Personal Narrative of three years' service in China

Chapter I. Page

Introductory remarks — Capture of Canton — Rohbers — Yeh's embarkation, and that of his treasure — Commissioners appointed to govern the city — The idols deposed — Forts demolished — Insult to an officer avenged — The use of pigtails — Chinese arms and infernal machines — Good disposition of townspeople — Starvation and soup kitchens — -Boats and music — Fire brigade and police* — Pigeon English — I hire a "number one" honest servant — False alarm in the city — Sepoys 1

Chapter II

Pic-nic at Mong-Kong — We fall among Braves — Amusements within the walls, theatricals and horses — The Tartar general and the Irishman — Our magazine in danger — Salutes — Bamboo-workers — Maternal affection and desertion — Foundling hospitals — Chinese beggars, and death en regie — The poor law as administered in Canton 25

Chapter IV

The Sepoys; their dinners and ablutions — Chinese fish-ponds — Game — How to recover lost property in China — Rumours of an attack — Singchong the contractor ; his opinion of the English, and ideas on religion — He makes a model barrack 60

Chapter V

Expedition to the Pei-ho — Pic-nic to the White Cloud Mountains — Attack on Chinese camp at Sampo-huey — Chinese acts of aggression, and steps taken to stop them — An honest old woman — Our baker refuses to poison us from selfish, rather than moral reasons — The Fayuen Committee — The Emperor's secret edict. Sing-chong's alarm — The defences of our cantonment ........... CONTENTS.

Chapter VI. Page

Continuation of annoyances— The braves attack the city— English rockets versus Chinese— The captured artilleryman and the mandarin's daughter —Bamboo-worker kidnapped — Sing-chong's ideas of partnership- Chinese epistles— How Lee-ching learnt proper English— Taxing our servants— Capture of Namtow— The drunkards secured— Pih-kwei' s exoneration °"

Chapter VII

Albert Smith visits Canton— Chinese pigs— Street scenes — Performing birds — The currency — Sale by weight — Sobriety of Chinese — General humiliation days— Chinese piccpuet — The bonzes on the White Cloud Mountains — The compass and native maps 102

Chapter VIII

Visit to the Pratas shoals — The wreckers — Offerings to the Joss presiding over shipwreck — Roast pig a-la-Chinoise — Chinese pilotage . . . 115

Chapter IX

Chinese artists — The dry season — Paper-hunts, and their dangers — Expedition into the country — Capture of Shek-tsin — Kong-tsun fair — Destruction of military buildings at Shek-tsin 124

Chapter X

Expedition to Fatshan — Exploring up the Canton river — The happy new year — A practical joke — The returned emigrant — Expedition to Fayuen — Pawn-shops — Our treatment by " the gentry " — Diy ponds tell a tale — Expedition to Shaou-king — Our chop-boats — The river-side scenery — Sugar-cane — The agriculturist and his cabbages — The rocky gorge — We arrive at Shaou-king 139

CHAPTER XL

Shaou-king — Anticipated attack by rebels — Apathy of inhabitants — Remarks on present condition of China — Marble rocks — Kingfishers — Visit to Shuntuk — The weak points in Chinese fortifications — Hats and umbrellas — Nam-pai-to — Return to Canton — Country trips — A snake — Artillery and rifle practice — Agriculture — Artificial egg-hatching — Cantonment amusements — Bowling-alley and racquet-court . . . 158

Chapter XII

We proceed to the north— Amoy— Docks— Different dialects in China- Street boys— Foo-chow and the River " Min "—Shanghae— Conjurors and street artists — We sail for the Pei-lio CONTENTS; V

Chapter XIV

I remain in the Gulf of Peh-chili — Tidings of prisoners — Chefoo and its resources — Teng-choo-foo — We run a risk of being captured — Compulsory sale of fat sheep — Toki Island— Donkey-beef and cow-beef — We sail for the Great Wall 200

