Historical Tales Volume Xii Part 19

This victory ended the war. Kanghi, on hearing of it, returned to Peking, having sent word to Feyanku to pursue Galdan with unrelenting vigor, there being no security while he remained at large. The recent powerful chief was now at the end of his resources. He fled for safety from camp to camp. He sent an envoy to Peking with an abject offer to surrender. He made new overtures to the Russians, and sought in a dozen ways to escape from his implacable enemies. But Feyanku kept up the pursuit, ceasing only when word came to him that the fugitive was dead.

Anxiety, hards.h.i.+ps, chagrin, or, as some say, the act of his own hand, had carried off the desert chief, and relieved the emperor of China from the peril and annoyance which had so long troubled him.

In Galdan died a man who, under more fortunate circ.u.mstances, might have emulated some of the famous Tartar chiefs, a warrior of the greatest skill, courage, and daring, a "formidable enemy" to the Chinese empire, and one who, had the government of that empire been as weak as it proved strong, might have gathered all the nomads under arms and overthrown the dynasty.

A few words must suffice to end the story of the Eleuths. The death of Galdan did not bring them to submission, and years afterwards we find them hostile to Chinese rule, and even so daring as to invade Thibet, which Kanghi had added to his empire, they taking its central city of Lha.s.sa, and carrying to the steppes a vast wealth in spoil. Eventually they were subjected to Chinese rule, but before this took place an event of much interest occurred. The Tourguts, an adjoining Kalmuck tribe, were so imperilled by the enmity of the Eleuths that they took the important resolution of migrating to Russia, marching across the Kirghiz steppes and becoming faithful subjects of the czar, who gave them a new abiding-place on the banks of the Volga. Many years afterwards, in 1770, this tribe, inspired by a strong desire to return to their own home, left the Volga and crossed Asia, despite all efforts to check their flight, until they reached again their native soil. For the interesting story of this adventurous flight see Volume VIII.

_THE RAID OF THE GOORKHAS._

During the past two and a half centuries the great empire of China has been under foreign rule, its emperors, its state officials, its generals and trusted battalions, being of Tartar blood, and the whole nation being forced to wear, in the shaved head and pigtail of every man from the highest to the lowest, a badge of servitude. The firm position gained by the Manchu dynasty was largely due to the ability of two emperors, Kanghi and Keen Lung, who stamped out the spirit of rebellion in China, added Thibet to the empire, and conquered Mongolia, subduing those restless tribes which for so many centuries had been a sword in the side of the great empire of the East. Their able administration was aided by their long reigns, Kanghi being on the throne for sixty-one years, while Keen Lung abdicated after a reign of sixty years, that he might not take from his esteemed grandfather the honor of the longest reign. Keen Lung died three years afterwards, in 1799, thus bringing up the history of China almost to the opening year of the nineteenth century. His eventful life was largely devoted to the consolidation of the Tartar authority, and was marked by brilliant military exploits and zeal in promoting the interests of China in all directions. It is our purpose here to tell the story of one of the famous military exploits of his reign.

The conquest of Thibet had brought the Chinese into contact with the bold and restless hill-tribes which occupy the region between China and India. South of the Himalaya range there existed several small mountain states, independent alike of Mogul and of British rule, and defiant in their mountain fastnesses of all the great surrounding powers. Of these small states the most important was Nepal, originally a single kingdom, but afterwards divided into three, which were in frequent hostility with one another. West of Nepal was a small clan, the Goorkhas, whose people were noted for their warlike daring. It is with these that we are here concerned.

In 1760 the king of Bhatgaon, one of the divisions of Nepal, being threatened by his rival kings, begged aid from the Goorkha chief. It was readily given, and with such effect as to win the allies a signal triumph. The ease of his victory roused the ambition of Narayan, the leader of the Goorkhas, and by 1769 the three kings of Nepal were either slain or fugitives in India and their country had fallen under the dominion of its recently insignificant and little-considered neighbor.

The Goorkhas differed essentially from the Nepalese in character. They despised commerce and disliked strangers. War was their trade, and their aggressions soon disturbed conditions along the whole Himalaya range.

