Professional Documents
Culture Documents
and the
Opening of China
H=:
^::23mmmm^mm^mmm
1800-1842
Michael Greenbei^
ifl^
-''"iiif'-i*
<%
British
the
Trade and
Opening of China
1800-42
BUSINESS MEN
By Ch'en Tzu-ang
(a.d. 656-98)
By
On
*In this
we
age of civilisation
from
and to
traffickers that
which
in
of "Princes"
James Matheson
title
in
Political Economy.
respectable quarter to have the elements of the science translated into Chinese;
Adam
and to
work on
Smith's
McCulloch and
this
the
Mill's Principles,
native reader
is
self-evident.
principles of Political
abuses which
may exist in
essay
The
Economy,
illustration
of the great
We
.'
Trade and
the Opening of China
British
800-42
BY
MICHAEL GREENBERG
New York
British trade
Greenberg, Michael.
and the opening of China,
800-42.
Ciiina.
Opium
2.
1840-1842.
1HF3508.C5G73 1979]
382'.4l'051
ISBN 0-85345-497-3
4.
China
trade
China.
I.
Title.
79-12206
Manufactured
in the
10 9 8 7 6
4 3 2
CONTENTS
Money Weights and Abbreviations
vii
Author
Preface
ix
chapter
CHAPTER n
The Honourable Company and the Private English
chapter
III
chapter
i8
41
iv
1834
75
chapter v
Opium
A. The Importance of the
B.
The
Opium Trade
Business History of
C. Malwa and
Damaun
D. The Struggle
E.
The
F.
Silver
against
Coastal Trade
and
Opium
'Vile Dirt'
104
112
124
Macao
131
136
141
CONTENTS
vi
chapter
vi
144
Banking
152
chapter
170
vii
175
B.
179
C.
185
D.
Political
Consequences of 1834
chapter
191
viii
Opium War
196
War
206
212
APPENDICES
I.
II.
III.
Tables
Jardine Matheson
216
& Co.
222
225
Bibliography
226
Index
233
Money
The basic circulating coin in
this period
foreign
dollar,
commerce
at
Canton during
and an exchange value ranging from 3^. iid, to 5^. The tael was a
hypothetical coin of pure silver used only in the East India Company's accounts and in
all
cotton transactions.
The
equivalents
2.
lac
10 mace
1072
taels
100,000.
Weights
I
Picul
The
3.
tael
$1
tael
33 J
was
lb.
100 catties
Abbreviations
L,B.
= Letter Book.
= India/Europe/Private/Coastal
Letter Book.
- William Jardine.
= James Matheson.
R.T. = Robert Taylor.
M. & Co. = Magniac & Co.
Y. & Co. = Yrissari & Co.
J.M. & Co. = Jardine Matheson & Co.
C.LC. = Canton Insurance Company.
B.P.P. = British Parliamentary Papers.
W.J.
J.M.
C. of D.
Company.
Commons/
Vlll
Chronicles
1635-1834, by H.
Company trading to
China,
B. Morse.
= Canton Register.
Ch.Rep. = Chinese Repository.
C.Reg.
'The Company'
Company;
is
'the firm'
refers
to
the
variously
styled
II.
Beale,
AUTHOR'S PREFACE
This study gives an account of the
activities
Nanking
which transformed the relations between the Celestial
Empire and the Western 'barbarians' and placed them upon a
footing that was to last for a hundred years. An historical epoch
which is only now drawing to its end was inaugurated by the
decisive pressures of an expanding British economy in the early
19th century.
The
guns, ideas.
reversing
direction
its
British
by
goods
one-third of
its
its textiles
was
to the extent of
capital
first
we
volume.
This period has been studied, hitherto, almost wholly from the
standpoint of the diplomatic historian; which
inadequate, both because
there
were then no
what
in fact
direct
apart
is
here especially
governmental
has
indeed been
character appealing to
l\\e:
much
written
litterateur as
upon,
much
its
picturesque
as its acquisitive
AUTHOR
PREFACE
its
statistical
importance, yields
much
quantitative information
about the trade. But the operations of the traders are concealed
rather than illumined in the evidence collected
by
the
many
More
Our
the records
&
overseas.
The
Britain's industrial
tration
development of
facturer.
large-scale, power-driven industry as the manuTrue, the Eastern trade was only one field of export.
author's preface
and not the largest
at that.
Its
xi
keep the
its
the
China was
is
home market
sagged.
open
which has puzzled some
British manufacturers to
it
used
is
is
of information available.
the Jardine
foreign merchants at
Canton were
European. The
in China, not
of
it;
but few
It is, therefore,
impossible from their writings to answer certain historical questions about the precise
economic and
social
impact of a technically
upon
a semi-feudal 'Asiatic
economy'.
it
They
lies
They
elsewhere.
workupon
is
&
wrote in 1832, rendered the firm 'a general focus or medium for
the business of the port' (of Canton). They were easily the largest
of the handful of British firms established in China.
bulk of their
letters are
Though
the
author's preface
xii
is
On
books
the other
hand the
letters
provide very
away by
full state-
now over twelve years since the late Sir John Clapham
me of the existence of the Jardine Matheson papers in
told
a cellar at the
It
was under
his
and offering points of criticism. Sir John Pratt also read the
typescript and made several valuable suggestions.
My last
acknowledgment
nurturing
me
is
to Trinity College,
as Scholar,
Cambridge, which, by
CAMBRIDGE
August ic)48
M.G.
Chapter
East and
West
into
modern times
who came out to seek
contact in
it
return.
textile
wrought
silks,
III,
in the
As
late as
&
and culminating
by Jardine Matheson
The
China trade
For
a full
bttween India
list
i.e.
is
pre-1842.
and England^
p. 326.
See also the market reports in Chinese Repository^ February 1834, for the
same opinion.
*
must have
been enormous. The China junks alone annually carried to and
from the marts of the Eastern Archipelago and India huge quantities of raw silk and stuffs, porcelain, tutenag, rhubarb, camphor,
shells, sandalwood, tin, ivory, spices and jewels, etc. The volume
defies statistical
measurement; but
in the aggregate
travellers,
it
Straits
of Magellan' was for over three hundred years the legal monopoly
of the East India Company. That unique institution, in the East
successively Factor,
Dlwan and
Raj^ at
home
so closely
bound up
Edmund Burke
could declare
'to
say the
less their
Company was
in a state
in a state
of
ripe years
distress',^
on
tea.
It
per pound.^
to traffic in a
the
many,
silks
meat of
in the interests
On
of the
Mn
p. 213.
turers
manufacturers, of
home
its
Company
textiles,
resolved not to
employ
was
to challenge this
identification
See
THE OLD CHINA TRADE
it
turned
its
to the import of
China
tea.
Tea was
universal
facture.
Then
from China
porcelain,
lacquered
cabinets,
silks,
etc.
con-
tinued and even increased with the cult for 'chinoiserie' which the
Age of Reason and rococo sometimes affected. But the HonourCompany tended by the end of the i8th century to leave this
able
its
tea
tea.
In the
last
few years of
its
the
These
Pritchard, op.
cit.,
compiled from
p. 150;
its
House of Commons
in
1830
was directing
all its
tea trade.
nothing but
tea.
In
its last
years the
that
all
the
as costs in
Company exported
Com-
pany's commerce.^
Company began
Indian territories.
its
own
But
it
As
British manufactures,^
do not
Lung
interest
me.
no use
*
Loc.
for
cit.
1006.
be tempted to put
*
Ibid.
'
He
high
is
who would
ff.
(cloth). Paisley,
and
THE OLD CHINA TRADE
production of
Sir
a century
'Chinese have the best food in the world, rice; the best
Possessing
demand on
The problem,
as
it
presented
itself concretely,
China
silver,
was how to
and to a
teas,
in
England.^
its
products
'cash'
silver
New
Spain.
The
early
it,
to
pay
in part for
China
See Chapter
III for a
discussed in Chapter
'
was
*
know.
In this section
'Provisions of
1
8th century*
Funds
am
tlie
is
A.S
Customs he
on the
Canton during the
Company's
trade at
himself to
its
III.
i8th century.
Company's angle
But Morse,
as usual,
The
Company
it
itself
dollars)
still
Old and
New
Turning
to the
goods.^
in
first
English
of
eight'. ^
'stock'
new
'English
Com-
left
silver
and
Now,
as
is
known,
well
Contemporary
The Portuguese
below.
On
this
critics
Chang
them with
See Chapter
a
III
The author
showing the proportion of money and goods exported by the Company to the
East, from 1658-82, 1698-1710. The proportion is generally about
3 to i, and in
some years much higher. Pp. 296-7.
'
I6id.
'
Until
enterprise.
I, 8.
loc. cit.
II, 3.
To
render
its
monopolist position
less
vul-
nerable, the Company was not content with the verbal arguments
of its defenders such as Thomas Mun/ but undertook to take at
least
one-tenth of
its
first
'tenth'
requirement.
silver
it
was
high as 98
as
in
of the cargo.^
It
sale
of wool, and
was the
principal
on which the
prices of tea
and
silk
were sold
depended.^ In 1820
it
'
Loc.
cit.
the
finance exports.
* The Chinese merchants were known to give
goods trucked for teas. S.C.H. ofC. 1830, 2764.
''S.C.H.ofL. 1820.
as
high a premium as 35
on
as a condition
Chinese
was
Hong
of
its
tea purchases.^
reason
why
Manchester
who
own
of
native of
whence he travelled to
Chinese merchants 'prefer what they call
settled in Philadelphia,
the
in
The main
language a
rich
cargo',
i.e.
one comprised of
treasure.^
mainly as a consequence of
Pitt's
at a
Commutation Act,
time when,
the
volume
Company
found increasing
difficulty in obtaining
increased
See evidence of
British
In
^C
of L. 1830.
treasure was,
though
9
bullionist theories
way of
were no longer so prevalent,
trading, a /^is aller. How to provide commodities which would
still
an unsatisfactory
profit
this
was the
problem.
The
solution
was
finally
found
little
The
first
in India. It
is
this
was being
shown by
realised in the
the declaration in
Investment
Europe'.^
(teas, etc.) to
by
growth of British
political power in India during the period; especially by the
assumption of the diwani^ the revenues in kind, which gave the
Company
a large
feasible
the
It
Quoted Pritchard,
Parkinson, op.
cit.
op.
cit.
p. 232.
Chapter
3.
Actually,
and was shipped to the extent of over ^i million a year, by private merchants;
though an opponent of the Company alleged that, even in Bombay, half the
cotton crop was often appropriated as land tax. S.C.H. ofC.y 1830, 3488.
lO
Company was
was
sent to Europe;
silver
On
had to be sent
flow of treasure.
figures
were
just
in 1833,
at
Canton.
is
obscure; applied at
came
The
trade
this
it
first
from
India,
providing funds
The
at
vital role
Statistics are to
'
W.
H. Coates, preface.
I.
the
decided to leave
it
in India,
it
itself/
II
to private merchants
who were
to
conduct
in the wall
Canton
for the
Company
In
some
a private trade.^
it
for
was
little.
of the 19th
England.
The Company,
as
quantities of Indian
we
produce to provide
itself
its
Pritchard, op.
cit.y
'
See Appendix
I,
Op.
cit, II,
483.
in
Morse's
article,
Table A.
it
he.
Appendix
experimented
cit.
III.
12
its
service the
Canton,
at a fixed rate
Company's Treasury
at
Morse,
S.C.H. of L. 1830,
loc. cit.
p. 288,
/^/^^
Chronicles,
II,
143.
I3
method of financing
its
The problem of
the
solved.
We are now in
it
had
fully
1817 onwards,
be
set forth
full
may be
in the Chronicles.
The
From
year ending
last
of the
developed in the
its
it
has the
transactions
The
of British imports
exports of $8,479,285
all
at
but a fraction of
% ($9,000 worth)
consisted of tea.
14
at $1,145,220.^
silk
The
Bills on the
Company's Canton Treasury were as follows
Court of Directors, London, $7,820; on the Bengal settlement,
Chronicles
(Vol.
may
this
Ill,
IV
passim).
quarter of the
total
in
last
its
the
tea investment;
was
now
practically
all
the
(jb)
its
Company's
tea investments;
its
still
its
own
its
role
*I
am prepared
in
India's
Company's
the time.
*
'
as
The
On
the
below.
certificates
the reasons
principle
why, and
article
I^
To
understand
it
is
this
necessary
far-reaching and
to
follow
responsible pronouncement,
Melville's
intricate
elaboration
was
India
to
in
Almost
as follows.
annually, from
In substance the
other;
/^3
of
Com-
period,
this
sum
million of this
repre-
to
make
from India to
China
the
London. This was partly because a considerable proportion of
channel
trade
the
of
remittance
the
kind,
from
its
its
home
Bills.^
in teas
The
from
the
England.
the
monopoly.
In 1833
it
it
Company's
ofC,
Company's
l6
House
India,
and under
few years.
For the Lancashire exporter, the most profitable mode of remittance from India was via China. Calcutta led to Canton.
The Country Trade had become the keystone of the whole
previously valued at
in a
structure.
The foregoing
ment but
to bring out
its
its
organisation or develop-
peculiar nature.
The expanding
demand
for British
goods on the
tea),
British
without
The
the
it,
importance lay
in its increasing
magnitude,
at a
annum. There
are,
I7
overcome all obstacles. The following pages will trace the rise of
these Country merchants, the nature of their business, their relations with the Company and their part in the struggles to end its
monopoly, culminating in their efforts to break down the Great
Wall of Chinese resistance to foreign penetration.
Chapter
II
community of
in
British
the
Company. Even
tically
Only
that
its
own
is, its
Canton 'Factory',
or agents, were to remain in
establishment of 'factors'
its
China.
The
who managed
shift in the
a merchant's
connotation of the
and
it
became
Chronicles, IL 2.
members
to
I9
Now
main duty of
allowed to engage
in 1786
by
a Supercargo
The proceeds of
business.^
Company's Treasury
else
at
Canton
on London, or
The extent
known pre-
1777
but that
Mr W. H.
it
large
is
is
not
shown by
sum
goods and
their
consignments of
20
own
ships, built
and registered
in India,
on
at
As
'free'
Super-
we find the
name of a private merchant, one George Smith, among that select
and jealous band of Englishmen resident in China. ^ He had been
early as 1764
Chronicles^ II, 4, 5.
On
the
Cohong
21
Government
redress.^
to approach the
They argued
that
these
Company's
Bills, in
home
in
Canton
'justice
to
demand from
and
of 'gunboat diplomacy'
at
brought the
officials,
by
their activities.
Pekin
at the instigation
For one
It
had
thing, they
because
Secondly, these private agents of 'China venwere a turbulent lot who gave a good deal of trouble. There
was the case of one Abraham Leslie, who forcibly occupied the
premises of a Hong merchant (Coqua) with armed Lascars.
Equally disturbing were the semi-piratical activities of Captain
to the Chinese.^
tures'
Messrs Hutton
&
Gordon were
'
Chronicles,
II,
47-9.
22
The
Company
vigilant
enforce
responsible.
powers. In 1780
its
Committee
to expel
it
from China
who were
British subjects
all
it
not
As
its
first
in 1783.
were recorded
The Company
Empire.
The one
the others
basis
trade
'free'
merchant
left after
which we
in
China on a
different
shall
examine
in a
moment.
'Squire Cox'
is
&
'singsongs'.^
The
latter
clocks, watches
as 'snuff
1
'
^6,
.1791,
Geo.
and
Ill, c.57.
archives.
On
Chronicles,\\y
23
Hong
merchants as obligatory
New
Year presents
to the
of confining himself to
act as
Finally, being a
man
of
initiative,
new
Company had
neglected,
flotilla,
anchoring
at
Whampoa,
the
piece).
Two
^ See
descriptive inventory of several exquisite and magnificent pieces of
J. Cox,:
mechanism and jewellery^ 1773* S.C.H.
of C. 1830, 4536. Apparently, the Chinese always wore watches in
pairs, on the quaint grounds that when one went to sleep the other would still
be awake. Certainly the invoices among the J.M. papers always mark watches
as sold in pairs. There were at this time no Chinese watches.
'
24
agency,
fitted
for furs.
more
this
The
new
rare
articles for
capital
Jacob Astor.2
A less spectacular but more important development than transPacific adventures in skins
was
at the
in enlarging his
important because
it
at
Capt.
Meares has
J.
successful. In 1789
Whampoa,
thus anticipating the practice of his successors forty years later, who
used the same technique, except that the islands of Lintin and Hongkong were
found more convenient than Macao. See below, Chapter III.
* K. W. Porter,
//. Astor, Vol. I, Chapters 7-9; Vol. II, Chapters 13-16.
' E.I.C. Factory Records^ China
(82), 2.4.1788,
Cox
Select',
25
had got rid of his preno private British could stay on.
But now a stratagem was devised to force the legal barrier. In
1779 a Scotsman named John Reid, whose service in the Bengal
Marine had brought to his notice the possibilities of the China
trade, had arrived at Canton with His Imperial Austrian Majesty's
commission as Consul and head of the Imperial Factory. When
forced
decessors. Legally,
it
Imperial Austrian
in the
Imperial
Eagle^ which in 1780 sailed from Ostend to the North- West coast
commission
Cox
&
Reid.
as
Cox and
Committee,
Russian settlement
at
of
at
When
the Select
Consul!
26
On
comment, the
loss
Company
...
too obvious
is
for
not
it is
to furnish
in
there'.^
As
way
out of this dilemma the Select Committee decided, on the instructions of the
Court
Agency
Two
in 1782, to provide
Agency
carrying on the
junior
members of
manage
Sparkes, were to
own machinery
its
Drummond
profits
among
for
business,
and
were to be
3%
on
sales
and
was
plete failure. It
disliked
by
Country produce
tion to circumvent
Beales.
The
it,
in India,
in
Committee of
letters to
Bengal and
11,141,
by
the Super-
Ve thought
Bombay
resisted
our public
was
duty
It
it
it
our
on the
subjects under your
to touch
'
/^iW. 196-7.
House was
established
at
The
protest
was of no
avail;
in
persuaded to undertake
it
only with
members of
The
difficulty.
Within a short
the
failure
Cox
Beale
left
for England.
Beale
China
to
in 1801, acted as
On
the
House of Agency,
see Chronicles^
II,
L.B.
3 1.8.
1806.
28
In
China
by informing them
in the capacity
of Vice-Consul
its
own
their
&
at
under the
&
style
of Baring
who was
Moloney
Lance
^ Cf.
the evidence of Davidson before the S.C.H. of L. 1830.
Matheson's oath of allegiance to His Danish Majesty is preserved
copy of
in the
J.M.
archives.
^ These Barings were presumably
related to Francis Baring, whose Chairmanship of the Court of Directors of the E.I.C. in
1793 may have contributed to his
is
not
interested in the
clear.
China
trade.
But
its
connection with
When in
29
1799
which had first been forbidden in 1729 but was now rapidly
becoming a most important element in the Country Trade, the
Court of Directors was faced with the necessity of deciding its
attitude to the disposal of
decided to prohibit
Mr
of opium.
proprietors of
its
its
it
duty to the
Com-
&
&
They
policy
is
discussed in Chapter V,
W.
S.
