Page:Dictionary of National Biography, Second Supplement, volume 2.djvu/239

 of Edwin Lawrence Godkin [q. v. Suppl. II], and he graduated B.A. in 1853 with honours. He was always interested in the affairs of Queen's College, where he proceeded M.A. in 1871 and was made hon. LL.D. in 1882.

In the spring of 1854 a nomination for the consular service in China was given by the foreign office to each of the three Queen's Colleges in Ireland. Hart received without examination the nomination which fell to Queen's College, Belfast, and he left for China in May 1854, being then nineteen years old.

Starting as a supernumerary interpreter, Hart after three months at Hongkong was sent via Shanghai, which was then in the hands of the ‘Triad Society,’ to Ningpo. He was at first supernumerary and in 1855 assistant in the vice-consulate at Ningpo, and acted for some months as vice-consul. In March 1858 he was transferred to the consulate at Canton, and from April held the position of second assistant, acting also for some time as first assistant.

As the result of the Chinese war, which was temporarily concluded by the Treaty of Tientsin, Canton was in the earlier part of 1858 jointly occupied by an Anglo-French force. Hart was made secretary to the allied commissioners, serving in that capacity under Sir Harry Parkes [q. v.] Subsequently his official chief at the consulate was Sir Rutherford Alcock [q. v. Suppl. I].

In May 1854, when the walled native city of Shanghai was occupied by Triad rebels against the Manchu government, the Chinese custom-house re-opened in the foreign settlement of Shanghai. It was resolved to collect there imperial revenue under the joint protectorate of Great Britain, the United States, and France. Each country was represented by its consul, the British consul being (Sir) Thomas Wade [q. v.] It was thus that the imperial maritime customs of China were inaugurated. The American and French representatives soon resigned from the triumvirate, and were not replaced; and Wade was succeeded in the sole charge or superintendence of the imperial customs at Shanghai by H. N. Lay, vice-consul and interpreter in the Shanghai consulate.

The success of the new system at Shanghai led the viceroy of Canton to invite Hart to undertake the supervision of the customs at Canton. With the permission of the British government he resigned the consular service in 1859, and joined the new Chinese imperial maritime customs service as deputy-commissioner of customs at Canton. He remained in Canton till 1861. After the war of 1860 between Great Britain and France on the one side, and the Chinese government on the other, and the conclusion of the convention of Peking in Oct. 1860, the imperial collectorate of customs at the treaty ports was in 1861 formally recognised and invested with regular powers by the Chinese government.

During 1861–3 Lay, who had become inspector-general of the customs, was on two years' leave in Europe owing to injury in a riot. In Lay's absence Fitzroy, previously private secretary to Lord Elgin, and Hart acted for him as officiating inspectors-general. Fitzroy remained at Shanghai, while Hart organised the customs service at Foochow and other treaty ports. He also visited Peking at the invitation of the Tsungli Yamen, and stayed there with the British minister, Sir Frederick Bruce [q. v.] The advice which Bruce gave him stood him in good stead in future dealings with the Chinese. On Lay's return in May 1863 Hart took up the duties of commissioner of customs at Shanghai with charge of the Yangtze ports. But Lay resigned a few months later, and Hart was appointed his successor. Thus at the age of twenty-eight Hart became inspector-general of the imperial maritime customs; and, although he tendered his resignation in 1906, he nominally held the post till his death.

When Hart became inspector-general the Taiping rebellion, which on his arrival in China was at the floodtide of success, was succumbing to the influence of Gordon and ‘the ever-victorious army.’ Hart met Gordon, with whom he formed a strong friendship, in the spring of 1864. He was largely responsible for reconciling Gordon and Li Hung Chang at Soochow in that year, and he was present at the taking of Chang Chow Fu. The rebellion ended in 1864, and Hart had much to do with the disbandment of the ‘ever-victorious army.’ In the same year he inspected the Chinese customs houses in the island of Formosa, and normal times having returned to China and its government, he was summoned to live at Peking, which thenceforward became his headquarters and permanent dwelling-place. There he exercised a genial hospitality, indulging a taste for music by maintaining a private band. He rarely moved from the capital during his long residence in China. A perfect master of the language, he wrote in Chinese, after his visit to Formosa in 1864,