interest of China. In one notorious instance-the forcing her to admit opium-it was certainly not the case. But the universal experience has been that when it has seemed to be for the interest of China to evade the rights granted under the treaties, or to make the concessions valueless, she has done so, often bringing great losses to individuals who have trusted in her promises. The interior navigable waters, for instance, were made free to foreign vessels in the summer of 1898, and large sums were spent in fitting out craft for this traffic; but when, on reaching China, an attempt was made to employ them the authorities put such obstacles in the way that this "concession" became a dead letter. They justified their action by the contention that it was in the interests of the river boatmen, whose means of livelihood would be taken away by the introduction of foreign steamers, which was no doubt true to a great extent.

This, then, is a principal cause of the present conditions in China. It is the mutual hostility of two distinct and diverse civilizations brought into intimate relations. In the one rights are maintained which seem to the other no rights-an obedience to a fundamental law demanded whose authority the other does not recognize.

Another, and possibly as significant, a cause is to be found in the fact that resistance to a ruler "so soon as he ceases to be a minister of God for good" is incumbent on every Chinaman. "This sacred right of rebellion was distinctly taught by Confucius, and was emphasized by Mencius, who went the length of asserting that a ruler who, by the practice of injustice and oppression, had forfeited his right to rule, should not only be dethroned, but might, if circumstances required it, be put to death." For two hundred and fifty years the Chinese have been the subjects of Manchu or Tatar sovereigns, alien to them in race and disposition. Nomads by descent, these emperors of the present dynasty have retained some of the barbaric characteristics which distinguish a pastoral from an agricultural and commercial people such as the great mass of the Chinese are. Their single aim has been, not to develop the resources of the empire, but to consolidate and strengthen their power. One result of their methods of government is the prevalence of official corruption to an extent previously unknown. The principal officers of the provinces are appointed for three years only, to prevent their gaining an undue and dangerous influence. The chief duty of the governor with relation to the emperor is to send an annual tribute to Pekin, upon the size of which depends his favor at court. Naturally his one object during his short term of office is to extort as much money as possible from his unfortunate subjects, and his example is imitated by all his subordinates down to the lowest magistrate. Now, it has been perfectly evident to all intelligent Chinese that as their government has grown more corrupt it has become weaker. Its weakness has never been demonstrated so clearly to them as in the latest times, in the ignominious defeat by Japan, and the absolute inability to resist the occupation of Chinese territory by the German, Russian, English, and French powers. Here are conspicuously, then, the conditions which make it the duty of a faithful disciple of Confucius to rebel against his ruler: injustice, oppression, and incompetency.

Added to this impulse to revolution is his unfading memory of a glorious past when China was under the guiding care of sovereigns of his own blood. It has only needed at any time in the last century a leader of ability and a definite cry to cause the discontented people to break into open revolt. Such a leader fifty years ago was Hung-siu-tsuen. The founder of a "Society of the Worshippers of God," he proclaimed "himself as sent by heaven to drive out the Tatars and to restore in his own person the succession to China." Multitudes flocked to a standard raised "to extirpate rulers who, both in their public laws and in their private acts, were standing examples of all that was base and vile in human nature." Hung-siu-tsuen defeated the imperialist forces sent against him, and in 1853 he stormed the great city of Nankin. Here a native Chinese Taiping dynasty was inaugurated, of which he was the first emperor, assuming the title of Taiping Wang, King of Great Peace, or Heavenly King. Subordinate aims were the destruction of idolatry and the prohibition of opium.

It was in its origin a religious and temperance as well as a national movement. This is not the time to discuss the causes of its rapid degeneracy and final overthrow, in 1864, by General Gordon, nor the strange blindness of the western powers to its distinctively Christian character. The Taipings, for instance, based their moral teachings on "The Ten Words" of Moses. They observed the "Lord's Day" and printed and distributed thousands of copies of translations of Genesis, Exodus, and St Matthew, as well as Christian devotional works. "The temples were burnt and thrown down," says an English eye-witness, "and not a whole image was to be seen in city or country for hundreds of miles." Had the powers given the movement their support, it is not impossible that the pure and high aims and motives with which it began might have been maintained. In that case there can be little doubt that the Taipings would have taken Pekin, and that a new era of peace and prosperity might have opened for China.