30
Davidson,
who had
visited
China
in 1807, to
a native of Scotland,
came out
in 1811 as a naturalised
on
When the
all
changing
after ^capriciously
Davidson,
Portuguese
join
its
regulations
two or
three times',
&
&
&
When
in 181
revive
its
petitive but
complementary.
The
They
etc., to
London,
31
through lack
failed
all
over the
Eastern seas in ventures to Manila and Java and the islands; and
&
licensed.
Chinese,
In 1814,
it
stopped
when
all
'the Select'
Bombay complained
British trade at
Whereupon
the merchants
'
impediment
'
as
it
is
should not be
calculated not
See Chapters
I,
VL
32
only to diminish
inevitable ruin
its
upon
exercise brings
its
it*.^
The
private
were
under the
restive
restrictions
still
Committee
English'
who
remained in China.
In
18 16
Committee
the
attempted to deport a
Palmer
But even in
Company were
of the
powerless.
as possible
little
them
met with
refusal.
Committee
to help
them
Bombay
from the
Hong
would
i.e.
*it
The
Parsees
Don
Pacifico
In the
last
gradually turned.
numbers
at
criticise the
yet.
The
Canton and
in influence in
Ibid.
IV, 55.
*if
To
254.
power for
33
of any
but as
it
may
suffer, I
I feel
very
me
much
came
gratified in
of contradicting
this
in the
more
is
commerce of India
Opium and
will necessarily
fall,
if British
subjects are
last
somewhat
number of
British residents,
number.
* Chronicles^ IV, 163-4. James Innes was evidently a man of spirit. In
1833 he
was so annoyed at the Chinese Customs Commissioner, the Hoppo, that he
deliberately set fire to his house. Truly a 'barbarian'
^ S.C.H.ofC.
1830, Q.278.
that
34
men and
their
opium
ships'
fact the
'outside' locale of the opium trade, which had become by far the
most extensive branch of the Country Trade, made the legal
control of the Select Committee impossible to enforce. In 1833
the last Select Committee of the Canton Factory, angered by
more than usually violent and provocative proceedings on the
part of the
the Sylph and the Hercules^ suspended their licence. Their action
in this 'grand contest', as
it,
was but
many
at
by
dying gesture.^
'They
[the S.C.]
have committed
other foolish acts this season for which they are laughed
all,
despised
by many. So much
the Select.'
The
had deeper roots. Under cover of a legal subtergrown up at Canton a small but peculiarly compact
merchant community of free traders, whose economic basis was
conflict
the
it
India.
It
number of
of their prosperity, as
collapse in 1829-33.2
At
it
it
P.L.B. of
WJ.
2.10.33.
at
the
i\
the sole
houses;
opium
it
component of
became
of these concerns
detail;
by these agency
raw cotton was more important;
later
35
their
is little
known and
Agency Houses'
'East India
houses'.
the East
and the
retired officers
24 in
'great
like.
1,
random.^ These
in the
purveyors
commercial world,
The
mortality
among
minor firms was very high, but there was a core of some
half dozen of old staple houses which, despite bewildering
changes of names consequent on changes of partners and amalthese
gamations, persisted
some
The two leading ones were the 'Fairlie' and 'Palmer' Houses. The
former was founded by William Fairlie and John Fergusson, who
came out
a partner in
Fergusson Clark
&
'
'
known
&
Evidence of Alexander
See Chapter VL
&
Matheson concern,
right until
its
36
&
&
influence.
&
&
&
Thomas Weeding,
the
first
From
181
5,
for
twenty
Jardine, carried
&
See Chapter
VI below.
&
Calcutta firm
owned
&
Co.,
whose
who
in
from
What
is
important in
this
context
is
was thrown behind the private merchants of Canton. The operative fact was that the China trade was essential to the India
merchants as a means of profitable remittance to London. The
Canton firms were largely outgrowths of these India houses,
frequently stemming directly from them in personnel and capital,
and being continuously associated with them in business transactions. It will be recalled that it was the action of the two Bengal
firms in preferring to transact their Canton business through their
own agents. Cox & Beale, which had defeated the East India
Company's project of an official House of Agency and so made
possible the existence of resident 'private English' in China.
It
was the powerful backing of the great East India Houses which
enabled the Canton community to flourish and attain indepen-
dence in
its
Company's
rule.
to be
found
personnel.
It is
it
among
of Scottish names
The
its
is
entrepreneurial
Houses.
of
was
will
engaged
&
by family
largely developed
Country
were some
^ Mackintosh
Co. were 'our valued Calcutta friends under whose auspices
our firm has been established'.
Y.
Co., 4.9.1822.
These
&
the
Agency System
see
Chapter VI
below.
'
period
A. Adamson,
J.
&
&
38
who were
it
that in this
Lombard
However
Street.
its effects on the development of the China trade were evident. The 'free' branch of that
trade was in the hands of a remarkable group of men, of modest
some, like James
birth but comparatively good education
Matheson, being graduates of Edinburgh University and similar
academies^
all shrewd and conspicuously able, seeking a distant
outlet for talents for which English church and society then had
little
use.
Moreover, even
China
were a cohesive
force. Partners
of
one Canton firm during the period include two Beale and three
&
it
of
was
When
a
a third
James Matheson.
nephew, Hugh, as
Charles Lyall, who had one brother in a London East India House
and another in a Bombay firm. 'I consider them a thriving and
united family'.^
enterprise,
The
was valued
&
of
strength.*^
&
&
*P.Z.^.,J.M., 4.11.1831.
Kinship was not of itself sufficient to ensure a partnership. There was the
case of young Francis Hollingworth, a cousin of the senior partner, 'Holly*
*
might almost say two royal roads from Scotland to Canton the
counting-house and the quarter-deck. Some, like James Matheson,
were apprenticed
others, like
in a
William Jardine or
his
knowledge of Oriental peoples and ports, cargoes and commissions, and invaluable connections with others engaged in trade
with the East.
The
private merchant
19th century at
Canton
is
to be seen as part of a
In a
official
the
of the
in
the Canton
first
English
move
battle
newspaper
wage
well-fitted to
book q{ Hints on
prominent
ability,
in the early
in different spheres,
who was
was
Company now
articles
of import
Canton. But
'willing, well-disposed
'Bell's Life
&
40
from India to China, there does not appear any room for comBut the growth of a body of free
petition between them
adventurers under the wing of an exclusive commerce is not
unlikely to lead to consequences of the first m.oment: and the
division of British residents at Canton into two commercial
classes so differently constituted and characterised cannot but add
.
free traders
is
between the
Under
They
will regard
Company may
one of rivalry
if
not of
'gradually',
now manifest
hostility'.
Company's
word
an accurate analysis.
In the Indian Presidencies the free merchants had to fight hard against the
Company
earliest issues
Chapter
III
themselves obliged to
fit
arrangements, commercial,
came
to
and
quasi-political.
This system,
Toogood Downing,
as
Hunter, have
Moreover,
this
'old' trade
it,
however summarily.
But these
The
They
latter
found that
were, extremely
it
C.
China, 1836-7.
vols.
W.
by
the
C. Hunter,
42
at causal
The
ments
Canton
columns of
as the following
'Senex'
beyond the
They
by some other argument than reason that this perhaps is not the
case'.^ Many modern Western writers on this period continue
and exclusiveness'
from the European world.^ Modern Chinese
writers^ have countered by pointing out that the early (i6th and
to attribute the Chinese 'sense of superiority
to this 'isolation'
even
in the
West
rigid control
of foreign trade
is
the
norm and
Com-
much
category.
foreign trade'.
India
^
"^
<
Company thought
the
Matheson, Present Position and Future Prospects of the China Trade^ 1836.
See Eames, Morse, Eitel, etc.
2, 183 1.
E.g. see Chang-Su, Chinas Foreign Trade^ 1919,
J.
I,
164.
43
however
that,
on China's
Writing of a much
later
been
period
when
cited.
who drew up
the Decennial
economic
little'.-
life
selves
extended
classes,
On
admitted he
knew
little
J.
this in a
F. Davis,
Supercargoes
at
Canton,
who had
lived
there for
17 years,
ment
offered
'a
vast field'
was
'Much
silk
*
many
Chinese.
distress prevails in
He wrote
to his
Bombay
agents:
It is
true that
by
lately
merchants.
'
^
*
in Hubbard, Eastern Industrialisation and its Effect on the West^ I935S.C.H. of C. 1830,449.
S.C.H. of C. 1830, see evidence of Marjoribanks and Davis, especially Q.275.
Co., Bombay, I.L.B. 5.1 1.29.
W.J. to Remington
Quoted
&
44
silk
district
And
dence on foreign trade was already being raised in 1830 with the
When,
restrictive policy.
come from
not
Celestial
how
it
presented
itself to
them was
Unlike contemporary
was
to devise a system
in revenue to the
receptive Imperial coffers and at the same time keep these uncouth
alien barbaroi
certainly
calculated
Marjoribanks,
commerce very
little
English
hospitality
into
latter
was
'exclusiveness'.
advantage.
first
turn
Hands, admitted
to
to
The
Portuguese,
Spaniards,
Dutch and
men
by which
it
was obtained. The Chinese were at all times their masters in the
art of fraud and deception; but it cannot surprise that a people
wisely estimating the advantages of peace as the
adventurers
with
the
first
of blessings
a nation, should
deserved'.^
'S.C.H.ofC.
1830, Q.704.
The
45
British
territorial
unknown
acquisitions in
to the Chinese.
brought
a feudatory of China,
armed power of Britain to the backyard of the Middle Kingdom.^ The Select Committees of both Houses of Parliament were
worried as to the effect of the Indian and Burmese wars upon the
Chinese treatment of the British at Canton. Davis stated that it
the
As
Emperor Kang Hi had warned: 'There is cause
for apprehension lest in centuries or millenniums to come China
may be endangered by collision with the nations of the West'.^
caused the Chinese to hold the English in 'especial distrust'.
early as 1717 the
legal
Ibid. 529-31.
Quoted
in
in
1835, cited in
J.
Slade,
See
Owen
It
Under
own
choosing
conform
to the
who was
its
own
affairs
community
under a Headman of
their
Chinese laws.
46
Very
difficult
to understand
at
the proprieties
Canton, found
it
of the Celestial
economic
in
Canton
'security' system.
was more
it
The
efforts
several stages of
and
trial
particularly
its
resist the
imposition of
others.
from
its
it
worked
its
in its full
abolition
by
development,
the Treaty of
is
some
The
following
salient features
v/as
by
at that place.
from the
rest
to Canton. Macao, a
Canton River estuary, had
Even
When
the
Dutch
to send
two
Dutch
not clear;
buy
it
from
there.
47
The
by
and
residential
were compelled
to
Portuguese were
1808,
it
mainly for
from Canton
September, which indeed they
do by Chinese regulation.
Macao had
trade at
British used
to be handled
Any
British private
by Portuguese
agents.^
The
allegedly to
more
fully in
Commercially,
its
was
it
Amoy,
finally killed
much more
by
the
development of Hongkong.
1830.^
The
latter
James Matheson,
who
in at
laid the
Amoy
the
San
Sebastian^ Captain
Spanish colours.
J.
between 18 10 and
Mackie, to
&
Amoy
in 1823
under
Portuguese Governor had to pay an annual rent to the Chinese and there was a
resident Mandarin. See also Cordier, III, 132.
^
See
The
letter to
B. Barretto,
who
received a commission.
&
&
Company.
S.C.H. of C. 1830, 170, 389. Another witness said the Spaniards had given
up the
Amoy
48
when
Amoy
eye on
new
from Manila
Amoy', but
to
the project
fell
through, chiefly
November 1806
Amoy. In
Anna Felix
cotton to
Amoy
Whampoa. The
moon
and,
later,
Hongkong remained
Camsing-
opium
dis-
Removed
&
"^
L.B. of Y.
and
I.I 1.
1804-6.
Co. 2.9.1823.
letters to Fairlie
1806, and
marked
'private
49
at
There were
it
aboard
tlie
retail
it
The
private
to smugglers,
cf.
numerous
instances in the
to get on*.
*
E.L.B.
10.
1.
81
1.
The
sycee 'must
To
F. Cowasjee,
all
E.L.B. 11.3.1810.
Bombay.
50
System;
how
gave a
list
went no
all
in 1832
The
and
were
at
Company
long before
clear, had,
new
it
is
by Treaty
in
To
turn
now
Canton
and
has naturally evoked
and
wonderful organisation'
as
considerable discussion.
Hunter
It
Cohong. 'That
called
it,^
perfect
^ Thus in
1832, a typical 'sample' year, out of $i8j million imported into
Canton on private account, $12,185,000 represented opium. The Company's
import was $4 million, none of which, of course, was opium. Chroniclesy IV,
339: see
statistical
appendices.
1 1.2.1834.
This figure included several famous opium
Rover, Water Witch, Sylph, Falcon and others which made the
journey from India two or even three times in the season.
^Canton Register^
clippers, the
Red
/.Z,.^. 7.11.1832.
*
Fan-Kwai
at Canton, p. 153.
5I
commercial
ship of the
as a
burden not
Member-
a privilege.
retire
as
soon
since 1788
and Senior since 1796, tried with difficulty to retire in 1808. Old
Mowqua tried in the same year and again in 18 10. Howqua tried
in
1810 and in 1826, and again in 1832, but went on until his death
in 1843.^
by
The
original
Senior
'as a
merchant which
shortly'.
Toogood Downing
pradore,
tells a
will
in
is
com-
Its
Hong
^
merchant traded on
or hrm,^ on his
By Morse,
parallel
own
his
It
had no
in his well
with the
'staple',
Crown.
^
Chronicles,
'Cohong'
II,
is
the
associated merchants.
*
given
list
of the
in the
last
Ch.
6.
merchants of the
i.
Cohong
prior to
its
abolition in 1842
is
Appendix. This gives the familiar pidgin name by which the merchants
52
(never in
its
it
do
so.
the
etc.
But
this
by stopping the
various Hongs have quite
successfully resisted
British trade.
ledgers the
On occasion,
one
Hong would
take advan-
'The
Hong
tion'.^
otlier in
any combina-
Emperor and
Government
the
officials.^ It
thus
the elder
H. Magniac.
'
I.L.B. 27.8.1823.
'
first
P.L.B. 22.10.1837.
3%
53
and only
if
They were
system.
chants',
on
by means of
it
the 'security'
trade.
and
in 1828 to seven, of
whom
only
means of carrying
on foreign trade at Canton. But their monopoly was limited to
staple articles. There were, in addition, a large body of 'outside'
merchants, called 'shopmen', who were permitted to retail small
three
were
really solvent)
Company
legal
goods such
it
as silks, nankeens,
and even
one of the
Madras merchant
by
who do
is
their
earlier
own Hongs on
account of
informed that
goods,
who
Bombay
its
then
'
to.
charge them to
us'.'*
agent as follows:
*L.B. 10.12.1800.
'It
In
has
54
merchants; from
same
port
a
which
an
Hong
to
by
merchant*s chop^ or
application
goods
is
made even
is
who both
in the
the Hongists.
connive
at the business
Matheson,
who
From
or
less
often the
were able to
^
etc., in
is
'the drug*.
*
Ihid.
4.
1 1. 1
804.
&
&
*Y.
See evidence of Coffin and other Americans. S.C.H. ofC. 1830, and Hunter,
Fan Kuae,
p. 35.
I. L.B.
26.7.1830.
55
many
financial
down and
closed
latter.
their
who
by
especially
the Parsees.
manufactured
articles, carried
Bombay
In consequence three
on
ships
have been detained for three months, but a compromise has been
reached
(shopmen)
deem
Hong
only be
will
merchants
shall
however,
during the next four years the foreign trade of the shopmen
increased, partly because the
tities
men
This
because
last
it
British manufacturers
who
wherewith
to beat
it.
'a
this
question of the
interests'.
Hong
An
merchants
lose a share
American and
the
illegal trade
'private English'
Hong merchants
were
now
to
Whereupon
the Select
them
But the
^S.C.H.ofC.
*
'
1830, Q. 1263.
L.B. of Taylor and Matheson,
Chronicles^ IV, p. 169 et
secj.
14.1 1.1820.
56
pany's interest.
buying
Hong
begins:
It
we
merchants as
all
teas, silks,
with
Committee of
rest, retorted
pleased',
articles
Comof
from shopmen or
The Viceroy
but the
in the habit
on
all
the foreign
American
petition, and confirming the old rule that shopmen were to sell
only the petty articles originally allowed them, which included
neither tea nor silk nor nankeen cloth. However, further pressure,
exerted by both the Americans and the 'private English', was sufficiently strong to force a compromise. A 'Proclamation concerning trade carried on by Shopmen' from Le, Governor of
Canton, and Yen, Hoppo^ was issued on 14 July 1828, which
modified the existing law.^ Hong merchants were to retain their
monopoly of most of the leading articles of foreign trade. There
were now enumerated 24 categories of exports, including tea, raw
trade of Canton.
nankeens,
etc.,
(cotton) goods.
aegis of the
Hong
merchant,
who
still
by warning
merchants.
Both
the
Cohong was
shopmen
to trade
under the
as
Americans
it
The
edict concluded
for those of
Mandarin
English'
was
is
It is
printed in
preserved
in
full in
MS.
in the
Company and
Hong
merchants.
in practice
57
the 'free'
foreign merchants.
in the
only
official
up the
river,
of using
at
maximum
demand was
foreign
was
when
feverish competition
imports were
endowed by
the
a paternal
the
succinct account
may be found
in
among
'privilege'.
the
Rice
Government, mindful of
magic quality of giving
European
provided
BRITISH TRADE AND THE OPENING OF CHINA
58
rice
women
the British
redress.
Government
to
demand
mode of trading
distinction
from the
Hong
merchants
at prices
which included
merchant;^ and
when
the
Hong
unknown
all
The
duties.
to the foreign
last
as
they acted as guarantors for both the Chinese and the foreign
parties.
Company
among
Cohong
twenty-one shares
same
dealt separately
These regulations are printed in full in The Canton Register of 15.7.1 831.
S.C.H. of L. 1830, p. 459. For Hong merchants as brokers, see I.L.B.
21.4.1831, etc.
S.C.H. of C. 1830, Q.1213. 4 shares of its contract teas went to the Chief
3 shares to each of the next four, and 2^ shares to the two junior. This
scheme varied according to the numbers and solvency of the Hong merchants.
*
Hongist,
Morse
could
only
sell
to the
is
wrong when he
Hong
59
merchant
who
his
who had
estab-
might
profit
from
cargo.^
its
Certain
Hong
merchants
own
account.'^
Secondly, the
pany
in
Committee of 1830
the Select
it
was
called, yet
it is
Hongist
evident
for, say,
International Relations
'
Howqua had
I,
its
Chapter
4.
I.L.B.
&
its
H. of C. {opium)y
1840.
in the
Report of the
6o
later
for cash,
and also
mono-
Country
traders,
Hong
therefore
It
to sell less
Hong
The
on
hand carried
on the major part of their business outside the Cohong, in the
*outer' anchorages; while at Canton they dealt extensively with
the
merchants.
shopmen.'*
'private English'
Thus,
in
practice,
the other
their
manner of trading
Thus
Puankequa, head Hong merchant, was required to have twoand one-quarter of the woollens which the Company had brought
in 1795
At times when
opium market
the drug
was occasionally
Co. 26.10.1823. In the
Patna crisis of 1822, Matheson reported to Calcutta that Charles Magniac was
underselling him by 'trucking'.