Chapter XV

The Great Wall — Our self-introduction and our reception — The use of geology — Tartar soldiers — Our mode of surveying — Grand review — We receive a present — We meet a mandarin, and get useful information from him — -Lew-sia-kwang — River Yang-ho — Native carts — My servant has an escape 216

Chapter XVI

Survey continued — Fishermen — Tartar soldiers — "Yung-ping-foo" — Road thence to Tien-tsin — A communicative soldier — River Laou-moo-kaou — Narrow escape from a fight — Reconciliation — The General's aides-de-camp — Night review — Watches versus dollars — Mirage — River Ching-ho — The aides-de-camp again — Sha-Iui-tien banks — River Chekaou — A poor diet — Mode of fishing — A midshipman's adventure — The Pei-ho again — We cause the Chinese to " eat misery " — The Pehtang-ho — Tartars again — Desolate country — The use of jelly-fish — The survey completed — We revisit Teng-choo-foo and Che-foo — Return to Shanghae 231

Lawful emigration and its results 323

Chapter XXII

Departure for Shanghae — Ningpo — Hangchow and the rebels— Sœurs de Charite— The Bishop of Ningpo— Chin-hae — Fishing cormorants — The Temple of Mercy — Chusan, and its mandarins — Its peaceful aspect — Poo-too — Kin-tang — Duck-shooting — Return to Shanghae — English and French missions 343

Chapter XXIII

Our ultimatum, and the answer we received — We sail for Chusan — Surrender of the island — Chusan fog — Barrack-works — International etiquette — Roe-hunting — We prepare to leave the island . . . 355

Chapter XXIV

We sail for Ta-lien-hwan — Sampson peak — The army is landed — Waterworks — Fatal boat accident — Reconnaissance of Pei-ho and Peh-tang — Council of war — Plan of operations . 372

Chapter XXV

Landing at Peh-tang — Chinese man-traps — Occupation of the town — Disembarkation of the army, and works connected with it — Advances — Capture of Sin-ho — Outrages on inhabitants — Capture of Tangkoo — Chinese artillerymen — The condition of the town .... 381

Chapter XXVI

Bridge over the Pei-ho — Preparations for attack on the Takoo forts — Capture of upper fort, and surrender of the remainder — Advance on Tien-tsin — The Tien-tsin lines — Encampment — Market — Negotiations broken off— I quit the army — Floating hospitals — Return to England . LIST OP ILLUSTRATIONS AND MAPS. PAGE The Walls of Canton on the North-east Side . Frontispiece Nine-storied Pagoda, and Police Watch Tower . . to face 38 Scene on the Canton River 114 Rocky Gorge near Shaou-king . . .v . . . . 157 Marble Rock near Shaou-king . 161 Scene on the River Min 179 Plan of the Mouth of the Pei-ho 190 Chefoo 207 View of Teng-choo-foo 209 Town and Harbour of Ting-hae, Chusan 368 Map of Canton and the Surrounding Country. . Rivers ' Chu-kiang,' and ' Si-kiang ' or Canton and I Consecutively, at the West Rivers. I end of the work- Map of a Portion of the Coast of Peit-chiu. THREE YEARS' SERVICE IN CHINA.

Chapter I

Introductory remarks — Capture of Canton — Robbers — Yeh's embarkation, and that of his treasure — Commissioners appointed to govern the city — The idols deposed — -Forts demolished — Insult to an officer avenged — The use of pigtails — Chinese arms and infernal machines — Good disposition of townspeople — Starvation and soup kitchens — Boats and music — Fire brigade and police — Pigeon English — I hire a " number one " honest servant — False alarm in the city — Sepoys. Since my return from China, now two years ago, it has fallen to my lot to meet with very few of those with whom I served there ; and from want of some one with whom to talk over old times, I found myself in a fair way of forgetting much of what I had seen and heard. In order to preserve my recollections, I set myself the task of rewriting, in my leisure minutes, the journal which I had kept in that country.

