Page:Decisive Battles Since Waterloo.djvu/212

178 England an indemnity of $21,000,000 for the cost of the war; five ports were thrown open for commerce and residence; Hong Kong became British soil; and there was to be lasting peace and friendship between the two empires. The peace lasted until 1856, when the seizure of the opium smuggler Arrow, by the Chinese, led to disputes, and the disputes into another war which lasted for nearly two years. It ended in the capture of Canton early in 1858, and the capture of the Peiho forts a few months later, and a treaty of peace signed at Tien-Tsin, by Lord Elgin on the part of England, and Baron Gros on that of France, Commissioner Keying acting for the Emperor of China. By this treaty Pekin was to be open to foreign ambassadors, there should be freedom of trade throughout the empire under certain restrictions connected with the customs duties, Christianity was to be tolerated, the expense of the war to be paid by China, the tariff to be revised, and the term "barbarian" not to be applied any longer to Europeans. As this treaty formed the practical opening to the rest of the world of the great empire that had been secluded for fifty centuries, the capture of the Peiho forts, which led to the treaty of Tien-Tsin, is worthy of a place among the decisive battles of the century. The account of this event is derived from the journals of Mr. Oliphant, the private secretary of Lord Elgin, and subsequently the historian of the embassy.

On his way northward from Canton Lord Elgin stopped at Shanghai, where he sought to meet the governor of that city, and asked that a letter be forwarded to the imperial government at Pekin. The governor received him outside the town of Soochow, near Shanghai. That high official took the letter, which he read in the street, surrounded by a crowd of people, who looked over his shoulders and perused the document at the same time. After the reading was ended, the governor politely asked the