Co.
4.9.1822, Y.
' This led frequently to 'no little altercation', as in the case of Cowqua in 1806.
L.B. 8.9.1806.
^
the
collapsed,
Y.
&
&
* On only one or two isolated occasions did the Hong merchants have direct
connections with opium, after the definitive prohibition of 1799. Thus in 18 19
Manhop was
Mowqua
is
mentioned
as
else in the
6l
Company, 'private English' and American testimony is conclusive. The honesty and commercial integrity of the distant Hong
merchants were a byword in the alleys of the City of London as
in the bazaars of Bombay. One who traded with them for twenty
years wrote: *As a body of merchants we found them able and
reliable in their dealings, faithful to their contracts,
and large-
minded. The monopoly they enjoyed could not have been in the
able, liberal or genial class of men'.^ Written
hands of a more
The
one flaw
indeed
symptom
after the
which made
in the case
of a
Hong merchant
it
involved
'Eli'
on the
Hunter, Fan-Kwai^
in 1827,
when
p. 40.
the desperate
in
&
his
Chinese
creditors.
Hunter, op.
For
cit.y
p. 38.
a case of severe
II,
278.
62
In
8 10-5, four
ficulties
Hong
dif-
number of
Hong
available
The
creditors
Hongs, because
it
whom
were always
would reduce
the
and because,
as
Matheson
credit of the
trustees, Messrs.
collect
to transact business,
though by
8 19 the
still
million
'broke'
foreign
including interest.^
The Company
&
Y.
'
Manhop
trustees
is
|5
these
enormous
except
failures
shook the
&
interest
was
of course, by
crisis
failed,
owing i6
But
Hong merchant
Co.^
their duties.^
credit of every
Magniac
63
remarkable
^failures'
of Mandarin merchants
who
which
These
had a monopoly
The
Cohong
Hong
merchants was the high interest they paid on loans from foreigners.
to be prohibited.
The
foreign merchants,
their lack
of financial
the
Of
crisis
of 18 10 and the
But squeezes
many
millions of
gifts,
at that
'presents', etc.
'
letters.
64
be instructive to examine
will
how China
was taxed
tea
in
England.
Some
13 million
lb.
75.9% to
in
127.5
%.
England, but
of this amount only some 5^ million lb. paid duty. The remaining
lb. consisted of tea imported into France and other
7^ million
on the Continent
countries
smuggled into England. In 1783 a House of Commons Committee was set up to enquire into 'Illicit Practices Used in Defrauding the Revenue'.
duty on
became
tea
less
By
the
was reduced
universal
in
12^%
to
100%,
which figure it remained until 1833. Tea from China (as noted
Chapter I above) provided about one tenth of the total revenue
of England.
As
trading
interest.
liabilities
The
that
from
more
their trade
wealthy
commissions. As
Bombay
Hong
'private
merchants, usually
their interest
late as
In particular,
Canton
profit
compound
many
at
Magniac show
account than
at
with the
how
chapter
times as
Hong merchants.^
65
much
as
20%
per
annum on
some-
consequent
exile to 'Eli',
This high
rate
at
% per month?
why
the
Cohong
A report^ by
came
original capital,
little
of respectability'. William Jardine, writing in 1830* on the consequences of the abolition of the Company's
monopoly
is
much
capital.
in the
it
will
Howqua
Mowqua
has large
P.L.B. of
The
WJ.
30.8.1837.
Fan-Kwai,
p. 39.
report,
man of
Hong
H. of C.
large property',
Mowqua
is 'still
J.
F.
Davis declared
men
(Q.451). 'Howqua is a
considered a very sufficient merchant'.
Puankequa and Cumqua 'are both men of opulence as is Gowqua' (or Goqua).
They admit the two junior merchants, Kinqua and Fatqua, were, 'we believe,
both poor men and indifferent merchants' (Q.672). The new Hongs created in
1830 as a result of pressure from the Country merchants (see Chapter VII) were
not known to Davis or Marjoribanks. It was as much in the interests of the
Company to minimise the weakness of the Cohong as it was in the interests of
the 'free traders' to magnify it.
' In fact Howqua did charter ships from the American firm, Russell & Co., to
send his teas to Europe even after this date. But he uould only venture on
profitable shipments, not caring to deal in British imports.
66
Company's
trade
Hong,
who
too timid to
is
allotted
Europeans. Tenqua,
conducts
nor
by
is
the
Company's
Hong broken
his creditors to
Hong
business.
up.
Chunqua
is
neither solvent
draw up
the Viceroy having been under a promise to bring the head of the
Melville',^
Old Kinqua
is still
last;
but
though his credit is good. Fatqua has neither money nor character.
Gowqua has money, but knows nothing of business beyond
who
Hongs.
as
little
We
generally pay
him cash
have
now
four or five
have some
character but
who
or
with
without money
very
dismissed Hoppo's
so-so
broken down opium
engaged
in the
opium
cold
trade
visited the
others are
free.^
character
know
so
brokers,
character
pursers, etc.
rather
What
is
newfangled nonsense
not'.
Hengtai,
who
failed
owing Jardine
Matheson
in
1836,
fall
to over-trading, miscalculation of
it
Mandarins and
his lack
of
capital.
1830,
He
his treatment
by
the
a limited
my
signboard
Eli.
67
than a
than another
lac'.
who were
Howqua
to Hunter,
dollars,
The
really
'extortions' of the
Mandarins
fell
Hong
in
84 1 the
Howqua's
was $1,100,000, Puankequa's $260,000, and all the rest together only $640,000.^ There
were occasions, indeed, when the foreign merchants had to
borrow from the Chinese! Tlie young and struggling firm of
Reid Beale & Co. found itself in difhculties in 1801 and borrowed
$50,000 from Pinqua (Howqua), $30,000 from Puankequa, and
$20,coo from Chinqua.^ Howqua even acted as banker to the
Company's Factory, on one occasion (18 13) advancing it a
quarter million taels.^ Clearly the great Howqua, Mowqua, Puankequa, and occasionally others, had more than enough capital to
give ample flexibility to the private foreign trade. But they were
reluctant to do so more than was necessary, because It was a losing
military authorities.
share
little tea.
The attempt by
provoked
Committee
stoppage of trade.
as a result
came up
the
Canton
river.
'
68
goods, of which the two dominant items were opium and raw
Opium was
cotton.
&
factures the
Davis,
cargo, or Bills
The
latter
sums of dollars and sycee derived from the sale of their opium
not to any Hong merchant for China goods, but into the Company's Treasury or to the Americans for Bills of Exchange. That
is
salt
opium shipments.
'
^S.CH.ofC.
1830, Q.408.
See Appendix for the amount of specie and
^Chronicles, IV, i68.
*
Bills
dealt
heavily
69
with Jardine's in
The
who was
it
was
Moreover, while
large.^
their
a sale, the
Hong
merchants in 1835-7
their struggle
with a 'combination',
Tea men'
we
Enough
show
of the
the 'Black
has
Hong
merchants arose from the nature of their trade with the foreigners,
as well as
from
their lack
Canton.
at
Firstly,
by Imperial
all
by
by
a levy
it
provided the
which was
all
the
more valuable
in those
When
'free'
Kuo,
guarantee
the Chinese
merchants with
money
'
by
of 1830-3, and
down
First Anglo-Chinese
with them,
War, Ch.
7.
70
Cohong
Hong
merchants in
from
office.^
rarely
on the other
Though,
foot,
in truth, the
it
all
cases,
removing Urmston
did pinch.
way
THE CANTON COMMERCIAL SYSTEM
in his time.
'I
71
[the
(I
suspect) they gave higher prices than they could afford to in the
actual state of the market.'
He went on
to say that he
way
conducted
as with a
solvent merchant, since they held the same rank (only as long as
rich
He
stantly
Cohong was collectively), yet 'I knew they had shares in the
Company's business and I felt assured they would be able to pay
me, which they were'. This was due to the fact that selling teas
to the Company at fixed prices was very profitable to the Hong
merchants. The insolvent Hongist was very anxious to deal with
people like Davidson and gave better prices for obvious reasons
'he wishes to continue or his insolvency will become apparent'.
Davidson was able to carry out his transactions with individual
Hong merchants because they shared in the Company's heavy
tea purchases and received the Company's advances. The ultimate
security was the Company, and with the end of the Factory at
Canton, this method of deriving advantage from the financial
weakness of the junior Hongs was no longer at the disposal of
the
by the
^
He
restrictive character
China in 1824. In fact, his firm was the only one established besides
and Magniac house and Parsee firms until the later 'teens of the century.
left
the Beale
72
Cohong. The
frequent bankruptcies of the Mandarin merchants were in themselves not fatal to the foreign trade.
The
foreign traders
still
were
who
was restriction, to adapt itself to rapidly changing conditions which called for expansion.
What the breakdown of the Cohong really indicated was
the gulf between the level of China's economy, with its low state
of capital accumulation and its 'domestic' industry, and that of
the rapidly developing British economy in this period of what is
conventionally known as the 'Industrial Revolution'. But Jardine
and his fellows were too close to the actual development of an as
object
of
its
diplomatic
efforts
to accept the
Canton.
Britain
and China
is
at
too
The
was the continued steady supply of tea. The Americans, too, were
well satisfied with the Canton System. Hunter's enthusiasm for
the 'old' system and especially the perfection of the Cohong,
^
3. 1.
struggle between the C. of D., the S.C. and the 'private English' over policy in
regard to the Canton System, which is more fully discussed in Chapter VII below.
letter to the
common
on the Chinese
73
Canton System.^
as follows:
may
we
bound
we
hence
consider ourselves
to
The
on which we
'private English',
first
China trade
at all.
They had
money as
life
The
at
Canton.
in 'old
(Incidentally,
Canton' suggests
woes of
that the
at
life
the
evading the
bribery.
The second
by
was no
clean
officer
.'
It
'It
Company had
traded in
I.L.B.
L.B.
10. 10.1829.
lo.i 1.1806.
Canton Register,
2. 10.
1830.
74
Become
a stronger
to stand
on
its
own
feet
monopoly to
venerable Cohong;
James Matheson,
in
&
Co.,
disciples to
Register for a
work on
in
'Political
Chapter IV
we have been
which the
British merchants
We
Canton operated.
at
articles
more
contemporary compilations
as
J.
most minutely
you anything
respects
from
all
others'. ^
Not
many
is
of opium, on account of
separately
in
the
its
The
following chapter.
subject
be treated
and
its ancillaries,
when
its
Vol.
II,
'
J.M.
2.7.
82 1 to
J.
Morgan, Singapore.
76
Up
to about 1815,
merchants estabUshed
private
at
when
there
and
its
scale small
its
it
development
When
to sharp crises.
in several
new
&
&
sufficiently
&
rhubarb,
book.
slice
known
letter
as
White
&
cassia
over a
lac
of dollars to the
where-
with to buy the 'drugs' from up-country dealers. They were then
shipped in the Company's direct tea fleet from Whampoa to
*
Some
effects
in this chapter.
later
1834 77
profitable;
another' to
oflficers
were
'falling
over one
camphor; but Shank was able to write to the Drug Concern that
he was still 'from my interest with the Hong merchants by far the
greatest purchaser of drugs here', sufficient to give the syndicate a
command
But
this
of the
London
market.^
drug business.
First,
they had to be paid for very largely in cash, since the Chinese
demand
for
limited.
moderate
informed. Therefore
'it
is
speculate
when they
will
make
of them.'
Company's
Reid Beale
&
Co.
at
'
would
Ibid. 30.4.1801.
78
The Drug Concern was always pressing Reid Beale & Co.
buy more of the drug supply. On one occasion Shank, who
a ton.
to
handled the English business for the firm, since the other partners
'Prussian',
wrote a despairing
letter to
more
certain
mode
than hitherto,
An
we
provided
is
fear
Mr Shank
and India shipping questions being before Parliament and expected to be favourably decided'.^ But permission for a private
ship
was
The
refused.
up
its
free traders
when
were
as yet too
weak
Company
to per-
proceeded
trade'.^
to
Bombay and
L.B.
Ibid. 10.2.
25. 2. 1 801.
1
Ihid. 24.
1. 1
fins.
1834 79
Bengal contributed
Fom the Malay Peninsula and the East Indian Islands came a huge
assortment of
'Straits
produce'
picked up
Manila.
at the island
of Banka;
rice
the
like.
taken aboard
Tin was
at Batavia,
or
articles
of import to Canton,
from
(sic); skins
merchants
months
were
after delivery
a separate venture,
agreement
six
the
Hong
or seven months
in
advance.
But
in spite
of the
Thus
junks.
*
in
Milburn, op.
cit.
in the
L.B. 25.10.1806.
Can ton
Register^ 18.11.1829.
'a
speculation in Bengal
8o
&
consigned by Alexander
Howqua
cotton arrived
was
the cotton
touch a bale
sale to
them
old.
Howqua
him
to sell
cotton,
When
the
*None of
the other
Hong
merchants would
to a reduction of only 4
merchants insisted
*a
practice
we always wish
to avoid'.
varied
by
nearly
33^%
in
one season
The
price
of cotton
at
resembled the
latter in texture.^
The
season 1805-6
is illustrative.
new high
level
of 14
taels
'moreSurat
than
picul;
The
The Bengal
deserved'.^
crop.
1 1
mace per
taels 5 mace
5
Nanking
staple
was sold
(including a profit of
locally in the
taels
Nanking
area at 32 taels
L.B. 7.8.1805
'
to A.
Adamson.
<
1834 81
therefore
it
the
season.
They
burden of possible
and
principals,
loss
upon
always to
tried
Hong
the
merchants by
they
lines
Rut the
fact that
China was
great
itself a
grand
This
staple'.
threat,
it
as
opium
until 1823.
The
value
in
by
the second
is
in rice.
It will
the
&
Magniac were
taken aback by these 'immense, unlooked for and, to us, incomprehensible speculations which have been lately undertaken from
Calcutta bringing 235,000 bags of
Beale
rice.
merchants,
Select
\\
Committee, agreed
Gilmore
'
L.B. 6.8.1806 to
only be resold
would
at
Fairlie
to
&
losses.^ Beale
Co.
buy
huge
Hong
Company's
though
it
could
82
wrote to one of
his constituents,
&
Scott
J.
you escaped
in the secret of
our sup-
of losing money'.
The
risks
The main
difficulty,
The
returns to India.
came raw
silk,
tutenag and
articles,
con-
total
silks.
woven
camphor,
cassia,
nankeens,
and
other
'sundries'
produce
Cantonese craftsmen,
of the
were troublesome
demand
frequently
made
at least part
of the proceeds of
to India.
Moreover, the
his ship
Thomas
Beale
to
diabolical
'this
Canton
tance which
regulation.
is all
The problem of
finding
'a
saving remit-
that can
perpetual
to resort
L.B. 30.9.1808.
Ihid. 30.12.1821.
I!
Again,
this
1834 83
of the private trade, only came to a head in the period after 1820.
had several
of the British
own name;
made out
in the
it
name
has been
name of Mr Reid or Mr
Beale
the
Northern powers.*
The most
War was
it
more
Company
to
VI below.
See Chapter
L.B. 22.12.1801.
'
Ibid. 8.9.1806,
Beale to A.
Adamson, on
from
Manila carrying $700,000 worth of cargo, and two Dutch merchantmen loaded
with the annual products of the Moluccas valued at ;(| 600,000 sterling.
*
84
were no private British ships between Bengal and Canton for the
whole season; and the Country merchants had to use Portuguese
bottoms from Macao -though the possibility of war with Portugal
made English goods liable to confiscation.^ Even a stray Arab
ship
was pressed
into service
proceeds to Parsees
&
by Beale
at Calcutta.^
Co.
to return
opium
own
teas
mainly shipping
But
this interesting
was
which perhaps
explains
'Hundred Days'
news
evoked at Canton. ^Congratulations on the peace between your
country and ours', Beale wrote to A. Hosack, Jnr., of New York,
*we have at the same time to lament both for the sake of humanity
and commerce that a war more bloody and dreadful perhaps than
the extravagant language which
of the
2/^/^.4.10.1801.
s
UiJ. 6.11.1S01.
To
Fairlie
*the astonishing
&
Co., their
London
1834 85
Europe
speedily be darkened
took place
in
by
the
the history
anxious expectation
we look
we
believe
that ever
.
with
latest as
battle in
near Mons'.^
later,
By
8 16, in spite
of the
at
Canton both
difficulties
of
until
1827
we have
E.L.B. 5.1.1816.
R.T. and J.M., 2. 10.1820 and passim.
E.I. Register^ 1815, 1820.
86
way of
Secondly, the
cope with
this
Hong
Already in the
is
many
lives,
about 200,000
taels,
350,000
taels,
effect
He added
that he
the
Cheonqua
Hong
Howqua has
Some of
of property.
terrible loss
Mowqua
was
loss
a large
of which
afraid
of the
Hong
merchants, at the
in old
Canton.
latter's risk.
There was no
fire
insurance
2.1 1. 1822.
is
gradually almost
\*
1834 87
totally expended'.
of disposal,
we have determined
mode
you
that these
thus taking
actually
them even
at
exactly
for
half the
singsong department
until 1824.
when
fell
away
a favourite article
for
marked
demand
pepper
in particular
touching
its
lowest
point ($6| per picul) for many years in 1827. Even tin, which
had appealed to James Matheson in 1821 as 'the most steady
article
Some of
by auction
at a loss.^
escape loss
by shipping adulterated
by
is little
tin.
article
E.L.B. 5.2.1815.
P.L.B. of J.M. to Charles Thomas, 31.10.1831.
'R.T. and J.M., 2.6,1821; I,L,B. 12.7.1827.
of
Straits
produce to
'
I.L.B. 24.2.1832.
88
escape the collapse, 'their bulk preventing the market from being
glutted'.^
The
it
firms dependent
The
result
Straits
was many
goods was
*as
depressed
as
an entrepot for
business'.^
Sandalwood,
by rapacious
early prosperity.
From about
Canton market
was one of acute and chronic depression. In
October 18 19 Charles Magniac wrote a puzzled letter to his
principal shipper of Bombay cotton: *It is somewhat singular that
our cotton market, even under the very limited importation from
your quarter and the almost total failure from Bengal, is by no
means high or brisk.' ^ In the following June he had to report his
18 19 for a decade, the state of the
is
LL.B.
Ibid. 26.4.1828.
7.6.1826.
1812
11,500
300
Forbes in Remarks.
LL.B.
83
13.10.1819 to
6,000
Remington Crawford
&
Co,
THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE CANTON TRADE TO
1834 89
was
'It
a further sharp
fall
in the
Bombay
Bombay
offered for
and
that he rejected
it.
year
Now
a further
but
at a loss
later,
he cannot obtain 14
the cotton market
and
was
Some
sales
Co. expressed
'the
worst
Canton,
in
were taking
place,
Magniac had
Co.:
of 9
&
taels
months
In December
was
&
mace
Mercer
taels
Bengal cotton,
to speculate in cotton
next season.'^
The
partner,
tell
much
was 'completely
the
at
same
story.
stand'; in
1821
Co., Calcutta:
'It is
it
&
was
'irretrievable
in
we have
in 4
months.
by announcing
taels 2
&
com-
to
trade
the
much
mace, payable
owing to the partial failure of the Nanking crop. This was followed
by a further short-lived rise in price on the report that large
stocks had been destroyed by fire
the cotton market had become
dependent on such adventitious fillip."^ In 1826 Bengal cotton was
'
Y.
