The Uncollected Writings of Thomas de Quincey, Vol. 2 | Page 4

not been received by Christendom in a corresponding
spirit of liberal appreciation. One proof of that may be read in the
invidious statement, supported by no facts or names, which I have just
cited. Were this even true, a London merchant is not therefore a
Londoner, or even a Briton. Germans, Swiss, Frenchmen, &c., are
settled there as merchants, in crowds. No nation, however, is
compromised by any act of her citizens acting as separate and
uncountenanced individuals. So that, even if better established as a fact,
this idle story would still be a calumny; and as a calumny it would
merit little notice. Nevertheless, I have felt it prudent to give it a
prominent station, as fitted peculiarly, by the dark shadows of its
malice, pointed at our whole nation collectively, to call into more vivid
relief the unexampled lustre of that royal munificence in England,
which, by one article of a treaty, dictated at the point of her bayonets,
threw open in an hour, to all nations, that Chinese commerce, never
previously unsealed through countless generations of man.
[3] 'America:'--For America in particular there is an American defence
offered in a Washington paper (the Weekly Union, for May 28, 1857),
which, for cool ignoring of facts, exceeds anything that I remember. It
begins thus:--'Since our treaty with China in 1844' (and that, be it
remembered, was possible only in consequence of our war and its close
in 1842), 'the most amicable relations have existed between the United
States and China--China is our friend, and we are hers.' Indeed! as a
brief commentary upon that statement, I recommend to the reader's
attention our Blue-books on China of last winter. The American
commander certainly wound up his quarrel with Yeh in a mysterious

way, that drew some sneers from the various nationalities then moving
in that neighbourhood, but no less certainly he had, during the October
of 1856, a smart exchange of cannon-shots with Yeh, which lasted for
some days (three, at least, according to my remembrance), and ended in
the capture of numerous Chinese forts. The American apologist says in
effect, that the United States will not fight, because they have no
quarrel. But that is not the sole question. Does the United States mean
to take none of the benefits that may be won by our arms? He speaks of
the French as more belligerently inclined than the United States. Would
that this were really so. No good will come of schisms between the
nations of Christendom. There is a posthumous work of Commissioner
Lin, in twelve quartos, printed at Peking, urgently pressing the
necessity for China of building upon such schisms the one sole policy
that can save her from ruin.
Next, then, having endeavoured to place these preliminary points in
their true light, I will anticipate the course by which the campaign
would naturally be likely to travel, supposing no alien and mischievous
disturbance at work for deranging it. Simply to want fighting allies
would be no very menacing evil. We managed to do without them in
our pretty extensive plan of warfare fifteen years ago; and there is no
reason why we should find our difficulties now more intractable than
then. I should imagine that the American Congress and the French
Executive would look on uneasily, and with a sense of shame, at the
prospect of sharing largely in commercial benefits which they had not
earned, whilst the burdens of the day were falling exclusively upon the
troops of our nation; but that is a consideration for their own feelings,
and may happen to corrode their hearts and their sense of honour most
profoundly at some future time, when it may have ceased to be
remediable. If that were all, for us there would be no arrears of
mortified sensibilities to apprehend. But what is ominous even in
relation to ourselves from these professedly inert associates, these
sleeping partners in our Chinese dealings, is, that their presence with no
active functions argues a faith lurking somewhere in the possibility of
talking the Chinese into reason. Such a chimera, still surviving the
multiform experience we have had, augurs ruin to the total enterprise. It
is not absolutely impossible that even Yeh, or any imbecile governor

armed with the same obstinacy and brutal arrogance, might, under the
terrors of an armament such as he will have to face, simulate a
submission that was far from his thoughts. We ourselves found in the
year 1846, when in fidelity to our engagements we gave back the
important island of Chusan, which we had retained for four years, in
fact until all the instalments of the ransom money had been paid, that a
more negligent ear was turned to our complaints and remonstrances.
The vile mob of Canton, long kept and indulged