Having now completed it, I am led to believe that what has proved interesting to me may not be uninteresting to others ; therefore I am induced to publish this volume. As it is merely a narrative of my own personal experi ence, touching on collateral events only so far as is necessary to preserve the thread of the narrative, it has no claim to be considered a history. The early part of the war was so ably treated by Mr. Wingrove Cooke, and the last campaign by Col. Wolsely, and other writers ; and its leading features have been so pro- B ORIGIN OF THE WAR. minently brought before the public, that any attempt of mine to renew the subject would be superfluous. But during the interval occupied by our residence in Canton many events occurred which are not generally known, and which are perhaps worthy of record, and may serve to fill up a gap hitherto unsupplied.

The per sonal nature of the narrative must excuse the error of any apparent disproportion in the importance of events, arising from an undue prominence given to those in which I was personally engaged, to the comparative dis regard of other, and perhaps more really important topics. It is hardly necessary for me to allude to the origin of the war. The outrage on the " Arrow " opened again the question already too long deferred — of the right of entry into Canton, nominally ceded to us ; the non-fulfilment of which had long been productive of most serious evil and inconvenience, as it prevented all intercourse with the authorities, and thus negatived one of the chief objects secured by the last treaty. Following in the retrogressive course of his prede cessors, and in open violation of solemn and additional engagements purposely entered into between the Grovernments, in order to explain and confirm the said treaty right, Yeh continued persistently to evade its execution ; and now, when the affair of the " Arrow " necessitated its enforcement, he flatly refused to acknowledge it, and thus added the last drop which caused the cup of forbearance to overflow.

The occupation of the foreign factories by an in sufficient force in 1856, which, however, was all at our disposal at the time, enabled the Chinese to gain a temporary triumph ; for though the city walls were breached and scaled, and Yeh's palace entered and burnt, yet we were ultimately obliged to abandon the PREPARATIONS. 3 position, and the whole settlement was completely destroyed ; literally, not one stone was left standing on another. The Chinese celebrated this success by the erection of a triumphal arch, which was, with others of like nature, destroyed by us afterwards. The force sent out to operate under General Ash burnham having been diverted to India, it was not until December, 1857, that offensive operations could be undertaken. The intervening time was employed in necessary works of organization ; one of the most important of which was levying a corps of Chinese coolies for the transport service of the army.

These men, renegades though they were, served us faithfully and cheerfully, and throughout the whole war proved invaluable ; their coolness under fire was admirable. At the assault of the Peiho forts in 1860, they carried the French ladders to the ditch, and standing in the water up to their necks, supported them with their hands, to enable the storming party to cross. It was not our custom to bring them into action, but the dangers of a distant fire which is often very galling and trying to the nerves, they bore with the greatest composure, and evinced a strong desire to close with their compatriots and engage them in mortal combat with their bamboos. The capture of Canton on 29th December, 1857, was admirably managed, though by the Chinese it was con sidered that we took a very unfair advantage of them.

In the first place, we did not come on the side on which they expected us, and where they had turned their guns on the approaches, crammed up to the very muzzle with grape ; and where they expected us to follow the example of Lord Grough, who advanced on the north side, capturing the fort named after him, and where he b CAPTURE OF CANTON. was unfortunately bought off from storming the city by its paying a heavy ransom. But General Straubenzee, neglecting all precedents, attacked the city where the walls were least strongly defended ; and even then, as the Chinese complained, instead of attacking the gates, he sent his men over like robbers ; and when our troops gained the city heights, the flower of the Chinese force was shut out on the Gough Hill, where they were dis agreably informed of our success, by volleys poured into their rear from their own walls.

The French escaladed on our left, but advanced to the attack a few minutes before the time agreed upon, an act of impatience which caused a loss to them as well as to ourselves, from shells fired by the Navy, which had been directed to continue the bombardment until the precise moment agreed upon for the advance of the troops. The loss incurred in the capture of the city was small in proportion to the result. In some places the enemy fought with great ob stinacy, more especially at the North Gate, which is in the Tartar quarter of the town ; when after having been driven from the walls, they continued to keep up the fire from the streets ; hiding themselves behind the corners of houses, whence they emerged for an instant only to fire, retiring again to load. A sailor who had fired many shots at one of these men with his Enfield rifle — a weapon at that time only recently come into use, and rather a complicated arm for him — meeting with no success, complained bitterly to a brother tar, w,ho seeing the sight down, exhorted him, though the range was well under a hundred yards, to put up the ladder and try again.