&
Co.,
9. 1.
1823.
&
'
'>
'
Co., Calcutta.
Ibid. 15.10.1821.
90
unsaleable
was
in *a
*a
most deplorable
their losses
of
last
state
season
The
Hong
while the
under
human
The low
price of cotton
No
loss.'^
9 mace
The
cotton
crisis hit
demanded
at
when
taels
7 mace!
ships
British firms at
Bombay
generally so
is
who
it
at
enormous
prices
I.L.B. 5.6.1826.
Ihid.
I.L.B. 24.7.1830.
'
1 1 .8. 1
828.
0.4. 1 820,
which the
attained.'"'
Ibid. 4. 10. 1 83 1,
But
1834 9I
consequently
chants.
licensed
fell,
*It is
by
Government
Chinese
the
deal
to
if
openly with
not to a state of
is
money among
capitals
Hong
the
merchants
partly caused
is
price of cotton]
prevails to a degree
is
low
of money, which
earlier
circulation,
we
possible, to
we
pay
interest
on the
here
The
Of
the large
if
by
want of cash
in
lost time.'^
knew
demand for
Indian cotton was dependent on the produce of the Nanking crop.
One frequently meets with the following comment in the market
interior) they
little,*
One
tion'.^
that the
&
I.L.B. 24.7.1823.
Y.
'
I.L.B. 10.6.1820.
Ibid. 5.3.1821.
Ibid.
3.4.
820 to Mackintosh
&
Co., 10.4.1822.
Co., Calcutta,
BRITISH TRADE AND THE OPENING OF CHINA
92
come
carriage, has
now
selling
at 15 taels instead
of 25 and 30
Indian cotton
it
and being of so
taels;
the sales of the latter to such an extent that they [50,000 bales] are
now
unsold by the
Hong
merchants.'^ There
by
consumers of the
article
fall
owing
is
another reference
in the price
is
among
the
them
of cotton
poverty
made
life
it
The
isolation
impossible for
significant
suspect
is
connected
'a
stagnation of
some degree
seconded
in a
some
is
in
the
years later
sumed
as
market
is
we understand
in the
China was
still
The
seemed unpromising
difficulties, a
I.L.B. 5.3.1821.
Ibid.
'
Ibid. 27.12.1820.
28.7.1824 to Leckie
&
Co., Bombay.
1834 93
demand
uncertain
them
it
when
may be an
there
inward-bound
to an
vessel
an operation which
is
seldom
its
Company compared
Trade susceptible
to credit disturbances in
&
crisis
stituents:
letter to their
India con-
The
to its
general prosperity.''^
I.L.B. 24.11.1826,
'
Ibid. 4.7.1827.
I.L.B. 24.7.1830.
">
I.L,B. 26.4.1828,
etc.
BRITISH TRADE AND THE OPENING OF CHINA
94
article
depression they had been able to develop the China trade along
new
lines
in
make use of as
in
silver,
returns to India.
trade
J.L.B. 26.4.1828.
See
j^gxt
chapter.
LL.B.
30.11. 18 19.
1834 95
Mazatlan and San Bias, and for some years his firm, Yrissari
&
The
By
1830,
when
silks in the
which they
were sending several ships every season. But an impediment to
the
in these ports, to
&
From
1 82 1
-7 James Matheson was in partnership with F.XJ. de Yrissari, a
Aragon with relatives in Calcutta, Manila and Mexico. The correspondence with the two latter places is in Spanish.
^
native of
Y.
&
Co., 1.7.1824.
96
On
with Japan.
their
Dutch had
was
the
a fellow Scot
to Canton.^ Rice,
it
will
rice
Jardine Matheson
at
&
Co.
set
up what was
virtually a
hemp
the
first
branch firm
rice,
supplied
'free port',
bound
for England.'^
a 'free
at
Singapore was devised; for the supervision of which the newlyestablished British firms at Singapore were eager to
^ Thus in 1831-2 over
LL.B. 24.3.1832.
Otadui
&
make an easy
I.LM.
7.4.1827.
% commission.
landed
at
Singapore; fresh
bills
at Lintin
By
to England.
Macao was
or
1834 97
on the same
ship,
May
1819,
of by
Stamford
Sir
enable
me
Raffles, its
to speak,
which there
Johore.
It is
possibilities
commercial
present
is tin,
is
procurable at $1
can be carried on
to
am
person settling here for a few months with a few thousand dollars
as a circulating
medium (which
is
China;
settlers from
which consisted of 200 houses and containing now upward of 2,000; and the Sultan of Johore, attracted by
the protection of the British Government, means to establish
all
the Java
interfering
with our
possession.'^
However,
development of
I.L.B.
state
24.5. 1819.
its
1829.
98
was not until January 1825 that the 'first authentick statement'
of the Dutch Government confirming British possession of
Co. in Canton.^ It was about the
Singapore reached Magniac
same time that a sudden rise in the English demand for China
goods made apparent the role which Singapore could play as an
entrepot between Canton and London. This time the 'China
goods' in question were not ^drugs' but silks. The lowering of
the English duty on silks in 1825 produced a remarkable boom
at Canton. Baring Brothers, of London, through their agents,
A. L. Johnstone, of Singapore, and Dents, of Canton, placed a
contract with the Hong merchants for 900 piculs of Nankin raw
silk at $480 per picul.^ This created a ^sensation' and was followed
by a remarkable run on this article (the best-quality China silk),
the price of which rose at once to $500. The Hong merchants
demanded two-thirds in advance as bargain money for silk conMatheson combined with J. Purvis of Singapore and
tracts.
Gregson, Melville & Knight of London to effect silk 'speculations'.
The 'gentlemen of the Company's fleet' joined in the scramble.
Such was the competition for ship room that 'privilege tonnage'
rose to its old high price of /^40-5o per ton.^ To meet the demand the Chinese Government's limitations on the quantity of silk
that could be exported had to be overcome by regular smuggling
via the Lintin ships. ^ Magniac & Co. were able to use their
special connections with the 'outside shopmen' to advantage,
until the restriction on their dealings of 1828.^ Though the boom
did not last, this silk trade was no passing thing, because it represented the capture of a section of Anglo-Chinese commerce by
It
&
By
1
1.L.B., to Napier
&
LL.B.
'
Ibid. 3.1.1828.
10.6.
825, etc.
For the
The
crisis
China raw
silk in
III.
British
The innermost
trade,
1834 99
all
preserve of the
Company's monopoly,
the tea
could not yet be invaded; but from about 1831 there are
Canton shipping
English bottoms.^
By
teas to
was already a
articles
all,
such
British cotton
manufactures.
One
unpromising response.
of the
first
attempts to dispose of
trial
shirting
they
call it
an imitation (and of
They seem
vessels
Canton
remarkable increase:
Nankin Silk
Silk
Total
(piculs)
(piculs)
(piculs)
1826-27
1,332
2,854
2,749
1827-28
1,736
1,834
2,806
1828-29
2,714
4,181
6,336
1829-30
2,224
3,746
4,831
1830-31
3,670
2,918
6,588
R.T.
&
J.M. to Maclntyre
etc.
&
Co., Calcutta,
14. 8. 1819.
lOO
and
if
ground
To avoid losses, it was necessary
heavy duty on piece goods. 1 could by this time
have smuggled up the whole of them in the ship's boat and sold
them gradually by auction, but was obliged to desist on finding
that my house servants were not to be trusted and had indeed
on
a white
the better'.
to evade the
'We augur
favourably of
from
their present
may
more
accrue to the
cloth and the spinner of yarn for the former to supply the people
with 2
catties
and therefore the very low price of cotton and yarn can be of but
little value; and tho' your parcel is firmer and better than the
Chinese, yet they have a strong objection to all novelty
However, we have it in contemplation to cause a small piece of
.
I.L.B.
1.
0.1 820.
to
Maclntyre
&
Co., Calcutta.
THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE CANTON TRADE TO
made from yours,
cloth to be
the natives/^
&
Finlay
Co.,
what value
to try
1834
lOI
it
selling at
Canton
With
China
out.
At
first
the
many
enquiries
'the
low
We
prices.
know some
of wealthy merchants
instances
bedcovers, and
if
becomes fashionable,
the taste
immense.'^
successful
The
it
as
is
by no means
is
ture.
In
November
1828
Jardine
reported
cotton
that
twine
we
can import
in the
ever,
beam
and
if
as
warp.
using
it
it
for
I.L.B. 31.10.1821.
IbiJ. 2.10.1822.
but
we got them
&
cannot spin
in
'The duty
is
entered as No.
'
Y.
IhiJ. 28.7.1824.
Co., 14.4.1824, to
very large
S|
by giving
Syme
&
now
made
to the
per piece
classed as
if
No.
i,
I.L.B. 20.11.1828.
I02
some of the
enquiries,
finer
manufacture
is still
in
its
pattern
is
turers',
Numerous
not admired'.^
'cotton twist
is
and the
daily
sale
growing
letters in
in estimation
among
the manufac-
&
By
more
felt
them
to
[at
Canton] before
we
impede an even
First, 'we must
mode of collecting
Unless
we adopt
the
American plan of
Company's
cotton goods
as the
ship
to
China
Under
8^%, and
I.L.B. 3.10.1829.
Ibid.
P.L.B. of J.M. 1 7. 1. 1 83 1. There was a subsidiary agency in Glasgow, under
a Mr Paton.
""
'
*
"^
The
is
1834
I03
1830S.1
By 1834
the
Company. But
tea
no longer stood by
itself.
and
&
Magniac
few years
later,
to enter a
this,
it
is first
phase.
necessary to supplement
examining
its
largest constituent
I.L.B.
')i-ton
II. 9. 1830.
Chinese'.
first
to ply
the Jardine appeared 'the engine could not be seen for masses of
Forty years later a similar experience befell the firm when it built the
rails to
Jardine in 1835.
Wherever
be torn up.
Woosung, and
Chapter
OPIUM
*A pipe of old Patna, that soother of
the
manna of
all
sorrows,
the mind.'
the subject of
opium
lies!
Since he wrote,
much
to
add to
this
hoary
ethical,
because of the unique part which opium played in the Old China
Opium was no
is
trade, but probably the largest commerce of the time in any single
commodity} In 1840 William Jardine defended his character as
the leading opium merchant by citing the repeated declarations
it
was
all
in
J.
Phipps,
Introduction.
'
OPIUM
105
opium
in any
'can scarcely be
matched
any one
article
him
gentlemanlike speculation
The
to be
in
full
economic
opium,
to invest in
I
am
profits
it
from Canton to a
and most
*the safest
aware oP.^
measured by the
of consumption
It
finance affords'.^
directly
most unique
The production of
became an
essential
Of
system.^
by means of
transit passes,
this the
Its
of
life
fiscal
lost sight.
are difficult to
opium production of
Phipps,
loc. cit.
P.L.B. of W.J. 3.4.1830. There were some lean years in which opium
dealers, especially the smaller ones, lost money. But in the good years, I have
calculated that gross profits were sometimes as high as $i,ooo a chest.
^
'
Owen,
British
Owen
has a
monopoly
the
the
Company's opium
documents stressing
importance of the opium revenue, see S.C.H. of L. 1840, Appendix I.
in India; op. cit.
Chapters 2 and
4.
For
official
Io6
Chapter
I).
The two
by
and
In spite of
W.
opium was
' Owen,
*
S.
bartered for China goods, But this was the exception not the rule,
op.
cit.y
p. 67.
OPIUM
nation to an extent of
India. Therefore the
to foster the
opium
The opium
107
Company
its
power
trade.'
It
relations.^
of
huge
its
entire
its
commercial and
political relations
battle.^
which the
Opium was no
small, incidental
among
the
Bombay
Parsees,
" L. H. Jenks, Migration
of British Capital^ Chapter 3. The triangular structure
of Anglo-American-Chinese exchange and credit relations is examined below in
Chapter VI.
See Chapter VIII below.
I08
organisation of the
opium
be traced from
firms.
juice', cutch,
opium
But
was not smoked nor its import prohibited by the Chinese Government until the i8th century,^ and
the demand remained small and local until the 19th. The Europeans
did not introduce the drug to China; but they organised its production and distribution upon a large scale for the first time.
authorities are agreed that
it
Company had
the
monopoly of
Company took
the lead.
The
its
by
at first
Smyrna
opium produced
on the
little
among
OPIUM
it
109
statistics
on
opium are even more unreliable than later ones,^ but practically
the 4,000 chests per
all
the average,
i.e.
Company opium.
It
production
The
single exception
was
in 1782,
Its
By
Company
imports averaged 230 chests per annum in 181 1-20, 141 in 1821-7, 857 in
Morse, International Relations^ I, 209. Jardine occasionally handled
1828-33,
Turkey opium
and the
'30s;
it
was consigned
until
1834 on
foreign bottoms.
*
On
opium statistics
opium was a contraband
the unreliability of
remembered
that
cit.^ I,
174.
When
it is
'
Company
is
borne out by Y.
&
no
owning
it
in India
and
dis-
in China.
in a decree of 1799
(it
drew attention
to a
is
Ill,
illegally.
Whampoa which
ships at
until 1820,
to
medium of Chinese
brokers,
by
made
possible
who
was actually a
corruption fund, started by the Portuguese at Macao, with a levy
of $40 a chest, which must have amounted, at the then volume of
sales, to about $100,000 per year.^ When, in the 1830s, opium was
smuggled 'by a regular system' up the East Coast of China, the
fees to the Mandarins were even higher. The contraband traffic in
received a fixed fee per chest.
In
181
there
when
scale
For the
'
Canton Register^
Chapter
II.
OPIUM
III
every issue.
in the 'outer
anchorages' the
opium
at
Whampoa;
while
defend themselves.^
Two
obstacles in the
way of any
effective suppression
on the
for
left
Canton
Emperor.^
the
In
Committee
^S.C.H.ofC. 1830,2536.
*
Ibid. 1830,
"
I.L.B.
4.
Q.2526, 2548.
4. 1 824. Cf. evidence of Jardine to S.C. 1840.
112
recorded: 'The Chinese war vessels have for some days past
collected at
shown
opium
trade at
people,
who,
if
apprehended
would pro-
in offering resistance
bably be put to death, while the crews of the former are persons
hired at
it
is
vessels
The opium
be of long continuance.'^
apart
from verbal
attacks.
were them-
The
^persecution'
this reservation,
it is
was reserved
for the
opium trade
frequent and vigorous interruption by the
to
Chinese authorities.
The
B.
The
'business history' of
War,
& Co.
opium between
1800,
when
the letter
Opium
falls
82 1,
when
the trade
See
statistical tables in
Appendix.
OPIUM
113
Macao
Smuggling was
carried
on
entirely
mer-
During
British
traffic
in the
some premature
up
much
as prices,
but averaged about 10,000 chests per annum, of which over half
was an
from 16,550 chests in the season
1835-6, and 40,000 in 1838-9. This was
enormous expansion
in imports
83 1 -2 to over 30,000 in
new
an
up
Canton upon the
a fleet of boats
private merchants to
Smuggling ceased
charter.
organisation of distribution
the
by means of
China
clippers
an influx of
coast,
abolition of the
Company's
loped rapidly along both the East and South Coasts, and in the
last
six
carried
on once more
in
detail.
When
the letter
at
Macao
for
^
"^
L.B. 13.3.1801.
Ibid. 3.1 1.1804, to
* Jb'ui.
5.5,1805.
Mackintosh
Patna was
&
at this
time scaling
at $1,400.
letters.
114
Whampoa
fact that
non-
Already they
from Portuguese
ships.^
But
&
opium quickly
realise their
monsoon's
wrote:
some months
past,
it
that the
owing
to the
Armenians,
at
Portuguese
and their conduct has been thought so improper
and hurtful to Macao that we understand the Senate has positively
.
L.B. 26.7.1804,
Ih'id.
to Fairlie
3.12.1805, 26.7.181
Gilmore
1.
OPIUM
passengers next year.'^
The
115
&
firm of Beale
opium
It
was already of
months
it.
sales.
which cannot be
On
repeatedly.
to be very inelastic.
forced', the
most
The demand
sales'.^
Opium
is
an
article
of Malacca.^
in the Straits
carious article
which
is
Opium
liable to
at this
of
it
is
of
all
period was
'a
very pre-
two years
At times
precarious'.'*
the
Beale wrote to
Armenians We never before last
season speculated so much in your opium, gentlemen, and the
result holds out no inducement for us to do so again.'^
Since the amount sold at the Calcutta sales during this period
remained fairly steady, while imports of Malwa and Turkey were
small, the price fluctuations depended very largely upon conditions in China.
Among contributing factors were periodic
combinations among the Chinese opium dealers, and among
Sarkeis and the other Calcutta
L.B.
26.1
possessed of
1.
80 1.
The
more
egregious G. M. Baboum,
who was
Yet
an Armenian, was
1799 he offered to
buy up the whole of the Company's supply of opium at 550 Sicca rupees per chest
if granted a monopoly for three years. The Company refused to be tempted.
little
in
IbiJ.
6.2.
that of Beale
*
806. It
&
Ibid. 22.1 1.
is
IhiJ. 25.9.1806.
own
account or on
Magniac.
801, 25.9.1803.
Ibid. 26.1
1.
801.
Il6
of a
political character,
in the
Macao
waters.
up
dealers forced
Both
in 1801
the price of
and
opium
Opium was
payment and
money'.
The
on
in 1805 'rings' of
at
Chinese
might be
that time
for
as
would thereby be
lost.
The
latter
*a finesse
sale,
often forced
though
up
the
market and not a chest could be sold. This was partly because for
some months
very dear;
it
is
said the
Chinese have
whole of
dealers at
fourth
reason for the stagnation was the tendency for the captains of
Whampoa
^
L.B.
22.11. 1801.
Ibid. 8,11.1805.
the ladrones were less eager to attack. L.B. 26.7.1805. A year previously Beale
had reported 'opium completely at a standstill owing to the number of ladrone
pirate junks off Macao'.
*
and transact
*
'
we hope
Ibid. 20.3.1806.
Ibid. 31.8.1806.
were forced
continues 'but
They
to realise at once.
OPIUM
was the
accidental reason
117
inelasticity
price of Patna
about $100
less
than
varied considerably
summer of
its
as in
some
later seasons.)
by William
below $1,130, and was
unsaleable at that. Beale, who had been unable to sell more than a
few chests in his ten month's stay at Macao, wrote to his Armenian
In the
fell
to
this
opium
prices)
was
the
when
this destructive
it
Not
all
who
Foyan
is
so strict that
it is
impossible to
sell
it
at
adventures are and ever have been hazardous in the extreme', but
continued to persevere.
From 1806
to 18 19
Indian
spondence
In'.
in the
second decade of
This impression
is
fact
that in
2
November
LB.
26.7.1805.