The flouris.h.i.+ng trade which had once existed between India and Thibet by way of Nepal was brought to an end, while the raids of the dominant clan on neighboring powers excited general apprehension. Twenty years after their conquest of Nepal the incursions of the Goorkhas into Thibet became so serious as to demand the attention of the Chinese emperor, though no decided action was taken for their suppression. But in 1790 an event occurred that put a sudden end to this supine indifference.

The temples and lamasaries of Thibet were widely believed to contain a great store of wealth, the reports of which proved highly alluring to the needy and daring warriors of the Goorkha clan. The Chinese had shown no disposition to defend Thibet, and this rich spoil seemed to lie at the mercy of any adventurous band strong enough to overcome local opposition. In consequence, the Goorkhas prepared for an invasion in force of the northern state, and, with an army of about eighteen thousand men, crossed the Himalayas by the lofty pa.s.ses of Kirong and Kuti and rapidly advanced into the country beyond.

The suddenness of this movement found the Thibetans quite unprepared.

Everything gave way before the bold invaders, and in a short time Degarchi, the second town of the state, fell into their hands. This was the residence of the Teshu Lama, ranking next to the Dalai in authority, and possessed the vast lamasary of Teshu Lumbo, rich in acc.u.mulated wealth, which fell into the hands of the invaders. A farther advance would undoubtedly have given them the chief city of Lha.s.sa, since the unwarlike population fled in terror before their advance, but their success at Degarchi had been so great as to check their march, many weeks being spent in counting their spoil and subduing the surrounding country.

Meanwhile urgent pet.i.tions were sent to Peking, and the old emperor, aroused to the necessity for prompt and decisive action, gave orders that all available troops should at once be despatched to Lha.s.sa and vigorous preparations made for war. Within a few months a Chinese army of seventy thousand men, armed with several pieces of light artillery, had reached Thibet, where the Goorkhas, alarmed by the numbers of their opponents, made hasty preparations for a retreat. But their spoil was so abundant and bulky as to delay their march, and the Chinese, who were well commanded, succeeded in coming up with them before they had crossed the mountain pa.s.ses. The movements of the Chinese commander were so skilfully made that the retreat of the Goorkhas without a battle for the safety of their treasures became impossible.

Sund Fo, the Chinese general, according to the usual practice of his people, began by the offer of terms to the enemy, these being the surrender of all their spoil and of a renegade lama whose tale of the wealth of Thibet had led to the invasion. Probably also pledges for better conduct in future were demanded, but the proud chief of the Goorkhas haughtily refused to accept any of these conditions and defied his foes to do their worst. Of the battle that followed nothing is known except its result, which was the defeat and hasty retreat of the invaders, much of whose baggage was left behind.

The Chinese do not seem to have suffered greatly, to judge from the promptness of their pursuit, which was made with such rapidity that the Goorkhas were overtaken and again defeated before they had reached the Kirong pa.s.s, they being now obliged to abandon most of their baggage and spoil. The pursuit continued with an energy remarkable for a Chinese army, the Goorkhas, bold as they were by nature, growing demoralized under this unlooked-for persistence. Every encounter resulted in a defeat, the forts which commanded the mountain pa.s.ses and defiles were taken in succession by Sund Fo's army, and he still pressed relentlessly on. At a strong point called Ra.s.soa the Goorkhas defended for three days a pa.s.sage over a chasm, but they had grown faint-hearted through their successive defeats, and this post too fell into the hands of their enemy.

The triumphs of the Chinese had not been won without severe loss, both in their frequent a.s.saults upon mountain strongholds and a desperate foe, and from the pa.s.sage of the snow-clad mountains, but they finally succeeded in reaching the southern slopes of the Himalayas with an effective force of forty thousand men. Khatmandu, the Goorkha capital, lay not far away, and with a last effort of courage and despair the retreating army made a stand for the defence of the seat of their government.

Their position was a strong one, their courage that of desperation, and their valor and resolution so great that for a time they checked the much stronger battalions of their foes. The Chinese troops, disheartened by the courage with which the few but brave mountaineers held their works, were filled with dismay, and might have been repulsed but for the ruthless energy of their leader, who was determined at any cost to win. Turning the fire of his artillery upon his own troops, he drove them relentlessly upon the foe, forcing them to a charge that swept them like a torrent over the Goorkha works. The fire of the guns was kept up upon the mingled ma.s.s of combatants until the Goorkhas were driven over a precipice into the stream of the Tadi that ran below. By this decisive act of the Chinese commander many of his own men were slain, but the enemy was practically annihilated and the war brought to an end.