During the first few days parties were employed in burying the dead : I observed that several Chinese ROBBERS. whom we interred were afterwards removed in the night ; I suppose by their friends. The situation of the troops who for the most part bivouacked on the walls, was exceedingly picturesque. Some ponds close by were made to deliver up their fish, and the destruction of stray pigs was enormous. The suspension of the local law called into existence bands of robbers, who plundered away right and left, and not content with that, dealt hardly with those who naturally endeavoured to save a portion of their own property. On the 31st, I was walking through the eastern suburbs with some naval officers and a party of seamen, and we were implored to enter a large building which we passed. We found a poor old man with his head cut open standing at the door, and the place full of robbers armed with spears, who took to flight through the garden on our approach.

The house was an -*-* Asylum for Aged Men," which one might have thought would have been safe. We caught one of the robbers, and he at once drew out from his sleeve a short sword, which he was only prevented running into the officer who had laid hold of him, by Captain Hall's sword rattling rather sharply on his head. The rascal's weapon was broken, his pigtail cut off with one of the sailor's ready knives ; he was stripped, and two dozen were laid on his shoulders with spirit by the boatswain, which, I hope, gave him a lesson on the consequences of maltreating old men. During the first part of the occupation, whilst the troops within the city walls were establishing them selves, and making such defences as the position admitted of, large parties of sailors and sappers were employed daily making a communication by which COMMUNICATIONS. access could be gained to the heights from the river's bank, which would enable the troops and stores to pass from the vessels to the cantonments, without going through the streets.

The point selected was one where a spur ofthe wall approached within 120 yards only of the shore. A narrow street led from a flight of stone steps on the bank, to the foot of the ramparts. The houses on one side of the street were pulled down, and those on the other side were reserved for stores. The debris was used in forming a ramp leading to the top of the wall, and also for the construction of a pier. As the period of our occupation extended, so did the area of our wharfage, with the necessary demolitions ; and we ultimately had a pier 200 yards long, affording means of landing at low water. Previously, our feelings of gallantry were much disturbed by the ladies who navigated the boats having to turn out on to the mud, where with trousers tucked up as far as they would go, they pushed their flat-bottomed boats and barbarian freight over the mud to the shore.

On one side the wharf was protected by a creek, and on the other we cleared a space which could be looked over from our loopholed buildings, as well as from a parapet wall, behind which ran our road. If any apo logy is necessary for the extensive destruction of pro perty incurred by this clearing of our front, it exists in the fact that we were often attacked by parties of braves and robbers, who approached, and endeavoured to set fire to our stores, under the shelter of the neighbouring houses, which were deserted by their legitimate oc cupiers. The first use made of this communication was on the 1st January, 1858, when Lord Elgin, Baron Gros, Ge neral Straubenzee, and the allied Admirals entered the YEH'S CAPTURE. city in state, salutes being fired from every ship capable of the act, from the top of the ramp, and from another point on the walls.

The houses which formed the materials for our road were mainly candle factories ; and the timber frame-work filled in with furniture, bricks, tiles, tallow, and the paint with which the joss tapers are decorated, would afford curious speculations for a future geologist ; the whole being before our departure worked down into a mass. The natives very complacently undertook to pull down a neighbouring fort called the " French Folly," and for a trifling remuneration brought the stones of which it was composed, to be used in facing our pier. The appropriation of storehouses was a point on which it was soon very necessary to come to an understanding with our allies. I saw one morning a French marine with a great pot of paint inscribing on the doors of the houses, in letters a foot high, " Magazin Francais, No. 1," " Magazin Francais, No. 2," and so on.