18 19
Thomas
Beale
Il8
Exchange
Company's Supercargoes
for Bills of
receipt of cash,
fever and
own
was indulging
in large-scale
opium operations on
his
opium
in the
After 1 8 19
of Magniac
trade.
afterwards Yrissari
first
new
was
features in the
a heightening of
^ Chronicles^ III,
238, 248-50, 307-8. J.M. ledger 181 5-6; and see below. Chapter
VI, for discussion of the relations between partners. Nearly twenty years later,
Thomas
Beale,
that his
I.L.B. 6.10.1832.
OPIUM
beat up the market into a
for $1,170 a chest.
119
boom. In July
8 1 9,
In August, Magniac
&
everything they could lay their hands on. In October they wrote
25 chests:
controlled
the
all
opium
In
in China.
December
new high
level
By
1820, $1,800
the following
of $2,500 a chest.
&
The Topa^e
affair,^
which produced
secution'
system developed at
'store-ship'
Lintin, prices of
at $1,500.
I.L.B.
3. 10.
8 19, to
in India.
wealthiest merchants
p. i8.
See footnote
article
having for some time been attended with such large profits as to hold out
more than common temptation to the weak passions of our nature*. 'Disintegrity'
was the sin: the adulteration of the drug, not its distribution to the Chinese.
I20
was asking $3,000 for a chest of Patna. Then came the collapse.
Within a few months (by June 1823) Patna was unsaleable at
$1,800, Malwa had fallen to $1,120. In September Patna was
priced at $1,420. Yrissari
feat
&
Co.,
who had
tried to
emulate the
ruin.^
The
first
great
the trade.
Bogue.
its
When
in 181
the
Macao
opium
its
at
belonging to a
Company
The
following March
W.
S.
Davidson was
Whampoa and
^
The
finding a
^KT,
situation
new
'no
money could
outlet
L.n. 4.4.18I0.
the firm,
OPIUM
July the Viceroy and
Hoppo
merchants to search
ships for
all
121
Hong
responsibility
for
The
the
who had
imprisoned by a local
same
caitiff
whom
Asee, the
at
Macao named
on a criminal
official
by exposing
the corruption
He
has
of
The
by
Pekin.
Asee,
Howqua
following July,
officials,
is
still
in
it
by
them
is
expected
a special
would
refuse to 'secure'
Four opium
any more
were
named, the Merope^ Hooghly^ Eugenia and the American
Emily. With the first three Matheson was connected. His ships
ships
specially
of the
river.
The
British
Y.
'
&
Chronicles^
Appendix Z,
W.
122
proceeding up-river to
Whampoa
Demurrage charge of $7
month (soon reduced to $5 on account of
'secure'.
imitated
the
The
this
Matheson wrote
first going out,
our neighbours declined entirely insuring her. The effect of a few
months' experience has however induced their swerving from
their determination. Then [in July 1822] 1% for sea risk was
I
*0n
the Merope' s
of ^%,
it
on account of
the
special
by
the Chinese
1
Y.
&
we
in case
of need
The
OPIUM
123
could not
fail
it
8 17,
who were
American
[it]
and punishment,
vessel in
as in
Macao Roads
It
Macao was
ruled out
from the
first.
Whampoa, had
it
intended going to
to
venture into a port where the Chinese are lords paramount, the
The
latter
was
by
a trade.'
^R.T.Z../?. 23.3.1820.
* The Filipinos
had
marched into Spain.
just
the
French had
124
floating (depots
[a
following plan
making
months
to the
various parts of the Coast best calculated for getting rid of the
article.
The
distance of Singapore
is
a great
drawback
if
not an
fact the
Opium War.
of Malwa, and
India.
its effect
upon
difficult
of
Company's policy in
Malwa by Country merchants
sale.
among
*a
combination
to
effect
sold
fell
to
Company
invited
the
In 18 19 James Matheson,
still
Y.
'
OPIUM
125
of Malwa
West Coast of
directly to China.
On
23
December
18 19 he sailed
&
fact
i.e.
to proceed
Portuguese
to
in
allusions.
letters,^
But apparently he
fell
at
from veiled
at
opium
were
at issue.
Magniac
affair.
Bombay,
Sir
Roger de
&
rival
Faria.
secondly
Don
Don Lorrenco
supersession of a
Don Joaquim
a friend
a
of Faria's.
fear he will
side.
of
my
an
way of
s^
of a small amount
if
is said to be
Bernardo Aleire,
in
consideration
the event
was not
a success
honest
offering a bribe.
126
Matheson took
Portuguese
authorities in India,
Court
whom his
in
Rio de Janeiro,
Brazil.
The
agents (*and
change
The
its
Company was
enter the
At
reluctantly forced to
Malwa market
itself.
the
In 1813 the
first
its
at
growth of
that
commerce and
Malwa
from Bombay was forbidden to vessels sailing under the ComThe Country merchants then chartered ships under
the Portuguese flag to carry Malwa to Macao; but they could not
consign it to Whampoa, since Portuguese vessels were not
allowed up the Canton river. From 18 16, as we have noted,
Malwa was imported on an increasing scale. In 18 16 and 18 18 the
Select Committee again sounded the alarm and the Company
decided to take action. In January 18 19 the Court of Directors
wrote to the Governor-General-in-Council at Bengal as follows:^
pany's licence.
*We have
received your political letter of 4 January 18 17, representing the injury which the opium branch of the Company's
1
840.
OPIUM
127
likely to sustain
is
&
The
$2,403,834.1
among
the
LL,B.
22.7.23.
128
production of Malwa by purchasing 4,000 chests, and thus overlaying and stifling the drug produced in Bengal from
whence the
Company were
first
cost
is
one season
the
a profit,
have
it
by
put
this
'We
rhapsody.'^
The
faith
among Europeans,
Com-
and
[it]
has shaken that implicit reliance with which the Chinese have been
^
I.L.B.
2.
1.
823.
Malwa
OPIUM
hitherto in the habit of accepting
all
129
seal
of
Company.'^
the
The
had
East India
failed.
The
sides of India
Company's experiment
in purchasing
opium
Malwa
Chests
Value in $
Chests
Value in $
1821-22
2,910
6,038,250
1,718
2,276,350
1822-23
1,822
2,828,930
4,000
5,160,000
1823-24
2,900
4,656,000
4,172
3,859,100
Supreme Government
the
to
at
Calcutta,
recommending
reduction of supply.
But
it
had to
I.L.B. 7.1
From Canton
1.
1823.
Register^ 5.4.1828.
These
Macao and on
130
is
its tactics.
The growth of
British
power
Company
to
force agreements
upon
the
Damaun
or
Goa
that 'smuggled*
Malwa
Owen,
op.
clt.y
&
Chapter IV.
&
Magniac
Co., Yrissari
&
OPIUM
ceased to be worthwhile.
131
Malwa was
carried
one-third via
Government.^
Thus, the Government of India, which was the Honourable
East India
Company,
its
maximum
in
States.
policy of restricted
production
The Canton
Company
'pass
D.
One
adequately appreciated.
by
exhibited
'in
its
spacious
dwellings,
warehouses,
Phipps, op.
cit.y
277.
It
churches,
i.
132
fortifications, the
was
'in
way
a fair
to recover in fashion
it
had
commerce'.^
lost in
dull land
place
was
its
&
'in this
remarkable superfluity of
ship's officer or
Magniac
One
relied
'pensioner' at Macao.
The
1 5
under
years of age
Slaves
Women
Chinese
his
Freemen, over
upon
=
=
=
=
=
604
473
573
2,693
45,000
majority of
its
in
penury;
its
dealers in
Canton Register^
1.
12. 1827.
Ibid. 1.6.1830.
OPIUM
the duties
it
133
Company would
agree to hold
Malwa
loss
the
Bombay and
Damaun
in
sales
if
of the
trade.^
in
at
goods.2
The drug
&
who were
Co.,
trade
was brought
to resemble other
to a standstill;
and Magniac
made
its
the Spanish brig Quiroga^ in spite of the $25 per chest export duty
The
its
India
opium
all
to
credit
and
at
'lost
Symptoms of discontent
were
exhibited
mandareens,
their
who
is
that
it is
is
so completely
'
I.L.B. 25.9.1823.
Y.
&
Co., 1.9.1822.
134
in subjection to
scheme
them
ment was
rejected
by
the Portuguese
islands,
we
that
being practicable.'^
who
preferred the
the Chinese
its
own consumption
the sales
outside'.
There was one last hope for Macao 'smuggled' opium, i.e.
Malwa from Damaun. It will be remembered that the East India
states
by way of
at
failure
do everything
power to prevent it being carried into effect.'^ A further
from Magniacs elaborates the nature of this final struggle.
Y&
I.L.B. 24.7.1828.
Co., 26.4.1823.
Magniac
OPIUM
135
as well as to the
shall
Court
at
latter
staring
them
any
strong remonstrances
their
laws.'
all
The Macao
overlord.
For
Jardine,
now head
Macao was
of Magniac
all
motives, of
able to defy
&
its
Goan
Damaun
vessel
control'.^
its
The
final
Company
introduced
Damaun. About
Ibid. 22.7.1825.
colonial
world
One example
at this
time
is
transit
Malwa'
Damaun
duty to Bombay.^
'only resource'.
in the
Portuguese
death of 'the Baron', Macao's leading citizen, in 1825. The Baroness (de St Jose
de Porto Allegre) fought the creditors of the estate, including several Indian
correspondents of Yrissari
&
Goa and
to Lisbon,
its
&
Co., for
many
years; the
136
In
83
prevent
1,
all
the
Government of Macao
in desperation tried to
The
from
common
'the
most
rights
Christian hospitality*.
paid
etc.,
by
of
it
die British
residents.
It is
worth recording
E.
The
developed
its
to
who would
collect the
shore or to junks which came from a distance. There were intermittent interruptions of the trade by the Mandarins.
(On one
of
raised, a
smug
But ...
number of
boats on their
it is
way
to
at
Canton Register^
4. 12.
1827.
OPIUM
137
and dealers are a good deal alarmed and some of them have
absconded.')^ There were at times 'unmeaning fluctuations' of
price caused
by
by 'com-
about one-third of
During
these years
&
in
initiative
Jardine Matheson
both directions
on
&
Co.,
the development of a
down
of a
fleet
of
There had been an earlier attempt to sell the drug along the
It will be remembered that in 1823 the first great opium
boom had collapsed, Patna falling over $1,000 a chest in price.
Yrissari
Co., who had attempted to corner the market in Patna,
were faced with ruin. Even trucking the drug 'with up-country
coast.
&
merchants'
at a loss
^ I.L.B. 13,12.1826.
Again (27.10.1827) 'deliveries and sales are entirely at an
end owing to one of the boats having been seized with 21 chests on board and
crew imprisoned
the dealers have absconded'.
On one occasion, August 2-3, 1828, the price of Malwa shot up by $100 in
one day. I.L.B. 1 1.8.1828. In 1832 there was a 'wild speculation'. 'The general
excitement is greater than I have ever seen. It reminds me of what took place in
England in 1824, and the result may be the same'.
W.J. in P.L.B. 2.11.1832.
Malwa had risen from $465 in July to $850 in October.
' 1827-8:
9,525 chests were consumed in China.
the
'
1833-4: 21,650
I,
Chapter VI.
138
Opium
to the dealers
As
by
Coast of China'.
The San
On
its
Chinchew (Fukien)
was opened
suf-
ficiently
formerly.')
But soon
that
rival firms
'It is
Dent
&
Y.
&
Co., 24.9.1823. See also evidence of the ship's Captain, John Mackie,
to the S.C.
ofH. ofC.
1830.
From
his
realised.
OPIUM
139
it
so
little.'^
Matheson
up the
coast,
but ours
is
the
first
at
Macao
for delivering
selling.
done on a small
scale,
we
Nine years
on
opium production in
As
a large scale.
India, the
fell.
into
It
was necessary
new
to find
two small brigs up the East Coast filled with opium and some
The experiment was only moderately successful;
piece goods.
He
new
clipper Sylph
voyage to Shanghai and Tientsin, and persuaded the missionRev. Charles Gutzlaff, to accompany her as interpreter.^
ary, the
&
Y.
'
Co., 12.2.1824.
'
Ibid. 1. 9.
824.
II.
a traffic
is
we may add
Gain
140
quick succession.
beautiful
the
and
More opium
fastest ships
monsoon and
the most
voyage against
of opium from Calcutta to
clippers
of their
J.M.'s
were
built,
class, able to
Red
Dent's Water Witch were the most famous clippers of the time.^
*Our idea
[in
building a
new
clipper]
so
is
that the
Company's
opium
charter
is
trade after
likely to
be
view to
profit that
it
can hardly
on a large scale, and on the secure footing of always being beforehand with one's neighbours in point of intelligence.'^ Experiments
who
eyes of those
better
we
shall
partake therein
be able to place
at
OPIUM
in steamships
141
fastest clippers.^
By
less
than the 17
fleet
of
The
local
'protection' to a
rate
jointly
flat
Mandarins raised
annum and no
more
serious question.
F.
at
'
Pekin;^ while the drain of silver to pay for the opium caused a
medium which
was noted by
*
local officials
sent
up
prices.
This
These were not always successful. The first steamer to sail the China seas, the
broke down ignominiously. P.L.B. 5.5.1830. Cf. G. A. Prinsep, Suam
Forbes^
Vessels.
*
Cf.
II.
^ P.L.B.
1. 11. 1835.
9.3.1835.
These negotiations for complete monopoly broke down. P.L.B. 12.4. 1836,
and Captain Rees' reports in C.L.B.
^
'
Corresp.y p. 154.
'
Kuo,
op.
cit.y
142
much had
China was
by
far less
London.^ This
last
point
in part to the
Americans ceasing to
after 1827,
is
its
monopoly
the
it is
equally true
was
the
definitely
is
that
century do not
by
statistics
of the import of
exist.
completely reversed.
silver was evident to the foreign merchants at
was observed with satisfaction by a somewhat
This drain of
Canton.
It
more
who declared
readily to
that
the final
it
alarmed
Chinese statesmen.
memorialists to Pekin,
opium
who in
Not
It
is
unnaturally, there-
notable
that
the
side of
^ 1829-40: Import:
$7,303,841 of silver. Export: $26,618,815 coin; $25,548,205
sycee; $3,616,956 gold. B.P.P. 1840, 'Statement of Claims of British Subjects
Interested in Opium*, p. 42.
I,
Bills
on London
are
OPIUM
143
is
before.
it
Where does
ago
find
now
all
centres. 'All
kinds of goods
Ergo
it
till its
price has
become enhanced,
depressed, the land and capitation tax, the transport of grain and
the
[salt]
gabelle
all
alike
defence ... the useful wealth of China will be poured into the
fathomless abyss of transmarine regions.'^
For
thirty years
illicit
at
Canton had
trade in opium.
Its
very
Government. The more this unique commerce was extended the more
precarious it became. A 'showdown' could hardly be avoided.
it
Kuo,
Ibid.
'
op.
cit.y
Chapters
and VI.
Chapter
BUSINESS
A.
VI
We
turn
to the
now from
morphology of our
The
subject.
characteristic unit
private British trade with the East, both China and India,
firm,
though primarily
of
was the
a trading
commercial and
It
etc.
It
financial,
with
its
actual sphere of
economy.
It
was of
expansion overseas.
first
importance
two
levels
of
The development of
'large-scale'
machine
profits
recognised that
best be
Cf.
1833', p. 193.
on commis-
discounted in the
to be sold
I45
when
in India
Thus
British enterprise in
'the
managing agency
system'.
described as Houses of
all
Canton agents.
on first coming out
Canton
of them, such as
became their
James Matheson
Robert Taylor,
resident
joined
Bombay,
Many
at
whom
half shipowners'
& Co. in
trade
to resident agent:
could he
goods quickly
in
1825. The
norm of the
the latter
had
The
Americans.
venture was
The
still
captain-owner,
much
in
way,
as did
most of the
or captain-Supercargo,
of a
In the
8.11. 1818.
146
in the ^speculation'.
Unlike the East India Company, these agency firms were not
joint-stock.
to an end
an
his
nephew Hugh
resulting
to rely
on
The
a single
life
will induce
your
on
their
own
partnership, as
Beale
when
in 181
Thomas
member of
Beale, senior
It is
liabilities.
approaching joint-stock
is
to be
On
in
to
found
in the periodic
combination
Malwa opium
many
&
Crawford
Co. and Jamsetjee Jeejeebhoy
of Bombay. Resources were pooled in so
one purpose of Malwa
Such 'com-
operations and
&
Co., Remington
were annually
was something more than a cartel, though less than
a full joint-stock company.
The supply of working capital provided no great problem for
the Canton Agency Houses. As long as they acted purely as
divided.
^P.Z.^.
2 E.L.B.
profits
It
7.1
1.
1832.
8.1.1816.
individual transactions.
I47
on the capital of
the shippers; and, of course, the Country Trade was primarily one
of imports. When they wished to speculate in 'drugs' or opium,
they were in the early days occasionally 'pushed for money', and
had to borrow from the Hong merchants or others on strict terms
'a system which can never answer to
at i|% interest per month
our purpose'.^ But they were soon in funds again, both because
of the long-term deposits which, as we shall see, were attracted to
Canton by the high rate of interest, and the quick accumulation
of commissions and profits. Profits were annually divided among
the partners but usually ploughed back again into the business,
agents, they needed little/ since they operated
On
leaving
their
it
ment^.
by
and
its
who
of the house,
which became a kind of hereditary concern, a commercial dynasty.
The main type of business carried on by the Agency House,
^
The
financial resources
of Reide Beale
David
Reid,
&
Co.
Thomas
in
Beale, Alexander
Shank having contributed $40,000. In 1837 the firm's capital was $2,613,000,
most of it being sunk in the fleet of ships and in the purchases of opium, in which
the firm was a heavy 'speculator'.
^ L.B.
21.4.1801. G. D. Reid.
' Hollingworth Magniac, who went home in
1827, did not retire at once but
retained his financial interest in the Canton firm as sleeping partner until 1831.
But this was due to exceptional personal reasons. P.L.B. J.M. 10.3.1832.
* In
1832 the financial weakness of Fairlie
Co., Calcutta, was precipitated
by the retirement of its senior partner. See below, pp. 165-7.
&
148
was
selling
trade
^speculation',
though
apparently without having any of the present derogatory connotation of the word.
Nevertheless, the
Agency
J.
money
at
&
later,
find
sufficiently
the partnership
advantageous'.^
document of
Yrissari
Matheson)
is
to
on
to a joint account,
from which
it
shall
it.
Profits are to
go
be allowed to neither
of the partnership,
when
it
shall
later
'20S,
their
of opium and
rice,
and sometimes
in silk to
in the articles
^liU.
to
in the
I49
business'.^
The
tariff
of rates of commission,
though not
selling.
On
March 1825
November
=3%
=5%
On
On
purchase of
sale or
returns
all
other goods
cf.
in
goods
cf.
in
Treasure or
^2^%
= %
Bills
(4)
On
(5)
=r
(8)
(9)
^=5%
outward freight
=1%
= 1%
= 2%
exchange
on respondentia
loans
at
law or arbitration
is
=z
necessary
Debts
if
estates
2^%
= %
= 2j%
recovered
Managing
= |%
= 2^%
= %
(10) Obtaining
= 2^%
=^ ^iVo
disbursement
(6) Ship's
(14)
1831:^
of others
as
Executors
Transhipping goods
P.L.B. J.M. 9.5.1832.
estate
of persons
=5%
=1%
deceased
(16)
for
150
*0n
all
upon
a fresh
advance'.