This conviction of the wickedness of their present rulers, whether judged by Confucian or Christian standards, has not decreased in strength during the last half-century. Many causes, on the contrary, besides those political ones already mentioned, have contributed to make it stronger today in multitudes of Chinamen than ever before. It is by no means impossible that the Boxer rising, with its watchword of "China for the Chinese," was originally a nationalist movement for the overthrow of the Tatar dynasty, as well as for the driving out of foreigners and the extirpation of Christianity. But the influences which led primarily to the Taiping rebellion have increased tenfold in force since 1850. Education of the western type has been extended to tens of thousands in all parts of the empire. A literature, both religious and secular, setting forth the principles on which western Christian civilization is founded and familiarizing the Chinese readers with Christian ideals of life and character, has been created. The intercourse with travelers, merchants, officials, and missionaries, together with the not inconsiderable number of Chinese who have visited our countries and returned to tell of what they had seen to their countrymen, has spread broadcast a more or less definite knowledge of the outside world.

The natural outcome of all these influences has been the birth of a reform party which increased in strength with such rapidity that, having gained the ear and confidence of the Emperor, it seemed but just now to be on the point of revolutionizing the ancient methods of government and education. Its principal aims are shown in the famous seven Reform Edicts issued by the Emperor in the spring of 1898. These provided for the building of railways; the abolition of the old essay system of the civil service examination and the substitution of western learning; the turning of unused temples into schools for instruction in this learning; the establishment of a great university in Pekin; the organization of a bureau for the translation of western literature into Chinese; the foundation of a patent office, and the protection of foreigners and especially missionaries. Although this strenuous, though possibly ill-timed and too sweeping, effort for reform disastrously failed, the leaders being executed or flying from the country, yet the influences which called it into existence remain. Doubtless the events of the past few months will have increased rather than diminished the number of its open or secret adherents.

These are then, in my opinion, the principal causes of the present outbreak in China, whose ultimate consequences it is impossible for the wisest of us to foresee. It is the inevitable conflict of two essentially diverse civilizations brought into close contact. It is also the result of conditions due to a long succession of weak and corrupt rulers. These appear to me to include all special causes, both religious and political. Though the outbreak was directed apparently at first against Christian missionaries and their followers and is now for the moment a life and death contest with all foreigners, yet hatred of Christianity cannot be attributed to the Chinese as a people. Their indifference to all religion is a national characteristic. There is no question but that their superstitious fears have been often awakened by the desecration of ancestral graves through the construction of railways, by the erection of churches with high towers, and by the refusal of native Christians to join in some religious rite considered essential for the common welfare, as to avert a drought or heal a prevailing sickness.

It is more than likely, it is certain, that many good but over-zealous missionaries have unnecessarily aroused opposition through lack of tact and prudence in attacking customs and beliefs which ages of existence had made sacred. The Catholic priests especially have incurred heavy responsibilities by their claim to sit as magistrates with the mandarins in cases in which the interests of members of their flock were at stake. The motive for obtaining the privilege was a good one, to secure justice, but the result has been in many instances disastrous.

The often-repeated saying, "First the missionary, then the consul, then the general," rests on an undoubted basis of truth. The missionary no sooner gains a foothold in any land than he is closely followed by the trader of his own or some kindred nationality. He in his turn brings after a time the consul, his government's representative to protect his interests, and with the consul comes a guard which circumstances may change into a conquering army. This is a natural, an almost inevitable, sequence, and one that abundantly justifies the Chinese suspicion that the original coming of the missionary is simply to prepare the way for the general. The history of Protestant missions, we do not say Catholic, bears triumphant proof, however, of the falsity of the assertion of such a motive in endeavoring to Christianize a heathen people.

What is to be the end of the contest now being waged in northern China? To this question there is but one answer that can be made with any degree of confidence. Pekin must fall into the hands of the allied powers. Whether or not the present rulers of the country will be captured with it remains to be seen, though all the probabilities are against it. But if they fly to the ancient Chinese capital, Singan Fu, in the province of Shensi, 750 miles inland, and set up the government there, what then? In other words, can the powers, either unitedly or singly, conquer China or any considerable part of it not adjacent to the sea? If the Chinese are united in their opposition to the powers, I believe this to be an impossibility from the physical character of the country and the number and disposition of the people.