I knew that the subject of appropriation had not been discussed, so I got a piece of chalk and marked all the others as " British Military Stores ;" and, as my chalk was more expeditiously used than his paint, I got the best of it. My experience of an alliance is, that it makes you look out very sharply for yourself. By the 5th we were so well established, that we com menced offensive operations, and an armed party moved down into the city and captured Yeh, the viceroy, as well as the general commanding the Tartar troops. The treasury was also ransacked, but did not turn out so productive as we expected. Yeh was brought down to the pier, to embark in the " Inflexible " for India. He looked very fat and stolid, and, at the same time, THE TREASURE. rather bewildered, like a man in a dream. He had five or six attendants with him.

Captain Hall handed, or rather shoved him without much ceremony into one boat, making all the attendants get into the other. Such was his exit from Canton : he was brought back in his coffin. As he had been degraded by the emperor for his defeat, and political failures, his body was not allowed to enter the city ; but, after having been for a time deposited in a temple in the suburbs, it was privately interred by his relatives. If a man brought up as he had been, and hardened by constant acts of cruelty, has the power of reflecting and feeling remorse for his deeds, what must have been his feelings during the months of his captivity — living a life utterly inac tive, and totally without excitement to distract him ! So ended the career of the man who probably in the season of his power took in cold blood the lives of more fellow-creatures than any one of modern times.

On the 8th the treasure was brought down by a long line of coolies, with a strong guard. From its outward appearance, one might think that a fishmonger's shop had been plundered, as the silver, which must have been in bars, was wrapped round with straw, and looked exceedingly like so many salmon. It was said at the time to be worth about 60,000/. —not a very large amount ; yet, as it would weigh about 9 tons, and take about 350 coolies to carry, it made rather an imposing procession, especially when one looked at it in the light of money hereafter to be divided into shares for the captors. It was considered that the government of a great city like Canton, inhabited by a people whose language and manners were known only to a few, would be rather a troublesome matter ; so it was determined to allow Pih- GOVERNMENT OF THE CITY. 9 Kwei, the governor, to exercise the functions of the departed viceroy Yeh, so far as was approved by the allied Commanders.

Three allied Commissioners were appointed to look into the working of the government, and to investigate all questions between Chinese and foreigners ; whilst the purely Chinese questions were to be settled, as heretofore, by the native magistrates. A police force of the three nations was appointed for duty in the city ; and the residence of the Tartar general appropriated for the quarters of the allied commission, he in his turn ousting the second in command to make room for himself. Brigadier Holloway, R.M., Captain Martinieau des Chenez, of the French navy, and Mr. Parkes were the Commissioners appointed. On the 10th February the blockade was raised, and the. city gates opened for traffic. The war tax was re mitted, on the consideration that the city, being now in the occupation of the allies, no expense need be in curred by the Chinese government on account of its protection.

The trade soon became brisk, the iinjjorta tion and manufacture of munitions of war being the sole prohibitions. For some days the force had enough to do in getting shaken down into their quarters, and arranging for an occupation which might last some time. The idols were bundled out of the temples, having previously had their backs picked. Some exploring soldiers, in closely examining these images, found that most of them had a little trap-door in their backs, through which small pieces of silver had been inserted into their bodies. The intelligence rapidly spread, and the gods were soon deposed. When in difficulties, they did not receive the respect of their former worshippers. I saw a big clay joss, which had been tumbled out of our temple, TURBULENT VILLAGERS. having the gilt scraped off his back by a quondam devotee.

There were outside the walls of Canton five forts, of which two looked into our position, and in the hands of the enemy would prove a constant annoyance. It would have been the right thing, in a military point of view, to occupy one or two of these as outposts ; but as our force was considered too small to cut up into detachments, it was resolved to blow them up. Their demolition was completed on 25th January. An officer of Engineers, on his return from visiting a working party engaged in preparing for the blowing up of Fort Lin, was one day mobbed, hooted at, and pelted, as he passed through a village. However, he showed a bold front, drew his sword, and made a rush as if to chastise his assailants, and they turned and fled incontinently. Wisely refraining from following them up too far, he made the best of his way inside the gates.