In actual practice,
undercut, habitually
able firms
made
'It
is
the Parsees.
'in
these rates
were
conducted business
special rules
by
terms of friendship*.
with
whom
they
with nobody'.
They
also
demanded
'Agents in Canton
extra
debts
Hong
Merchants, to
whom
they
may have
disposed of goods on
is
premium
% cannot be
No
risk what-
i
on sales
Canton might be 'more
moderate than any part of India with which we are acquainted'.^
But, as far as regular agency business went, James Matheson was
justified in speaking of 'the snug way' in which 'income comes to
you without asking' in the China trade.
Each agent at Canton had many 'constituents', or 'correspondents' as they were called, since almost the main duty of an agent
was to maintain a frequent and accurate correspondence. But, in
important centres of trade, each Canton agent had one or perhaps
two principal correspondents, who enjoyed his full confidence.
Thus Jardine Matheson
Co. in 1832 had over fifty regular
correspondents in Bombay, and almost as many in Calcutta; but
most of their letters, including all the more important ones, were
written to two firms at Bombay and one at Calcutta, Remington
Crawford & Co., Jamsetjee Jeejeebhoy & Sons, Bombay, and
Lyall Matheson
Co., Calcutta (after Fairlie Fergusson & Co.
for
bad
debts'.^
3% on
certain sales at
&
&
L.B. 5.10.1805;
"
I.L.B. 6.1.1830.
failed in 1832).
very
As compared with
close.
priority of information,
moral and
financial
support.
'to
whom
& Co.,
we might
we do
interest
his constituents.
wisdom
is
pledged to
us'.-^
Co.
have.
be advantageous to
&
Calcutta,
London establishment
As however the
sell
Magniac of London
we have
business,
15I
a collision of
The most
frequent
of
was
fixed,
price,
letter
'It
was
(i.e. at
all
Calcutta).
confess to
among
we could
your benefit'.^
Such disputes rarely affected the close relations between
Y.
&
Co., 21.6.1825.
I.L.B. 12.7.1831.
152
may be
said to
have carried on
&
hazardous tendencies'
monopoly under
his
a tobacco
member of their
charter
it
The
London provide
Banking
Banking operations were from the beginning carried on by the
Canton Agency Houses. Since there were no European banks in
B.
The
granting of
credits
P.L.B. J.M.
Ibid.
1837-8 passim.
lending of
money
to the
money market
Hong merchants, it
coming
'private English'
first
at
be
will
to
I53
Canton.
The
recalled,^
was
China
in the
temporary
wants of
financial
young
'the
officers,
opium.
mainly of course
in
in that,
even
owing
to
the lucrative character of the China trade and the scarcity of funds,
died.^ Captains of
who
left
$3,000 in the
interest
To
Mr Robertson
&
Co., $2,000 on
to inform us if interest
is
to be
London
1,250
(at
10%)
in
money
in
&
at least a
Hong merchants
at
tin speculation
40%
Canton
^
^
'
that
per annum. ^
to use the
Reid Beale
The
money them-
money
to the
paid interest at
The
from
interest
value of
Hong
merchants.
once in 1803
so high at
money was
Chapter II above.
L.B. 28.4. 1 801.
UiJ. 28.12.1800.
cit.,
Chapter XI.
154
account
far less
is
18% on
great
unrivalled.
This happy
of the
Hong
several
state
When
in 18 10
all
when
trustees, to
L.B. 10.10.1801.
E.L.B. 10.1,1814.
the defaulting
was again
On the easing
Hong
merchants
whom
raised to
Ibid. 15.2.1806.
*^
Ibid. 1.1.1815.
155
In the '20s the general depression in the Country Trade, and the
beg to
announce our intention on returning to you on the ist February
next, the principal sum of $10,000 plus interest, now in our
necessity of paying off our constituents, and therefore
hands*.^
&
Magniac
remittance to
on advance
Indian constituents whose funds were locked up in
Co. continued to charge
opium or cotton
in China.
Bombay
interest
&
firm of
is
12%;
less
than
10%
is
never
In charging
ourselves to be
and above
in
Canton
rate
of
the
all
.
is
At
to force
^
we
the
will therefore
I.L.B. 15.10,1824, To Martha Van Mierop, Macao, Cf. R.T, and J.M.
1 82 1, 'Money is at this moment very scarce in China but good security is
14-6.
also scarce.
And although
&
Co,, Calcutta)
156
account
at that rate at
Bombay who
To
a Capt.
O. Ross of
in 1823
&
Magniac
Co. the firm wrote: 'Since the employment of money
in China has now become more practicable we have allowed you
interest at
6% since
1825'.^
The Macao
firm 'The
Widow Payva
&
benefit of
Chemqua Hong
merchant'.^
opium dealers on
was unsatisfactory since it did
to the Chinese
not yield a regular and certain interest per month. But 'the risque
Hong
on
merchants
is
so very considerable as
there
is
only
that of advances
level
12%
of
Hong
merchants
1.L.B. 1.4.1825.
iii^ 2.10.1826.
Jbid. 20.8.1828.
p^L.B. W.J.
Ibid. 26.5.1826.
157
their
&
Only necessity
Company's
discount of 1%.^ The
were for
private merchants
to seek other
means of
effecting remittance.
^
In Chapter
I,
above.
158
One
early
method was
that
in
Canton
to help
them purchase an
money to be
repaid in India,
within a fixed number of days after the landing of the cargo which
was
was
was no doubt
the reason why the space in front of the European Factories at
Canton was called 'Respondentia Walk*! But as a method of
remittance it was unsatisfactory, both because it depended on the
shipping being available and because it frequently led to disputes
over the conditions of the loan and the real value of the cargo.
Another way of remitting was to purchase 'Company certificates
for certain sums which their commanders have the privilege of
paying to the Select Committee, on condition of receiving the
same in London at an exchange to be fixed by the Court of
Directors'. The private merchants were often prepared to buy
these certificates at a premium; but the amount available was
limited and the 'sight' unsatisfactory. A captain's certificates were
limited to $12,000, an oflicer's to $6,000; in both cases half was
payable at 12 months and half at 6 months. Again, odd Bills
might be picked up at Canton, drawn by the Dutch or Swedish
or Danish companies. But these were irregular and drawn in
quantity only on particular occasions
as when in 1823 the Java
Government raised money to suppress a native rebellion by
selling its Bills on the Netherland Government to the Canton
agents. To supplement these uncertain methods of remittance,
and their inadequate export of China goods, the 'private English'
had to ship treasure, both bullion and specie.
One source of treasure was Manila, whence for many years it
was shipped in extensive quantities to the Canton merchants to
be reshipped to India as remittance. Thus, in the season 1819-20
fully2 lacs of dollars worth of Spanish coin and quicksilver was
sent by Robert Stevenson
Co. of Manila to Magniac & Co., in
return for short Bills at 90 days sight. But this inflow was
this
&
when
Government placed
heavy
Peruvian
silver,
come
to
159
to Canton.
much of
Likewise,
specie brought
by
chases found
its
the
Americans to finance
their
Canton pur-
British merchants
had built
in
China; for which boon, of course, the British agents had to pay
a suitable
premium.
of
all
The
export
by
Macao
Hong
specifically
prohibited
several
times.^
could, however,
It
lower estuary.
Calcutta mint
it
was found
1 5
at the
in
China
as
it
An
more than
as high
intrinsic value.^
See also
in 181
is
reprinted in Chronicles,
l6o
demand
at all.^
On
premium,
European trade
was now
to limit
private or
its
Company
Bills
drafts
China exchange
while of the
among
crisis
in
the U.S.A.,
which
led
to
American import of new Spanish dollars to Canton.^ When two U.S. ships brought a supply of dollars in the
middle of October 1826, they demanded 2% premium 'for
Cowshings even', i.e. new dollars. This was the season when
Magniac reported that no new dollars or South American bullion
was procurable. Sycee was at a premium of 6-7% and very
'hazardous' to smuggle, owing to the exceptional vigilance of the
Mandarins. There were few good private Bills available, and
those drawn by Magniac &: Co. and Dent on their local agent at
6 months sight were eagerly negotiated by the Parsees; while the
'wants of the Select Committee were soon satisfied and the
the customary
2
'
E.g.,
Ibid. 7. 10.
826.
l6l
influence
refusal
certificates
happened fortunately to be
India.3
be solved in a
of interlacing credits.^
The American
traders,
which
The season
which they brought drafts on London mercantile houses to any considerable amount. The vigilant Select
Committee of the East India Company shrewdly remarked that
*If the Americans were annually provided with an extensive credit
on Houses of respectability in England, we are not aware of any
1810-1 was the
first
in
in
Canton
in
preference to
LL.B.
Ibid.
'
Ibid.
27.8.1827; 20.10.1827.
it
28.2.1827; 29.4.1828.
7. 1 O.I 827.
See also N.
S.
Buck,
l62
Anglo-American
tion of the
some years
War
London
the use of
had the
effect
credits
by
of checking for
the Americans in
The
crisis
&
&
&
&
T. Wilson
when he
House
credit or to such an
amount
as
in
America
bills to
may have
he
who
gentleman here
'a
To
to
has
draw on
occasion to draw
They
there-
fore
At
first
innovation.
As
late as
Ibid. 17.10.1827.
November
1829, Magniac
Cf. I.L.B.
Jenks, op.
1 1
cit.
1 1
824.
I.L.B.
5 .6.
826.
&
T. Wilson
house
in
163
New
York,
as affording an equally
advan-
drawn under
it
letter
London
other
was
But
which
finally
American
In
the
Bills.
James Matheson
1832
wrote
an
expository
letter
on
partner
&
in Lyall
many London
with
We
in Calcutta.
except
when
bills
called for
credit
till
seldom remit
bills
by our
constituents,
Bombay
demand
...
for
them
It is likely that
after
we
by
this season.
Bills
we attribute
Bombay
.
only
relative.
all
commerce
is
"^
I.L.B.
Magniac
&
Co, to
their
In the season
London
agents, FairHe
7.4.1830.
was found
in
London
to contain a small
&
by
and the
rest in
admixture of gold.
it
164
credits
from a known
who owns
capitalist,
Gledstone, Drysdale
bills
whom we
pound
T. Wyatt
is
still
draw
is
sterling.
Then
comparatively insignificant'.^
& Co.
him
Bills,
The advent of a
regular supply of
American
83 1 to
that It
Bombay
is
firms
generally in
Bills
on London
circular letter of
&
to
Co. declared
England on
whom
Matheson, with
1.L.B. 25.4.1832.
P.L.B. J.M. 27.7.1828. The J.M. papers throw much lio;ht on this great
firm, 'the best-managed business this side of the Cape', as Matheson
Bombay
165
Calcutta credit
crisis.
failed,
The
Houses.
assets,
down
all
of debts,
list
Palmer
&
= /^5,000,000
Co., Calcutta
^ /^3, 500,000
& Co.,
= 2,500,000
Mackintosh & Co.,
= /^i,ooo,ooo
Colvin & Co.,
= /^ 1,800,000
Fairlie & Co., London & Calcutta
= /J9 50,000
Richard Mackintosh & Co., London
One Bombay firm, Shotton Malcolm & Co., went down
Alexander
The
Houses.
'It is
out,
admiringly wrote. Jardine began dealing with them in 1822, and the two firms
were
still
details
an
of Jamsetjee Jeejeebhoy,
who from
Biographical
l66
He
other reasons than the *rage for speculation and inordinate gains
directors'.
of a bank of
profits
of
believed that
medium of
maunds of indigo were
its
it
export suddenly
averaged 118,111. In
it
As
and a Bengal Indigo Fund was set up to buy the surplus production from the Factories. But the influx of new firms into Calcutta
stimulated production to even greater heights. The collapse was
finally
than indigo.^
loj. a lb.,
dropped to
}s. jd.
one quarter
There were few buyers; and the
at
J.
price,
Palmer
their price
failure
Phipps, Indigo.
Agency Houses,
167
from which
&
consignments requiring
American
Bills
risks
by
on London. When,
November
1833, Fairlie
&
Co.
finally
loss
worth Magniac,
powerful
that
capitalist
were
'instantly protected
Mr Timothy Wiggin;
is
charter, Jardines
without a
London
agent.
that
by
House was
Company's
were
essential to the
deal with a
Bills.4
P.L.B.
10.3. 1832.
According to James Matheson, the origin of the bitter feud between Dents
and Jardines lay in the dispute as to the latter's withholding of the correspondence
brouglw from Calcutta in a Jardine clipper which bore the news of the failure of
'
Palmers.
*
us circulating in the
home money
amount of
market,
is
bills
l68
However,
a
in 1835
Smith,
Smith
&
Co. of
Lombard
Street.
William Jardine,
*fully
no time
shall
it
London
be expedient that
however, giving
may
parties',
we
aware
London Houses
to
preponderatory share
act as
may have
we
Magniac Smith
Canton firm in
&
Their
American
Bill
'crisis
of the three
Ws',
produced
a
Exchange unsecured by invoices or bills of lading
speculative boom in the American trade, with its inevitable
reaction.^ In August 1837 news reached Canton of the failure of
some dozen American firms in New Orleans, Philadelphia and
New York, and the consequent alarm over the London 'American
Houses', even the situation of Barings being queried. In September
extent of our business.
From
We find
the
amount
we
can supply.
169
House seems
to
former partner,
&
Geo. Wildes
by
a loan
Co. have
from the
all
their
engagements secured by the Bank of England, on condition of the winding up of their affairs. But by a reasoning
which we cannot understand, they do not appear to consider as
existing
engagements,
of
bills
T. Wilson
credit.
&
Co., and T.
assistance
stoppage
in
some
&
loss.
Our widespread
I
London
friends,
Magniac Smith
&
&
Com-
fleet, 'to
In a
that
since
Ibid. 11.10.1837.
the firm
'
were
Ibid, zo.10.1837.
lyo
period
the risk
will,
however, enable us to
set
on foot
a plan
for
principles of security'^
whereby
all
credits
&
When
had to be supported
the hands of
Magniac
Co.
William Jardine went home from China
in 1839,
^^
&
Matheson
Co., one of the most powerful firms in the City.
Thus, Jardine Matheson Sc Co. were enabled to develop a banking
business, which on the withdrawal of the East India Company's
Finance Committee from Canton in 1839^ handled the lion's
share of the lucrative exchange transactions arising from the
China trade. Wherefore, it naturally, though unsuccessfully,
opposed the formation of the Hongkong and Shanghai Banking
Corporation in 1865, which was to revolutionise the whole of
British Exchange banking in the East.^
Insurance and Shipping
C.
directly
to
trade,
BUSINESS AND FINANCIAL ORGANISATION
marine insurance and shipping.
a trade of rich cargoes
opium and
I7I
treasure,
and great
risks
who had
the concern,
L.B. 4.5.1801.
to secure
you
10.12.1832.
the
Agency. Bear
in
mind
for
whom
it is
you
172
&
replied
of shares
we have
naturally turned
who as from
The
^risks'
was
that each
Bombay had an
&
and
Thus
Fairlie
Magniac
&
Co. as
Calcutta Insurance
its
Bombay
Insurance
Company,
&
differing
^%
Dent
In
I.L.B. 24.12.1832.
M.
& Co. agents of: 8th Canton Insurance Society; Bengal Insurance Society;
Bombay Insurance
Company; Phoenix
Dent
&
Insurance
Equitable
Insurance
Company.
wound up
it
made
The concern
a surplus of ;{^20,ooo.
With
I73
In 1836
volume of
revenue from insurance increased proporthat in 1835, on the loth Canton office
was
tionately.
coming to a close, Dents decided to end the 'ancient custom' of
alternate management, the revenues of which were relinquished
every five years period, and set up their own 'China Insurance
Company'; the 'Canton' remaining permanently in the hands of
the
China
trade, the
One
result
Jardine Matheson
& Co.^
by
the
owned
in India, receiving
for obtaining
outward cargo,
1%
commission
%
5
monsoon
of the Company.
islands, the
and the
was
the
I.L.B. 12.1.1835.
174
the
Canton agent
the
more
became
of clippers, receiving-ships,
joint
who
made
a point of
Matheson
grew up
a shipping interest.
Jardine
of the China
seas.-^
It
was a
list
was
to involve.
is
Chapter VII
eager public.
private letter of
form
home
realised that
more than
outcome of
half of British
'memorable' year in
its
years
a British
fifteen
it
it
proceeded to
the change.^
If
it
is
account.)
Company's trade.
be recalled that by the 1820s
the
for a
moved
in 'different
P.L.B.]M.
29.12.1833.
I7<3
Bills
own
on London gave
credit structure
Company. Whereas
China
to
in 1807
and
W.
old
left in
S.
1824,
Davidson,
on
it
out
early days
was 'merely a
from the
existence
of the
who came
Matheson,
first letters
for
its
Vacillating'
methods, which
about
at
opium
policy,
and
its
'unbusinesslike' financial
at a discount.^
Bills to
be bandied
financial
for remittances to
Above
itself in
all,
the
new
spirit
tea,
may
not find
much
material
Bombay,
'nearly
all
I77
In
May
of that year 44
it.
To
object
their surprise
we have
and delight
in view,
not so
is
much
The
more extended
basis.
it
will
be our endeavour
Court of Directors,
mittee.
it,
The
that
Committee were
the
will
first
propriety of a
sanction from
'
C.
/?eg'.,
26.8.1829;
3.
0.1 829.
lyS
In
December 1830^
had increased
magnitude
place
it
failure
in defiance
of Chinese restrictions
upon
Amherst Missions]
House how little is
will
Cohong was
[i.e.
efficient
point of such
Macartney and
the
forcibly suggest to
to be gained in
'to a
House of
your Honourable
'a
state'.
medium of
'Your
inter-
petitioners',
it
permanent residence
at
commerce
in this
Hongkong was
Formosa
insurrection in
in
To
the
news of
a formidable
little
a footing
on
the island'.^
The
private
political
There survives
P.L.B.
3. 1.
MS.
The
1833.
On
the other
is
24.12.1830.
I79
step.
regime, as far
Enjoying
as the
and
it
at the
November
my
is
it
will
situation'.^ In
engage
cannot consider
in
it
in
it
resistless
impulse of
merchant
unlock the gates of the Chinese market. 'Great Britain can never
derive any important advantage from the opening of the trade to
money from
demand an
I
am
B.
So say we
from us'.^
afraid
our friends
at
home
differ
we
can extend
We have the
right to
residents.
But
The
Company's mono-
Right
down
attacked
P.L.B.^.].
16.1.1831.
^P.L.B.]M.
'P.L.B.^'.l
29.2.1832.
l8o
In i8 1 3, when the
petitions
centres had
much
But the Company still retained the monopoly of the China trade,
which withheld from the Manchester merchants not only a
potential market but also a means of remittance from India. *The
difficulty of making profitable returns is a great obstruction to
the future expansion of our India trade.'^
In February 1827 the Manchester
Chamber of Commerce
Chamber.^ After
of
whole export trade
of the Kingdom 'independently of forming a principle article of
home trade', and giving employment to numerous hands, the
expressing
cotton
its
now amounting
to two-thirds of the
ourselves to promote
it
(i.e.
