Page:Eminent Chinese Of The Ch’ing Period - Hummel - 1943 - Vol. 1.pdf/139

Rh ments. After several promotions he was appointed in 1814 provincial judge of Honan and in 1819 was made governor of that province. In 1820 he was dismissed for failing adequately to control the Yellow River during floods, but in the same year was pardoned. He was re-instated in his earlier post of provincial judge of Honan, and soon after was transferred to Shantung where in 1821 he became governor. Early in 1823 his father died and he inherited the rank of Marquis. In the following year he succeeded in exterminating a rebellious sect in the district of Lin-ch'ing, and early in 1825 was commended by the emperor for the determination he had shown in the face of great obstacles. Later in the same year he was appointed governor-general of Kiangnan and Kiangsi. His plans for the improvement of the waterways in northern Kiangsu gained the approval of the emperor, but the engineering methods he employed resulted in such damage in 1827 that he was dismissed from office. After being degraded for a few months to sub-chancellor of the Grand Secretariat, he was re-appointed governor of Shantung. From 1829 to 1831 he held the important post of governor-general of Szechwan and was then (1831–40) given the same host in Chihli. In 1836 he was made concurrently an assistant Grand Secretary and in 1838 a Grand Secretary.

In 1839 the first Anglo-Chinese War broke out at Canton (see under ) spreading northward when the British fleet took Tinghai, Chekiang, on July 5, 1840. Ch'i-shan was transferred to Tientsin to supervise defense measures. When the enemy squadron arrived off Taku on August 11 and 12, instead of offering opposition, he sent them provisions, and on the 16th his aide received for transmission to the emperor Lord Palmerston's letter demanding payment for the opium destroyed at Canton by Lin Tsê-hsü in 1839 and for the expenses of the British military operations. The letter further demanded that the affronts to Captain Elliot (see under ) be punished; that the island of Hong Kong be ceded to the British as a trading post; that the Hong merchants at Canton pay their large outstanding debts; and that in the future the British government's representatives be accorded treatment on terms of equality with officials of the Chinese government. On August 1840 the emperor instructed Ch'i-shan to negotiate with a view to getting the British back to Canton for the settlement of these matters. Ch'i-shan's entertainment of the British emissaries in specially prepared tents set up at Taku, and his tact and consideration in the negotiations held there on the 30th and 31st, were so successful that on September 17 they promised to leave for Canton. For this diplomatic success Ch'i-shan was sent to Canton to take the place of Lin Tse-hsü as High Commissioner, and shortly afterwards he was made acting governor-general of Kwangtung and Kwangsi—his main task being to continue the negotiations which he had begun near Tientsin. He was given power to act as he saw fit with the understanding that he would consult with Governor and others.

Ch'i-shan's task was not an easy one. Though he went to Canton to inaugurate a new policy of conciliation, he was required to employ local officials who were still loyal to the old practices used by Lin—officials who did not give him faithful support. Shortly after his arrival at Canton, on November 29, he sent the emperor a private report showing how Lin had promoted strife by his unfulfilled promises of compensation to the British for the opium he had destroyed and his insistence that further commercial dealings be under bond, with a penalty of death for traffic in opium. He also refuted several of the statements in Lin's official reports. In his dealings with the British Ch'i-shan encountered new difficulties: inadequacy of the military defenses of Canton, increased British demands for the punishment of Lin, cession to Britain of a new trade center, and finally an unexpected change of policy in Emperor Hsüan-tsung himself who now favored a more hostile attitude toward the British. Diplomatic failure or military disaster seemed inevitable. On January 7, 1841, the British, unwilling to allow negotiations to drag on longer, attacked the forts of Chuenpi (Ch'uan-pi 川鼻) and captured them. Ch'i-shan's first report of this battle, written on January 8, called it a "draw," but on January 10, after ascertaining the facts, he memorialized the throne on the fall of the forts and the inadequacy of the defenses against British cannon. He advocated the cession of Hong Kong to Great Britain and immediate resumption of trade at Canton in order to appease the British and to save Canton from almost certain disaster. Along these lines he began negotiations at the Convention of Chuenpi which was concluded on January 20. This convention proposed that the island of Hong Kong be ceded to the British, that an indemnity of six million dollars be paid to them, that the privilege of direct official relations be granted to them, and that the Canton trade be soon re-opened. Without waiting for 127