This having been reported, a small force was sent out on the next day to chastise the delinquents. Sol diers were posted all round to prevent escape, a gun was unlimbered in a threatening position in the village square, and a search was instituted for the head man of the village — a creation of that system of the scale of responsibility which I believe alone enables so enormous a country to be governed as it is. Failing to find the veritable head man, who probably had made off on the first scent of alarm, the twelve most respectable looking and oldest inhabitants were selected, fastened to one another by the pigtails, and conducted before Mr. Parkes for admonition. On arriving, the front man prostrated himself precipitately, which nearly wrenched out by the root the tail of the man behind him, and who was compelled to succumb to the tug.

CHINESE ARMS. In his turn he likewise pulled down the next, and so, like successive ninepins, they were all at the feet of their captors. After a considerable lecture, they were told to rise, which they did rather more carefully, and were marched into the town, where, after a short de tention, and another lecture as to social obligations, they were set at liberty. In the explorations made in the city, the different military storehouses were discovered, and such a mass of rubbish as they contained it would be hard to ima gine. There were some good matchlocks, and much fair clothing ; but such a collection of old muskets, spears, bows, arrows, jingalls, &c, as defies description. They had a sort of breech-loading jingall, apparently of an tique construction ; the upper half, about a foot in length, of the breech-end of the barrel was cut off hori zontally, leaving the lower half in section like a boat.

Into this slit, a breech-piece, loaded and primed, could be dropped - its handle, when turned half round, fitted into a notch in the side of the boat-like piece, which keyed it in as the veritable breech of the gun. After it was fired off, the handle was turned back, the false breech removed, and another put in. A number of these were of course kept loaded, and supplied in suc cession. They had also infernal machines, intended for the destruction of our fleet. One description was a mere tub, with false bottom, capable of containing a charge of powder at the base, and other combustibles above. One of these, which exploded close to one of our ships in the river, was charged with some filthy mess, which 'was blown up all over the rigging. These were made to go off by an arrangement whereby, on the tub receiving a blow, a glass tube, probably containing INFERNAL MACHINES. sulphuric acid, would be broken, and an explosion occasioned from the contact of the acid with chlorate of potash or some such substance.

This was the system adopted by the Russians in the powder-boxes concealed in front of their works before Sebastopol. Another was fired by clockwork : it could be set so as to dis charge a flint lock into the powder at any given minute. In a third, flint locks were held cocked by a bar of wood attached to a leathern bellows, screwed down on to the bottom of the box : the bellows, when inflated, would rise, and the hammers be released. As there was a pipe leading up from the centre of the bellows to the lid of the box, it is probable that it was meant to be moored in a ship's path : when the vessel passed over it, it would become submerged ; the water would rush down the pipe, inflate the bellows, release the hammers, and cause the explosion. There were many of these things. I remember, of one description there were forty-eight.

The arms were all taken into our custody, to be returned to the governor on our departure from the city. He was wanted that any which might be found, after due notice for their surrender had been given, would be confiscated. Of course, in suddenly arresting the whole trade of a large city, and throwing thousands of people out of employment, besides the inevitable destruction of an enormous amount of property, great personal distress must be caused. The state of the poor in Canton was very gad. Crowds of emaciated and half-starved wretches thronged round our cantonments, and pre sented, in the most distressing way, evidence of the dreadful ravages of war. Here were people, quiet and peaceable, desiring to harm no one, disposed to DISTRESS OF THE POOR. 13 look with kindly eyes on all who contributed in the slightest degree to their trade and welfare, and I believe willing to hold entirely friendly relations with us, plunged into the deepest misery and degradation by the acts of their rulers, who, after endeavouring to poison their minds, by telling lying legends of the wicked and untameable barbarian, brought their misery to a climax by forcing us to the extremity of seizing the city : a wanton act of recklessness on their part, which even the arrogance and stupid pride of Yeh could hardly have disposed him to consider as a feat of arms impracticable to us, though for sixteen years he had, by evasion and stratagem, succeeded in preventing our peaceable entry.