"
The
M.
Ch.
II,
9.3.1827, are:
Cotton goods
East India
1818=
1821
1822=
Ibid. Vol. I.
;C^'5 million
=3
37
190,000 pieces
511,000
710,000
l8l
are rapidly
full
employment
capital
to our redundant
Commons which
East,
begun
in earnest.
At
the
first
meeting of
this
Committee
it
was resolved
to
five
interested'.
Proc.
M.
Ch.
TI,
25.4.1827.
its
*
'
Ibid.
Vol.
T,
29.4.1829.
l82
Company, and
for
by
therefore material
it is
classes
all
the commercial
which
are
more immediately
called
It
was
On 15
made
enquiry should be
full
was
matter.^
Company
unnecessary for
*is
its
prejudicial
security,
to
the
carried
on by
commerce extensively
it,
it
under the
own
dis-
advantage'.^
As
Proc.
M.
Ch.
II,
8.2.1830.
183
printed of a brief statement of the free traders' case and sent to the
chief merchants and newspapers of the various towns which had
sent deputies to
London
sent
to each
somewhat maliciously
Company and
Leaflets
were even
The Manchester
in the
was decided to
maintain permanently a united delegation in London, appoint
a secretary at a salary of 300 a year and rent a committee room
in the King's Arms, Palace Yard.^ 'The deputies of the commercial and manufacturing towns opposing the Company's monopoly
held their first meeting on 24 February 1830. It decided to raise a
'fighting' fund of /^ 1,000 from mercantile and manufacturing
seven principal towns continued to be active,
The
cities.'
proceeded
delegation
'to
excite
public attention
China
mation regarding
it',
it
trade), to obtain
It
Kingdom'.
been
Above
all, it
sent
throughout
issued a circular
'which had
generally
mittee of the
Company's
representations,
points: (i)
The commercial
extraordinary
facilities
the
free
the
Com-
traders
stressed
several
to
sale
(2)
The
of British manufactures.
(3)
great
The
consumer
'
Proc.
M.
Ch.
11,
1. 2.
184
upon
The
relaxation of effort
by
was no
Petitions continued to
in
at the
China
trade.
coming up
for a
ministers. It
is
notable that
Prime Minister, Earl Grey, they argued that the opening of the
China trade would be of much greater benefit to the commercial
world than the opening of the India trade had been.^ The outcome
of the struggle was in little doubt. The future belonged to the
new men and interests of the North and Midlands. In the England
of the Reform
Bill,
Edmund
Company
valid.
The
Proc.
M.
Ch.
5. 2.
83
1.
185
Company's monopoly on
was
divided up
commercial
among
the
effect
new army of
free merchants.^
Certainly,
from 66
Arms
to
and a
fall
in those
produced a general
rise
own commission
&
Jardine Matheson
medium'
fully a third
for the
of
Canton
'the business
trade,
of the
Port'.2
Most disappointing
was the
irregular import
in
the
&
to
to
l86
Canton 62,000
But by 1842
tea,
Company's commercial
and 'disgraceful
marked its introduction to the London market. Forty
per cent more teas were shipped to England in the first season
after the abolition of the Company's monopoly than in the
'free tea',
exhibitions'
As Forbes remarked, every merchant and shipowner who had ever seen a chest of tea immediately turned his
attention to China. ^ But the men on the spot had a natural advantage. On 22 March 1834 Jardine despatched the first 'free ship',
the Sarah, from Canton to London, though her cargo contained
previous one.
Forbes, op.
IhU.
'
Forbes, op.
6.
1 1
cit.
1
833, etc.
cit.^
p. 45.
P.L.B. W.J.
UU.
4.4.
3.1 1. 183 5.
837.
teas,
'still
187
when
&
teas to
'speculate',
to
at first
on
their
own
account.
They
themselves from
many of
the losses
fell
in the following
season.
it
on England to
individuals intending to ship merchandise from China to London.
This policy provoked violent opposition from the private Canton
merchants. Jardine wrote angrily to Weeding:^ 'We are all very
much surprised here at the quiet way in which you merchants and
agents at home submit to the Company's Finance Committee at
Canton. We consider it in direct opposition to the Act of Parliament [ending the charter], and what is worse, it is likely to turn
advance up to
to
Fan-Kwai^
The
The merchants
in the outports
[i.e.
provinces] have
P- 33-
P.L.B. W.J.
17.7.1834.
'
They found
it
worth while
Thus
procure
at
in
'
December 1834
28
in the price
;;(^5oo
taels,
the
l88
to be dissatisfied, as the
teas for unsaleable piece
still
more reason
value of their teas advanced in cash, and the chance of the English
may do harm
and Hong merchants
advances
description of tea
what
is
worse than
may run
off with
in another
to
The
*free
all
were
traders'
it
fair traders'.
now
'fair
traders',
objecting to a
it
in the
The second
China
trade,
Opium War.
by assigning
Thereupon
down
the price to be
the shippers
Any
'really
it
the argument, which Matheson actually used in another context, that competition
a sovereign, as the East India Company was in
was strongly objected that Messrs Daniels &
Astell, who managed the operations of the Company's Canton Finance Committee,
also formed a firm of their own which used funds provided by the India revenue
to finance shipments of tea to London, cf. P.L.B. J.M. 23.12.1832.
was
India.
who was
it
189
may meet
But when
different
do all
by the
power
therefore, instructed to
in his
from being
'sacrificed
the Brokers
who, when
the market
is
'a combination of
These 'slippery and saucy fellows', as Jardine
called them, were the middlemen from whom the Hong merchants
bought their 'black' tea the chief type exported to England.
them
were
demanded higher
now
prices
from the
Hong
hundred of
merchants,
who
had always dominated the market. In 1836 the tea-men made even
higher demands and refused to deliver teas, though contracted for
London
the
to induce
resist the
tea dealer.
Hong
who
'
The American
teas.
The
adjectives
implied a non-existent difference in colour; the actual difference lay in the preparing of the leaves. See R. Fortune, Three Years' IVandering in China, 1847.
^
190
two years been reaping large profits while the Hong merchants
have not made enough out of teas to pay for the expense of their
Hong establishment. This must appear to you almost impossible,
when you look at the relative position of the parties
the tea
last
merchants cannot ship off a single chest unless through one of the
Hong
ten
merchants/
Hong
merchants.
Jardine and the other European buyers, seeing that the tea-men
common
good',^
Hong
made
the
was
at this
Hong
with $20,000. If
and
we do
if
we break
one,
we may break
the whole;
six
or
"
Ibid.
6. 1.
837.
Ibid.
6.4.
836.
I9I
China
is',
wrote Jardine
from
in 1837, 'the
China trade has been too much run on the Company's advances
have afforded too much facility for wild speculations.'^ Matheson
:
Company's monopoly
and endless turmoil of free trade'. ^ But this comment was made in
a rare mood of defeatism. His general attitude and that of the
other Canton merchants was
free trade could not
merce
in
still
D.
Political Consequences
Cohong.
0/1834
free traders
directly
Supercargoes.
To
is
so
'inter-
national relations'.
conflict
'
2 P.L.B.
WJ. 3.1. 1837.
J.M. 8.3.1837.
Costin, for example, writes of Napier: 'as the bearer of a royal commission, a
P,L.B.
more than
192
Throughout
his brief
British
Jardine, in
whose house he
when
lived
and
who
The
off.^
of Trade
as First Superintendent
who had
hope you did your best to impress upon his mind the necessity
of a dignified, firm and independent conduct in his dealings with
*I
He
the Chinese.
game
When
to play'.^
wrote optimistic
letters to his
month of October'
the
was
that
for the
.
the
When
British merchants in
'forward policy'.
'
Ihid. 23.10.1834.
'
Ihid.^
and
J.
Phipps, op.
Chamber of Commerce^
2
'for the
7^-^ 10.6.1834.
cit.,
membership of
the
Chamber
is
the
fail'.
When
Napier's action had resulted in the Chinese stopping the trade, the Parsees had
I93
a plenipotentiary supported
by
three warships to
demand: (i)
Northern
Cohong
'the
and to the
the
Hong
merchants
is
Elected the
first
to the well-being
is
of
obtained'.^
Chamber of Commerce,
Government
By
the time
The
Through
was
far
was able
to get in
and Glasgow.
appealed to Napier to abandon his stand, since otherwise 'ruin appears certain to
thousands of our countrymen dependent on the China trade'.
'
Printed in
J.
Phipps, op.
cit.
itaHcs).
194
manu-
written to
will
Mr Mac Vicar,
'I
hope you
your manufacturing
friends'.^
stir
up
a fellow feeling
between the
medium
it
The
letter
its
continues
of the House of
P.L.B.].M. 14.11.1832.
2
Proc.
M.
Ch.
Cf. Proc.
M.
Ch.
II,
10.2.1836.
the
I95
most serious
important trade
is
Napier's ''Mission".'
the trade
was
liable to
be stopped
at the caprice
it
argued,
of the
Hong
liable to
Therefore the
by 1836
of the Honourable
up
^
Company from
The
elimination
who was
named
after
^
J. Matheson, Present Position and Future Prospects of Trade
London, 1836.
in
China^
Chapter VIII
A.
The
War
Company,
accentuated them.
The more
the
trade
increased,
the
more
The more
desirable
China appeared
more
as a potential
restrictive
it.
market for
illicit
'upon a
safe,
show
J.
at
sions are to be found in almost every issue of The Canton Register and The Canton
Cf. Sir J. B. Urmston's pamphlet, the Treatise of Phipps, the Remarks of
G. Staunton, and H. Lindsay's Letter to Palrj,erston^ all published in these years.
For Parliamentary propaganda, cf. P.L.B. J.M. 5.1. 1838.
Press.
Weeding^:
'I
am
I97
commencement of
the
Time must
from what
would warrant
at a loss
determine, but
fire
I
is
Government
now
interfere'. Jardine's
attitude of the
letters to
1 wish most
was:
H.M.
sincerely
officer
anger
at the cautious
periodically in his
the
news
that the
in irons
him.'
But he
treaty'
still
now
a
realised
all
in repairing
It
was
lead to war.
the Black
letters
Tea-men and
Cohong
the
*0n
as
a public
Hong
at
Canton.
merchants
failure
^P.Z,.5.
of Hengtai's
WJ.
25.4.1831.
Ibid.
I.I
1.1835.
Hong
this
proclaimed the
198
1836 the
gist
Hong
In the
summer of
of the debate
at Pekin.^
Some
Emperor
the
Hong
alarm was
in favour
merchants, but in
strict barter
Little
the
See Chapters
III
annoying'. Loc.
'
Loc.
cit.
cit.
I99
invest
all
Such
'I
cannot
resisted,
let
Hong
would be
contrary to reason.'^ Right until his departure from China in
January 1839, Jardine was convinced that the storm would blow
merchants
sell
a proceeding
over.2
He was
be admitted,
increased,
be contracted and
many Hongs
Hong
ruined.
The
opium
to
never be brought in
will
will
strictly enforced.'^
As
if
am
never answer
India we
to
down
are
was not
by
opium trade was likely. Had he
been on better terms with Howqua, the head of the Cohong, he
might have been undeceived, as were Howqua's confidants,
alarmed. This was partly due to his being misinformed
Mowqua
Russell
&
Co.^
become so high
smuggle
holders,
trifling,
at all
though
owing to
in June, Jardine
1
'
is
completely
is
deliveries
total
837.
temptation
was reporting
1. 1
felt.
hazard
at a
that the
Cf.
Ibid, 28.2.1839.
5.
12.1838.
200
entirely closed
'We
are
and among the islands in European boats.'^ But even on the coast
the Mandarin junks were vigilant. In one 'severe battle', in which
an opium junk was attacked by the Viceroy's boats, a number of
men were
killed
of the coastal
fleet
Several ships
The only
thing to do was to
new
send more armed European ships along the coast and try out
coast
and
force
cutters
Trade
flag.
this 'great
and
off an
whole
China trade was threatened thereby.^ But the change arose from
necessity.
now
thing
now
in operation as a
made
smug boat
The
limited deliveries
European sailing
which convey the drug to various points on the coast and
high up the River even as Canton, to the great alarm of the
effected here are
entirely in decked
boats,
as
Hong
merchants.
It is
8.
1. 1
837.
Corresp.
etc.
ji^ij
P.L.B. J.M.
retail
9.1. 1838.
it
from
tolerated only
is
201
It is
evident that such a system cannot endure for any length of time.
it is
impossible to say.'
boom
in the
it is
somewhat astonishing
to find that
both
on the
Government's policy
breaking out into rebellion. 'We cannot look for any improvement unless popular discontent should be manifested in much
possibility of popular discontent against the
To
the
Governor of Ceylon,
the Right
Hon.
J.
on the
possibilities
who
official ears.
frequently
They had an
Ceylon.
^
P.L.B. W.J.
16.12. 1838;
1. 1.
1839.
Ibid. 5.12.1838.
202
we
An
annoyed
insurrection
is
In Canton,
many
were searching
inhabitants,
houses
their
'I
severity in
rebellion.
They
their oppressive
rulers.'^
letter^
New
Year's
Day
'after
1839
much
thought'.
crisis,
dealers
now
had
it
Empire,
If the
'a
same
rigid
was
that,
more turbulent
provinces'.
pace Captain Elliot, the inside trade up the river was not
trade
was
'idle
He
campaign.
'in
Bombay
agents not to
is
or
individuals.'
of
India!
as
the
reports^
from
WJ.
Ibid.
1. 1.
839 to
J.
''W.J. 16.12.1838.
II. 1. 1839.
'
Jeejeebhoy.
21. 1. 1839.
203
On
all
charge.
all
the
It
that /^2,40o,ooo
opium
at
current prices)
''for
that the
ever
The
not continue.
In this 'disastrous' situation, a
Elliot's
way
the pledge
Though
its
full value.
1.5.1839.
^Loc.cit.
204
And above
the British
all,
In the important
left
Matheson
disastrous.'
opium
to the
opium newly
He
it
from
surrender'.
ment'.^
The
British
its
to intervene to save
vast ramifications,
from
collapse.
it is
government'.^
thrown by the
restrictive spirit
of the
had written urgently to the Foreign Office, the Governments of Bombay and Bengal, begging them to announce that all
Elliot
claims
Matheson,
all
its
Loc.
cit.
"
Ibid.
>4.i839.
'
Ihid.
Corresp.^ 189.
in 1837.'
At long
the British
last
20^
The
Not
were badly
treated.
and
belli.
The
horrors of the
exercise
from any actual want of the necessities of life.' True, their servants
were taken away, but 'having no business to attend to, they
cheerfully turned their attention to the various domestic depart-
ments, and there was never a merrier community than that of the
foreign merchants of Canton, during their imprisonment within
the limits of their
own
houses.*
May
Americans and
Sir
edict
may be
in
Whampoa. Matheson's
considered tantamount to
To have surrendered
decade.
^
P.L.B. J.M.
*P.L.B.]M.
loc. cit.
11.5.1839.
to
'
Forbes, op.
cit.
206
Canton
of
all
the
opium
fire
from the
Hongkong,
the
British frigates.
However, it was not until the following spring that the glad news
was brought of the troops being sent from India. On their
arrival in June 1840, a blockade of the Canton estuary was
established and the Opium War had formally begun.
B.
Trade during
the
War
his firm's
firm
will
vicinity.'^
fleets
their
Hongkong
islands.
Only
the
followed in India.
Singapore;
at
P.Z.^.J.M. 24.8.1839,
mere $200
in
lO'J
a chest.
to be invested in the
sending
sum.^
at the
new opium on
same time
the firm's
own
account,
again to import
it
it
to give a detailed account of trade during the war; but the salient
features can be indicated.
&
wrote that since they had so much opium on hand in India without
any means of realising it owing to its being excluded from the
China market, 'it occurred to me as a sort of duty to extend a
branch of our firm at Manila for drug business only until times
mend.'^ There was no local demand
sales
'
^P.L.B.]M.
24.8.1839.
'
Ihid. 29.5.1839.
Ibid. 25.6.1839.
especially cotton.
In fact Manila
became an entrepot
2o8
through.
On
his release
to Jardine
London that his friends the captains of the coastal fleet were at
their old work again
'we shall adhere to your old routine'.^ The
in
of the proceeds,
flotilla'
after
risks
run by
For about nine months Jardine Matheson & Co. had practically
monopoly of this opium trade via Manila. But increasing competition and the consequent rise of Calcutta prices by almost 50%
Andrew
over'."*
captains
To
on
'the
sell at
still
no matter what
prices.^
But the
traflic
off"
Namoa, was
attacked
by
his
and
The
wounded and
Commodore of the
on
fire.
Captain Rees,
on
on
the
The danger ceased
life.^
P.L.B. 27.5.1839.
* Morse, Owen and others state that the price of opium jumped to over $1,500
per chest, quoting Hunter and the Chinese Repository as authority; but the J.M.
papers show that this was not so, the highest price quoted being $i,ooo and that
^ P.L.B. 24.1 1.1839.
only for a very small parcel.
^
'
/^rW. 16.5.1840.
/^/W. 10.12.1839.
209
Government
lost prestige
and
its
edicts
were
once more flouted. *Smug' boats began to run again, and deliver
opium from
in
Opium
prices
During the rest of the war, the opium ships followed the flag.
As soon as Canton surrendered, receiving-ships went up to
Whampoa; when
opium
Woosung
speculators; in
Matheson
&
low
rates.
To
built.
on
Canton, by means of
&
and
flags
The Americans,
as
neutrals in
W.
*
P.L.B.
12. 7.
1839;
19. 8.
1839; 4.1
1.
1840.
210
Bills
agents
on
at
Canton,
it
flexibility
and
teas
commission of
it
But
own American
on
and
silks
i^%-2%;
cotton
sell
at a distance
to circumstances.
In the summer of 1839 they
appointed as Canton agents two Americans, James Ryan and
according
Joseph Coolidge,
who
had recently
left
&
Russell
Every
Co.^
how
Canton, giving
at
the different
Hong
at
Canton,
at
con-
provides our only source of information as to what was happening in Canton while the British were elsewhere.
the coast
the
This
field
The London
These two
of A. Heard
&
later joined
New York
now
to
&
Co.
in 1875. Its
September,
*a
it
may
211
still
doing
all
would somehow
month passed and the ships were not
allowed to move, he became anxious. In a remarkable letter to
John Abel Smith, he wrote: *It is worthy of consideration,
teas,
But
be got out.
whether, as tea
Government
is
as the
by
our turbulent
home
You
of the revenue.
ment on
this
home endangering
the
among
Government's popularity'.
British
who
at
London,
to the
who
lost
considerably thereby.^
once launched a
fierce attack
on
Elliot in
the newspapers.
Even
in
later
accounts,
With
*
There
is
Bogue
in the
forts in
March 1841
it
was
was influenced by
212
Canton could now be dispensed with, and Andrew Jardine went up to take over. But the
thought that the American agents
at
hostility
their Factories
December 1842
its ratification,
returned to Canton.
Factories
by
'a
the Cantonese
was
Trade and
C.