China proper-that is, excluding Mongolia, Manchuria, Tibet, and Turkestan-is, in round numbers, 1,500 miles in extent from east to west and 1,400 miles from north to south. It is, roughly speaking, divided into three great river basins, which are separated from each other by ranges of mountains. The northernmost is that of the Yellow River and consists in large part of a plain, subject to terrible inundations from the fact that it lies below the level of the river, which now and then bursts its banks and makes for itself a new channel. It is unnavigable and apparently would afford no aid to an invading army. This is not true of the second or Yangtze River, which is navigable for nearly 2,000 miles and has numerous tributaries navigable for small craft. This is the richest part as well as the most populous of the empire. The deltas of these two rivers are connected by the Grand Canal, formerly a great avenue of trade, upon whose banks were important cities. Sections of it are now in ruins, and even if it were in good repair it runs throughout its entire length so near the coast as to be useless to an army invading the interior. The third river is the West, in the extreme southeastern part of China. It is navigable for some 200 miles and would give access only to two provinces, only one of which, Kuangtong, is of any importance.

These river basins were formerly connected by imperial roads, constructed before the Tatar conquest, and even in their ruins excite the admiration of travelers and attest the height to which Chinese civilization once reached. The present rulers have suffered them to fall into decay and comparative disuse, as rapid and easy communication between the different parts of the empire was considered dangerous, as affording a discontented subject people opportunities to combine against their rulers. It will be evident that to march armies sufficiently large to subdue 400,000,000 people through such a country-armies almost all of whose munitions of war would have to be transported from the coast-would be a physical impossibility.

Then the Chinese, when hard pressed, are capable of using means of defense against which the best equipped European armies, led by the ablest generals, would be as powerless as if they were naked savages. On one occasion the inhabitants of the northern province of Honan, being unable to meet an invading army in the field, "cut through the dikes of the Yellow River, 'China's Sorrow,' and flooded the whole country." The invaders escaped to the mountains, but upward of 200,000 natives perished in the flood, and the city of Kaifeng was destroyed. Another time, "in the first period of the Manchu dynasty, the Chinese had the patriotism and resolution to lay waste their own coasts as far as twenty leagues up the country, and destroy villages and cities, burn woods and cornfields-in fact, to create an immense desert-in order to annihilate the power of a formidable pirate, who for a long time had held in check the whole strength of the empire." What this extraordinary people have done more than once in their stress they would do again under similar circumstances.

But are they united and animated by the single desire of driving out the "foreign devils"? It does not seem to me that there is any evidence of this other than the mere assertion of writers who have apparently taken it for granted. A united purpose impelling the ignorant myriads of Chinese, divided in speech and in habits of life and separated by vast distances, is inconceivable. Hatred of the foreigners is, I believe, in large measure confined to the ruling classes, whose powers and privileges are threatened by the new religion and the reforms which it brings with it. The Chinese magistrate who sells justice to the highest bidder naturally hates the consular court. It is they and the literati, or educated class, from whose ranks they are drawn, who foment these disturbances; who placard the cities with inflammatory invitations to rise up against the foreigners; who circulate scandals about the Christian rites, similar to the assertions made and believed in France and Austria about the Jews. That they are able to arouse the common people to action here and there, especially in the coast provinces and in large cities and their neighborhoods, recent events have proved. It is possible, but hardly conceivable that they could do the same throughout the empire, for it should be remembered that there are still great districts, inhabited by millions of people, into which missionaries have never gone and through which foreign travelers rarely, if ever, pass. At present I am convinced that the great mass of the people throughout China are ignorant of what has taken place at Pekin and Tientsin; they are indifferent as to who rules over them, provided they are left in peace to till their fields and reap their harvests.

Does the western world need China, and, reciprocally, does China need intercourse with the Christian nations? Many persons question seriously whether we ought to force, as it were, our civilization, our commerce and manufactures, our modes of government, our literature and religion, upon an unwilling people, the mass of whom are probably as well off materially as the mass of the people of Europe. They are probably better off than the Russian peasants. The accounts of some travelers lead one to believe that in some parts of the province of Szechuen the inhabitants surpass all other peoples in their apparent prosperity and contentment. Why should we come and disturb this peace? In answer it is only necessary to say that the commercial and religious invasion of China by the western nations is a part of the progress of the world. China is no longer at a distance from us, but is the near neighbor of Russia, England, France, and the United States. She is one of the great nations of the world, and mutual intercourse between her and them is inevitable. Its advantages, even from the lowest material point of view, are not all on one side. Her foreign commerce, amounting to nearly $300,000,000 annually, not only pays a third part of the expenses of the central government, but enriches her merchants, tea cultivators, and the raisers of silk as much as it does our manufacturers of cottons. And this commerce is but a small fraction of what it will be when her vast virgin fields of coal and iron are exploited and the whole empire is thrown open without restriction to all who desire to enter.