The Goorkhas now humbly solicited peace, which Sund Fo was quite ready to grant, for his own losses had been heavy and it was important to recross the mountains before winter set in. He therefore granted them peace on humiliating terms, though these were as favorable as they could expect under the circ.u.mstances. Any further attempt at resistance against the overwhelming army of their foes might have ended in the complete destruction of their state. They took an oath to keep the peace with Thibet, to acknowledge themselves va.s.sals of China, to send an emba.s.sy with tribute to Peking every five years, and to restore all the plunder taken from Teshu Lumbo.

Of the later history of the Goorkhas some words may be said. Their raids into India led to a British invasion of their country in 1814, and in 1816 they were forced to make peace. The celebrated Jung Bahadur became their ruler in 1846 through the summary process of killing all his enemies, and in 1857, during the Indian mutiny, he came with a strong force to the aid of the British, whose friend he had always remained. In more recent wars the Goorkhas have proved themselves among the bravest soldiers in the Indian army, and in the late war with the hill-tribes showed an intrepidity which no part of the army surpa.s.sed. The independence of their state is still maintained.

[Ill.u.s.tration: CHAIR AND CAGO CARRIERS.]

_HOW EUROPE ENTERED CHINA._

For four or five thousand years China remained isolated from the rest of the civilized world, its only relations being with the surrounding peoples of its own race, notably with the Tartars of the steppes. Then, in the nineteenth century, the wall of isolation suddenly broke down, and it was forced to enter into relations of trade and amity with Europe and America. This revolution did not come about peacefully. The thunder of cannon was necessary to break down the Chinese wall of seclusion. But the result seems likely to prove of the greatest advantage to the so-called Celestial Kingdom. It has swung loose from its moorings in the harbor of conservatism, and it is not safe to predict how far it will drift, but it is safe to say that a few years of foreign war have done as much for it as hundreds of years of peace and isolation.

From time to time in the past centuries Europeans made their way to China. Some were priestly envoys, some missionaries, some, as in the case of the Polos, traders. Afterwards came the Jesuit missionaries, who gained an important standing in China under the early Manchu emperors, and were greatly favored by the emperor Kanghi. After his death a change took place, and they were gradually driven from the land.

The first foreign envoy reached China from Russia in 1567. Another came in 1653, his purpose being to establish freedom of trade. A century later a treaty was made establis.h.i.+ng a system of overland trade between Russia and China, and since then a Russian missionary station has existed in Peking. In 1516 came the first vessel to China under a European flag, a Portuguese trader. Others followed, and trade began through Canton and other ports. But the foreign traders soon began to act rather as pirates than as peaceful visitors, and in the end the Chinese drove them all away. About the middle of the sixteenth century a foreign settlement was begun at Macao, on an island near the southeast boundary of the empire, and here the trade grew so brisk that for a time Macao was the richest trading-mart in Eastern Asia. But so hostile were the relations between the Portuguese, Spanish, and Dutch, and so brigand-like their behavior, that the Chinese looked upon them all as piratical barbarians, and intercourse did not grow.

The English had their own way of opening trade relations. A fleet under Captain Weddell came to Canton in 1637, and, as the Chinese fired upon a watering boat, attacked and captured the forts, burnt the council-house, carried off the guns from the forts, and seized two merchant junks.

About fifty years afterwards they were accorded trading privileges at Canton and Ning-po.

To England, indeed, is due the chief credit of opening up China to the world, though the way in which it was done is not much to England's credit. This was by the famous--or infamous--opium war. But in another way England was the first to break through the traditional ceremonies of the Chinese court. All who approached the emperor's throne, foreign amba.s.sadors as well as Chinese subjects, were required to perform the _kotow_, which consisted in kneeling three times before the emperor, or even before his empty throne, and each time bowing the head until the forehead three times touched the marble flooring. This was done by the Russians and the Dutch, but the Earl of Macartney, who came as English amba.s.sador in 1792, refused to perform the slavish ceremony, and was therefore not permitted to see the emperor, though otherwise well received.