To
Flag
the
the
opium question;
but for the British merchants the issues were wider. 'The grand
cardinal point of the expedition'
was
to
Matheson
believed,
was impossible
of
In
settled.^
mode
therefore
'the future
He was
May
all
is
questions as to
henceforth to be
war
hoped
it is
will
British merchants
were
thus clear.
There was
still
some doubt
as to
but Jardine wrote^ from London that the island was too large to
P.L.B.
"
'Correspondence
28.3. 1 84 1.
In*.
16.9. 1839.
Ibid. 4. 1.184 1.
213
which was doubtful. Jardine and John Abel Smith preferred the
island of Chusan (off Ningpo) and persuaded Palmerston to
instruct Elliot to occupy it. But the latter on his own initiative
accepted the offer of the barren, mountainous island of Hongkong
made by the Chinese minister Kishan. Matheson's comment was
Hongkong would be
that the
more
the
new English
settlement.^ Moreover,
finest
Hongkong
When
in
January 1841 the British flag was hoisted over the island, Matheson
On
there.
Elliot's
to use their influence if 'not for its retention at least for the reten-
tion of
some
us, in place
.
Many
On
British people
subjects
to
known and
are
prefer
later
become our
at
As soon
connected with India and China are becoming very impatient and
threatening to
the Queen].
.
We
delay
is
go
Some
to
talk
provoking.'^
though the
anti-opium feeling in
High Church
party'
and the
'Saints'
with counter-propaganda.
* P.L.B. 25.8.1841.
P.L.B. 22.1.1841.
Kowloon was annexed
'Correspondence In'. 18.9.1839.
in i860.
214
On 29 August
safety,
four
new
in substance, the
abolished,
were limited to
% (except on
admitted to the
new
opium
tea), British
Consuls were to be
Hongkong was
to become a British
was not to be mentioned. A year
later, Alexander Matheson, who became head of the firm on
James' going home, wrote happily: 'The new tariff and port
ports,
trade
is
sure
P.L.B. 7.8.1840.
|i
215
will
to
Canton
to
sell his
Company
Cohong in China, and the British merchants were ensconced at
the mouth of the Yangtse as well as in possession of an island base.
The rise of the 'private English' had taken place on the basis of
nor
First, the
development of smug-
Canton
Commercial System. Thirdly, the abolition of the Company's
monopoly had brought to China the irresistible power of the new
gling via Lintin and along the coast had undermined the
Against those
Adam
who came
little avail.
in 1833: 'As in
all
parts
wants be
and
a government even far
stronger than the inefficient weakness by which this Empire is
ruled. What the Milan and Berlin Decrees failed to do for the
Continent and the exclusive possession of Spain for South
satisfied:
its level
a people's
effect.'
and well-governed
Now the Mandarin Empire seemed but a
'wretched burlesque', incapable of resisting the new 'princes' of
civilized
28.4.1842.
Payne, Smith).
APPENDIX
TABLES
I.
A.
statistical clarity
1817-33^
the trade
between India and China was never quite co-extensive with that of
the private nnerchants.
Not only
did the
Company
continue to import
Canton some Indian goods on its own account, but the private
merchants hired tonnage on the Company's ships as well as using the
to
private 'Country' ships; while the early J.M. papers reveal occasions,
the
Company
In
some
Company
its
Country trade
account.
own
on Company
which the
in
commerce
*
carried
Based on data
is
IV
passim.
The
APPENDIX
Estimated value
in dollars
217
('000 omitted)
Exports
Imports
Season
Private
Total
Company
Private
Total
5045
8650
13645
6127
13048
9769
10072
4408
8620
5946
8036
3642
4126
1819
4334
4212
8714
3671
1 1
1820
4856
IOI28
14984
8335
5081
13616
1821
4877
9123
14000
13667
3663
13268
693
7998
8548
5689
1822
4163
12711
1823
5180
10954
16134
8674
4047
1824
5158
10896
16054
7986
4056
12042
1825
5157
15701
21218
8213
5264
13477
1826
5871
15710
21581
9370
4293
13663
1827
4519
15846
20365
3562
1828
4940
21313
6255
13931
1829
4484
15373
18412
8479
7676
22896
7531
6265
13796
1830
17393
16832
21907
7757
5293
13050
1831
4154
3688
20520
5176
1832
4039
18258
22297
7763
8018
4646
12939
12664
1833
4358
19099
23451
7668
5778
13446
Company
1817
1818
707
272
204
APPENDIX
2l8
B.
Season
($ '000 omitted)
IV
passim.)
($ *ooo omitted)
1817
3920
1826
4083
1818
2689
1827
6095
1819
861
1828
1820
1829
4703
6656
1821
495
481
1830
4684^
1822
234
1831
2845'
1823
2619
1832
3835^
1824
1743
1833
6577
1825
4341
silver
Season
Ill,
$1,91 1,000 in
Company
on the orders of
its
APPENDIX
C.
219
S. Latourette*s Article in
Season
Specie
Season
Specie
Bills
on
London
Dollars
Dollars
1805
2,902,000
1819
7,414,000
200,000
1806
4,176,000
1820
6,297,000
2,995,000
Dollars
1807
2,895,000
1821
1808
3,032,000
1822
5,125,000
1809
70,000
1823
6,292,840
1810
4,723,000
1824
4,096,000
1811
2,330,000
1825
6,524,500
1812
1,875,000
1826
5,725,200
616,000
1827
1,841,168
400,000
1828
2,640,300
300,000
1829
740,900
657,000
1813
1814I
1815I
1816
1,922,000
1830
1,123,644
423,656
1817
4,545,000
1831
183,655
1,168,500
1818
5,601,000
1832
2,480,871
667,252
1833
682,519
4,772,516
APPENDIX
220
D.
No
OPIUM TABLES
after
all,
on the
lists
Register
and Price
to imports
and
The second
table refers
accurate, being
is less
I,
Bengal
(Patna
&
1821-31.
Malwa
Total
Benares)
Season
Value $
Value %
Chests
Value $
1821-22
2,910
6,038,250
1822-23
1,822
2,828,930
1823-24
2,910
4,656,000
4,172
3,559,100
7,082
8,515,100
1824-25
M55
3,119,625
6,000
4,500,000
8,655
7,619,625
1825-26
3)442
3,141,755
6,179
4,466,450
9,621
7,608,205
1826-27
3,661
3,667,565
6,308
5,941,520
9,969
9,610,085
1827-28
5,114
5,105,081
4,361
5,277,000
9,475
10,382,141
1828-29
5,960
5,604,235
7,171
6,928,880
13,132
i2,533,iM
1829-30
7,143
6,149,577
M57
5,907,580
14,000
12,057,157
1830-31
6,660
5,789,794
12,100
7,110,237
18,760
12,900,031
Chests
1,718
4,000
2,276,350
5,160,000
Chests
4,628
5,822
8,314,600
7,988,930
APPENDIX
(^)
Season
221
1800- 39
Malwa
Turkey
Chests
Chests
Chests
3,224
1,346
2,203
Bengal
Total
&
(Patna
Benares)
800-0
1801-02
1802-03
1803-04
1804-05
1805-06
1806-07
1807-08
1808-05
1809-10
1810-11
1811-12
1812-13
1813-14
1814-15
1815-16
1816-17
1817-18
1818-19
1819-20
1820-21
1821-22
1822-23
1823-24
1824-25
1825-26
1826-27
1827-28
1828-29
1829-30
1830-31
1831-32
1832-33
1833-34
1834-35
1835-36
1836-37
1837-38
1838-39
1,744
2,033
2,116
1,259
2,322
724
837
2,131
1,705
2,607
3,084
1,519
1,124
3,233
985
3,074
1,487
3,592
2,788
1,376
2,103
3,328
1,638
3,213
1,556
2,999
2,723
674
3,376
1,507
1,242
2,911
781
2,575
1,741
2,265
2,591
3,298
3,181
3,360
5,960
3,810
6,570
6,650
4,903
7,443
5,672
6,815
7,598
7,808
10,207
14,851
12,606
19,600
18,212
977
150
32
4,358
4,208
200
100
5,091
80
488
448
807
180
5,535
6,663
140
411
5,504
7,709
8,099
12,856
9,333
14,007
11,715
11,678
15,351
3,159
3,938
4,306
3,855
5,563
5,605
3,447
3,292
2,840
102
180
383
1,653
2,278
4,570
56
1,256
715
1,428
402
380
963
j>
j>
21,427
243
M,773
21,988
4,593
4,968
5,066
4,769
3,673
4,321
5,106
4,140
4,359
4,186
4,244
5,459
7,773
9,035
12,434
9,373
12,231
12,434
13,868
16,257
18,956
16,550
21,985
20,486
21,885
30,202
34,776
34,373
40,200
7
1
APPENDIX
II.
JARDINE MATHESON
CO.
A.
Firm
1782
&
Partners
J.
(& John
Reid)
Thomas
1787
1799
and Beale
Thomas
800
Daniel and
Beale
Beale, Alexander
Shank
has died)
&
801
Reid Beale
803
181
81
Beale
&
Co,
Beale,
Co,
8 19
Charles
Magniac
&
Co.
APPENDIX
223
II
Firm
&
Magniac
1824
Partners
Charles Magniac goes home.
Co.
1825
827
Jardine Matheson
&
Co.
819
82 1 -7 Yrissari
1827
&
Matheson
Co.
&
Co.
F.
X. de
who
Yrissari
died 1820
and
J.
Matheson
&
partner
1819-23
in business
he begins
1825
W.
to
do opium
& Co.
&
Co.
APPENDIX
224
B.
II
COMMANDER
Hercules
E. Parry
Austin
J.
Rees
Young
H. P. Baylis
Lady Hayes
A. Paterson
Red Rover
H. Wright
Governor Findlay
F. Jauncey
Hellas
A. Scanlon
Omega
W.
Jardine
F.
Harriet
J.
Venus
W.
Col.
Coral
Strachan
Denham
Hall
Erskine
APPENDIX
The following
list,
franfais en Chine,
at the ratification
III.
I^
negociant
existence
doubtful
is
Name
to
as
known
Name
Family name
of
Hong
Europeans
Howqua
Wu-han, kwang
Ewo-hong
Mowqua
Lu-man,
Kwangli
Puankequa
Puan-ching wee
Goqua
Sie-ngo,
Kingqua
Kiang-King
Mingqua
hong
Teng-ling
Tung-ling
Tien-pan
Puan-ming
Ching-ho
Saoqua
Mu-sao
Shintai
Punhoyqua
Puan-hai
Jinho
Samqua
Wu-Shwang
Tong
Kwanshing
Yih-Kwang
Futai
kwang
shin
BIBLIOGRAPHY
This
but
list
is
text.
MANUSCRIPTS
Y.
&
R.T.
& J.M.
8 19-21, 3 volumes.
^Correspondence In.*
Canton packed
in
Loose
originals of letters
coming
into
letters
which reply
to them.
(c)
The Ledgers from 1800 have been conBut many of tbem are defaced, or eaten away by
termites, or missing. The Accounts Sales from 18 19, Accounts
Current from Y^iii^ Journals and Invoice Books from 181
have been looked at but not consistently. They are of little
value, as most of their data was transferred to the Ledgers.
Lists o( Prices Current are found from 1823, loosely attached
Account Books.
sulted.
to various volumes.
II.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
III.
227
B.
I.
Blue Books,
1
8 10
82
affairs
Foreign Trades.
1829-31
1830
First
Company on Opium.
1831-32
1833
Report of Manufacturers.
1830
83 1
1840
1840
1840
1842
Communication of Capt.
843-45
Correspondence
up
1
844
rel.
II.
opium
to the Chinese.
treaty.
Current, 1827-43.
delivered
BIBLIOGRAPHY
228
The Chinese
Repository, 1832-51.
Pamphlets^ Treatises^
etc.
Chine, 1806.
J.
F.
The
Downing,
C.
3 volumes, 1838.
Forbes, R. B. Remarks on China
in
China
in 1836-37,
Company,
1810.
Meares,
BIBLIOGRAPHY
229
Phipps,
Guide
J.
to
to
volumes, 1926-9.
Commerce of Bengal,
1823.
on the
Volume
I,
Indigo, 1832.
Shaw,
S.
Journals, 1841.
Slade,
Warren,
S.
Williams,
Wissett,
S.
Opium,
W.
1839.
Compendium of East
C.
Buck, N.
Carey,
S.
W.
1906-7.
Chi, Chao-ting.
in
Costin,
in
'T'oung Pao'
II,
Leiden, 1902.
W.
Volume
BIBLIOGRAPHY
230
1902.
Eames, J. B. The English in China (1600- 1843), 1909Easton, H. J. History of a Banking House (Smith, Payne, Smith),
1903.
Eitel, E.
Europe
I.
Fairbank,
J.
F.
The
Legalisation of the
of Hongkong, 1895.
Trade, in 'Chinese
Opium
W.
Volume
Business History',
III.
1938.
Jermigan, T. R. China
Keeton, G.
in
W. The Development
1905.
of Extraterritoriality in China,
2 volumes, 1928.
in 'Transactions
Volume XXII.
Lattimore, O. Inner Asian Frontiers of China, 1940.
Lindsay, W. S. History of British Shipping, 1876.
McCuLLOCH,
J.
I,
1847.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
23I
Company Trading
to China,
volumes, 1926-9.
the E.I.C/s
Trade
at
Canton dur-
April 1922.
Currency
in China, in 'Journal
1908.
Nazir, C.
S.
The
1919.
Spalding,
W.
F. Eastern
II,
232
BIBLIOGRAPHY
1927.
INDEX
Abel Smith, John, i88, 189, 204, 207,
211, 213, 214
American trade,
and Hong merchants, 53
and outside merchants, 54-6
and the Canton system, 72-3
its growth in Napoleonic wars, 84
furs and sandalwood, 88
and opium imports, 108
import of dollars, 159
and drafts on London houses, 161 -5
speculative
boom
in,
168-70
Amoy,
47-8, 209
Arriaga, Senhor, 118, 135
Astor, John Jacob, 24, 163, 164
Atkinson, Dr B. F., xii
Thomas,
113, 117,
Bombay,
Edmund,
149
its
money
market, 153-74
146
Burke,
2,
185
Cohong
Canton,
private merchants
at, x
of British trade, 5, 7, 8
sale of Indian goods at, 11- 13
exports from, 13
and Country Trade, 15
the Company's Treasury at, 19
as centre
in
at,
20-5
xii
chants), see
Commutation
Hong
Act,
merchants
3, 8
Confucius, 215
62, 87
INDEX
234
Cotton
its tea
trade,
Country Trade,
58-60
and
Hong
and
to,
merchants, 55,
85
trade, 92
depression
in,
prices
imports
of cotton
to
Company's monopoly
the
93
threatened, 175-7
abolition of charter desired, 178-9
decisive
Company,
opposition
from
Man-
chester, 179-85
challenge to
186-8
Company's
tea trade,
175-215
Cox and
Cox,
Cox, John Henry,
62-3
77-8
China, 90
Hong merchants,
Company officers,
credit of
dealings of
58-60
newcomers
trade, 3-4
Damaun,
Exching (Patqua)
Hong merchant,
W.
see
30, 70-1,
S.,
107,
iii,
120, 176
Davis,
J. F.,
Drug
J.
K., xii
43, 45, 68
Downing, Toogood,
Fairbank, Professor,
Fairlie
41, 51
trade, 76-8
Drury, Admiral, 47
Goa,
Gowqua (Hong
East India
Company
(the
Honourable
merchant), 66
Company),
the chronicles of, x
early imports,
28, 76
Hamilton, Robert, 27, 28
Hart, Sir Robert, 5
62
INDEX
Hastings, Warren, 109
Hengtai Hong,
197
merchants,
and imports from America, 8
the Cohong dissolved, 20
their debts to private traders, 21
and relations with foreign trade,
Hong
trade, 79-81
and cotton
and opium
ships, 173
Agency Houses,
market
214
and
Shanghai
Banking
Corporation, 170
Honourable Company,
India
and freight
prices, 90-2
153-5, 178-9
Hongkong
trade, 107
relations with
Hongkong,
50-74
235
the.
See East
Company
House of Agency,
early experiment with, 26
intelligence,
origin of
company, 22
of rival houses, 30
opium
Malwa opium
coastal
trade, 137
syndicate, 146
trading ventures of, 148
their Indian correspondents, 150
and Manila agents, 152
and remittances
to
London, 164
43
dealings with
Hong merchants,
65
52-4,
INDEX
236
Jardine, William
service in
Macao,
cont.
trade, 139-40
Agency House,
145
at, 6
supercargoes
bullion
at,
20
London, 187
advice to Hongists on tea trade, 190
on Formosa, 178
on
and
speculation, 191
friendship with
reputation in
rival
trade,
198-206
advises occupation of Chusan, 213
visits London, 213
Jauncey, Captain, 208
Macartney, Lord, 4
MacClary, Captain, 22
Mac Vicar,
Johnstone, Andrew, 39
Kang
and Singapore, 98
Java, 96
95
Hi, the Emperor, 45
Kieman, V., xii
Kumsingmoon,
Hong
merchant,
48, 122
Abraham,
21
Lintin,
and
illicit
opium
trade, 49-50
at, 69, 11 2- 13
further smuggling
at,
119-23
traders, 209
93,94, 121
INDEX
Matheson, Donald, 210
Matheson, James,
on his business in Canton, xi
takes out Danish papers, 27
and partnership arrangements, 38
founds Canton Register^ 39
his pamphlet on Cantpn system, 42
and Amoy trade, 47-8
and use of Lintin, 48
trades with 'outside' men, 54-5
and falling prices, 87
and influx of cotton, 92
sends tea to Australia, 95
on future of Singapore, 97
opium
traffic,
Agency house,
145
sets up Calcutta agency, 148
on exchange business in Canton, 163
reorganizes London firm, 170
194
urges forward policy in China, 195
and changes in opium trade, 200
and veto on opium imports, 204-5
expelled from China, 206
conducts secret opium trade, 207
and tea exports, 211
on freedom of trade in China, 212
on Hongkong, 213
returns to England, 214
C, 4, 14, 16
^37
Opium
trade,
growing development
of,
33-4
dangers of growth
in, 196
prohibition of, 198-209
Otadui and Co., 207
final
20, 51,
67, 190
Raffles, Sir Stamford, 97
Rees, Captain, 202, 208
Hong and
outside
merchants, 53
financial difficulties of, 67
their
on of Napoleonic wars, 83
letter books on the opium
trade,
1 1
Melville, T.
150
Rickards, Mackintosh and Co.,
Rogers, William, 84
Ross, Captain, O., 156
Mowqua (Hong
Namoa, 208
Nanking, Treaty
146,
214
Napier, Lord, 192, 193, 197
Nepal, war with, 45
INDEX
238
Urmston,
Vernon, Admiral, 21
definition of, 18
and
and
and
and
and
illegal trade, 55
the
opium
trade, 109
99
Sir James,
xii
70
Voltaire, 215
Weeding, Thomas,
Wellington,
Duke
192, 197
of, 193
Whampoa,
Canton, 23, 25
trade driven from, 48
merchants and, 53
as seaport of
opium
Hong
sailings
Tea
trade,
14
148, 151
[8,
120, 137,
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