The first event of importance in the nineteenth century, that century so vital in the history of China, was the hoisting of the American flag at Canton in 1802, which marked the beginning of American trade with the Celestial empire. From this time the trade of Canton rapidly grew, until it became one of the greatest commercial cities of the world, while its mercantile activity gave employment to millions of natives in all parts of the empire in preparing articles of commerce, particularly tea. It was also of great importance to the imperial government from the revenue it furnished in the way of duty and presents. It is of interest to note, however, that the emperor and his court looked upon these presents as the payment of tribute, and the nations that sent them, unknown to themselves, were set down as va.s.sals of the Chinese crown.

We have now an important feature of the Chinese trade to record. Opium was a favorite article of consumption in China, and its use there had given rise to an important industry in British India, in the growth of the poppy. In the year 1800 the emperor, perceiving the growing evil in the use of opium by his people, issued an edict forbidding its introduction into China. This did not check the trade, its only effect being to convert legitimate into smuggling traffic. The trade went on as briskly as before, the smugglers being openly aided by venal officials not only at Canton but at other points along the coast. By 1838 the disregard of the law, and the quant.i.ty of opium smuggled into the empire by small boats on the Canton River, had become so great that the Peking government determined to take more active steps for the suppression of the illicit trade. At this time there were more than fifty small craft plying on the river under the English and American flags, most of them smugglers. Some of these were seized and destroyed, but as the others were then heavily manned and armed the revenue officers declined to interfere with them, and the contraband trade went briskly on.

At length the difficulty reached a climax. Arrests and punishments for the use of opium became common throughout the empire, three royal princes were degraded for this practice, a commissioner with large powers was sent from Peking to Canton, and the foreigners were ordered to deliver up every particle of opium in their store-s.h.i.+ps and give bonds to bring no more, on penalty of death. As a result, somewhat more than one thousand chests were tendered to the commissioner, but this was declared to be not enough, and that official at once took the decisive measure of cutting off the food-supply from the foreign settlement. This and other active steps brought about the desired result. Captain Elliot, the British superintendent of commerce, advised a complete delivery of all opium under British control, and before night more than twenty thousand chests of the deleterious drug were surrendered into his hands, and were offered by him to the commissioner the next day.

News of this event was sent to Peking, and orders came back that the opium should be all destroyed; which was done effectively by mixing it with salt water and lime in trenches and drawing off the mixture into an adjacent creek. Care was taken that none should be purloined, and one man was executed on the spot for attempting to steal a small portion of the drug. Thus perished an amount of the valuable substance rated at cost price at nearly eleven million dollars.

We have described this event at some length, as it led to the first war between China and a foreign power. The destruction of the opium deeply offended the British government, and in the next year (1840) Captain Elliot received an official letter to the effect that war would be declared unless China should pay for the goods destroyed. As China showed no intention of doing so, an English fleet was sent to Chinese waters in the summer of 1841, whose admiral declared a blockade of the port of Canton, and, on July 5, bombarded and captured the town of Ting-hai. Various other places were blockaded, and, as the emperor rejected all demands, the fleet moved upon Canton, taking the forts along the river as it advanced. In the end, when an attack had become imminent, the authorities ransomed their city for the sum of six million dollars.

But the emperor did not know yet the strength of the power with which he had to deal, and still continued silent and defiant. The fleet now sailed northward, capturing in succession Amoy, Chin-hai, and Ning-po.

Cha-pu was the next to fall, and here the Manchu Tartars for the first time came into conflict with the English. When defeated, great numbers of them killed themselves, first destroying their wives and children.

The forts at the mouth of the Yang-tse-Kiang were next taken. Here the governor-general took care to post himself out of danger, but in a grandiloquent despatch declared that he had been in the hottest of the fight, "where cannon-b.a.l.l.s innumerable, flying in awful confusion through the expanse of heaven, fell before, behind, and on every side, while in the distance were visible the s.h.i.+ps of the rebels standing erect, lofty as mountains. The fierce daring of the rebels was inconceivable; officers and men fell at their posts. Every effort to resist the onset was in vain, and a retreat became inevitable."

The result was the capture of Shanghai. The British now determined on a siege of the important city of Nanking, the ancient capital of China.

The movement began with an attack on Chin-Kiang-fu, the "Mart-river city." Here a fierce a.s.sault was made, the Manchu garrison resisting with obstinate courage. In the end, of the garrison of four thousand only five hundred remained, most of the others having killed themselves.

This victory rendered the capture of Nanking certain, its food-supply was already endangered by the English control of the river, and the authorities gave way. The emperor was now convinced that further resistance was hopeless, and the truce ended in a treaty of peace, the Chinese government agreeing to pay twenty-one million dollars indemnity, to open to British trade and residence the ports of Canton, Amoy, Foo-Chow, Ning-po, and Shanghai, and to cede to the English the island of Hong-Kong, with various minor stipulations.

This war, which was fought with the discreditable purpose of forcing upon China an injurious drug against her will, had nevertheless several very useful results. Other European nations hastened to claim the same privileges of trade that were given the English, and in 1844 a commercial treaty was signed between China and the United States, in the conduct of which a favorable disposition towards Americans was shown.

The eventual result was the breaking down of the barriers of intolerance which had been so long maintained, that ancient and self-satisfied government being at last forced to throw open its gates for the entrance of the new ideas of international amity and freedom of commerce.

But much had still to be done before these desirable results could be fully achieved. Hostile relations were not yet at an end, annoying restrictions being placed on the promised intercourse. In 1856 a native vessel flying the British flag was seized by the Chinese, who refused to apologize to the British for the act. As a result, the city of Canton was bombarded and the forts were destroyed. A warlike demonstration was decided upon by Great Britain and France, the first result being the total destruction of the Chinese fleet and the capture of Canton. A revision of the former treaty and the concession of greater privileges were demanded, which China, warned by the lesson of the opium war, found itself obliged to grant.

The English and French, however, refused to treat at Canton, as the Chinese desired, but sailed to the mouth of the Pei-ho, the port of Peking, up which stream their fleets proceeded to the city of Tien-tsin.

Here arrangements for a new treaty of commerce and the opening of new ports were made, Russia and the United States taking part in the negotiations. But on proceeding to the mouth of the Pei-ho in 1859 to ratify the treaty, the river was found to be obstructed and the forts strongly armed. The American and Russian envoys were willing to go to Peking overland, in accordance with the Chinese request, but the British and French determined to force their way up the stream and to take as many soldiers with them as they pleased. They attacked the forts, therefore, but, to their disgust, found themselves defeated and forced to withdraw.

This repulse could have but one result. It gave the Chinese for the first time confidence in their ability to meet the foreigner in war. It humiliated and exasperated the English and French. They determined now to carry the war to the gates of Peking and force the Chinese to acknowledge the supremacy of the nations of the West.

The events of this war we can give only in outline. In the summer of 1860 a new attack was made on the Taku forts, troops being landed to a.s.sail them in the rear, in which direction no arrangement for defence had been made. As a result the forts fell, a large body of Tartar cavalry, which sought to stop the march of the allies with bows, arrows, and spears, being taught a lesson in modern war by the explosion of sh.e.l.ls in their ranks. The capture of the forts left the way clear for a march on the capital, which was at once made, and on the 5th of October, 1860, a European army first came within view of this long-hidden and mysterious city.

_THE BURNING OF THE SUMMER PALACE._

The "sublime" emperor, the supreme head of the great realm of China and its hundreds of millions of people, dwells in a magnificence and seclusion unknown to the monarchs of other lands. His palace enclosure within the city of Peking, the "Purple Forbidden City," as it is called, covers over half a square mile of ground, and is surrounded by a wall forty feet high and more than forty feet thick. Within this sacred enclosure the Chinese ideas of beauty and magnificence have been developed to the fullest extent, and the emperor resides in unapproachable grandeur and state. Outside the city, a few miles to the north, lies the Summer Palace, another locality on which the Celestial architects and landscape artists have exhausted their genius in devising scenes of beauty and charm, and which is similarly walled in from the common herd. Beyond the Great Wall, on the borders of Tartary, exists another palatial enclosure, the hunting and pleasure grounds of the emperor, in the midst of an immense forest abundantly stocked with game.

To the latter his supreme majesty made his way with all haste on hearing of the rapid approach of the English and French armies. In truth, the great monarchs of the Manchu dynasty had pa.s.sed away, and the feeble reigning emperor lacked the courage to fight for his throne.