《近代中国对外关系史 The History of Modern China's Foreign Relations》课程教学资源（阅读材料）John King Fairbank - Trade and Diploma on the China Coast

xii CONTENTS CONTENTS xiii 31.WU CHIEN-CHANG AND THE "CANTONIZATION"OF 9.Customs Collections Reported from the Five Treaty Ports 1843-1855 SHANGHAI 1852-53 393 (in taels). 259 The emergence of "Samqua"Stoppage of duties as a diplomatic weapon.The impact of the rebellion.Alcock's bonding system. Io.Examples of Regular and Surplus Quotas 262 Wu Chien-chang and the Shanghai rebellion. II.British Community at Canton I85I. 273 22.RUTHERFORD ALCOCK AND THE PROVISIONAL SYS- 12.Costs on the Tea Route to Shanghai from Fukien 303 TEM1853-54 410 The precedent at Amoy,May 1853.The first steps in the Anglo- 13.Customs Duties Paid on British Trade at Canton. 351 American coiperation.The Provisional Rules of September 9, 1853.Foreign neutrality at Shanghai (October-December 1853). Neutrality violated (the arms trade).The reinstatement of the MAPS taotai.The results attained by foreign consular administration. The China Coast:Treaty Ports and Receiving Stations ca.1850. 58 23.SIR JOHN BOWRING AND THE FOREIGN INSPEC- 2g4 TORATE 1854 439 The Tea and Silk Routes ca.1850. The collapse of Wu Chien-chang's customhouse (February-Marck). Shanghai during the Provisional System,1853-54. 417 Chinese policy and the crisis at Shanghai (April).The revival of Anglo-American cooperation.McLane begins negotiations.The customs bargain:A foreig落nspectorate排exchange∫or back duties.The inauguration of the Inspectorate. CONTENTS OF VOLUME TWO REFERENCE NOTES 24.CONCLUSION:THE TREATIES SUCCEED THE TRIB- UTE SYSTEM 462 APPENDIX A:BRITISH PERSONNEL IN CHINA 47 Sec.I:British Consular Oficers at the Treaty Ports, INDEX 469 1843-r858 Sec.2:Partners of Jardine,Matheson and Company and its Predecessors,to 1854 TABLES APPENDIX B:DATA ON THE CH'ING CUSTOMS AD- MINISTRATION AFTER THE TREATIES 1.Dynasties of Imperial China (a21 B.C.-A.D.19ra). 8 Sec.I:The rearrangement of the Hoppo's accounts in 2.Early European Embassies to the Court of Peking. I843 Sec.2:Tables of Collection Periods,1843-1855 3.Article XIII of the Supplementary Treaty (October 8,1843). 125 BIBLIOGRAPHY 62 4.Proportion of Hongkong Registered Lorcha Trade to British Inter- GLOSSARY OF CHINESE NAMES AND TERMS national Trade at Canton,1844-47. I27 5.Staff and Salaries Proposed for H.B.M.'s Consulate at Amoy, September 1843. 67 6.Staff and Salaries for H.B.M.'s Consulate at Canton,June,1844. 67 7.Former Hong Merchants and their Establishments,as of July 27,1843. 249 8.Quotas and Reported Collections of 29 Customs Administrations under the Boards of Revenue and of Works in the 1840's. 256-57

xii CONTENTS 21. WU CHIEN-CHANG AND THE "CANTONIZATION" OF SHANGHAI 1852-53 The emergence of "Sam qua." Stoppage of duties as a diplomatic weapon. The impact of the rebellion. Alcock's bonding system. Wu Chien-chang and the Shanghai rebellion. 22. RUTHERFORD ALCOCK AND THE PROVISIONAL SYS￾TEM 1853-54 The precedent at Amoy, May 1853. The first steps in the Anglo￾American cooperation. The Provisional Rules of September 9, 1853. Foreign neutrality at Shanghai (October-December 1853)· Neutrality violated (the arms trade). The reinstatement of the taotai. The results attained by foreign consular administration. 23. SIR JOHN BOWRING AND THE FOREIGN INSPEC￾TORATE 1854 The collapse of Wu Chien-chang's customhouse (February-March). Chinese policy and the crisis at Shangh(ti (April). The revival of Anglo-American cooperation. McLane begins negotiations. The customs bargain: A foreign inspectorate in exchange for back duties. The inauguration of the Inspectorate. 24. CONCLUSION: THE TREATIES SUCCEED THE TRIB￾UTE SYSTEM INDEX TABLES I. Dynasties of Imperial China (221 B.C.-A.D. 1912). 2. Early European Embassies to the Court of Peking. 3. Article XIII of the Supplementary Treaty (October 8, 1843). 4. Proportion of Hongkong Registered Lorcha Trade to British Inter￾national Trade at Canton, 1844-47· 5. Staff and Salaries Proposed for H. B. M.'s Consulate at Amoy, September 1843. 6. Staff and Salaries for H. B. M.'s Consulate at Canton, June, 1844· 7. Former Hong Merchants and their Establishments; as of July 27,1843· 8. Quotas and Reported Collections of 29 Customs Administrations under the Boards of Revenue and of Works in the 1840'S. 393 410 439 8 IS 125 127 167 167 249 256-57 9· 10. II. 12. 13· CONTENTS Customs Collections. Reported from the Five Treaty Ports 1843-1855 (in taels). Examples of Regular and Surplus Quotas. British Community at Canton 1851. Costs on the Tea Route to Shanghai from Fukien. Customs Duties Paid on British Trade at Canton. MAPS The China Coast: Treaty Ports and Receiving Stations ca. 1850. The Tea and Silk Routes ca. 1850. Shanghai during the Provisional System, 1853-54. CONTENTS OF VOLUME TWO REFERENCE NOTES APPENDIX A: BRITISH PERSONNEL IN CHINA Sec. I: British 'Consular Officers at the Treaty Ports, 1843-1858 Sec. 2: Partners of Jardine, Matheson and Company and its Predecessors, to 1854 APPENDIX B: DATA ON THE CH'ING CUSTOMS AD￾MINISTRATION AFTER THE TREATIES Sec. I: The rearrangement of the Hoppo's accounts in 1843 Sec. 2: Tables of Collection Periods, 1843-1855 BIBLIOGRAPHY GLOSSARY OF CHINESE NAMES AND TERMS xiii 259 262 273 303 351 158 294 41 7 I 47 58 62 81

PART I CHINA'S UNPREPAREDNESS FOR WESTERN CONTACT

PART I CHINA'S UNPREPAREDNESS FOR WESTERN CONTACT

CHAPTER I THE PROBLEM OF CHINA'S RESPONSE TO THE WEST THE CENTURY OF THE TREATY PORTS IN CHINA,from 1842 to 1943,is now at an end,and historians may examine it for clues as to the future of Sino- Western relations.We can be sure that these three generations of steadily increasing contact have been more than a strange interlude in the long drama of China's ethnocentric history.For better or worse,the treaty ports remade Chinese life.Through them flowed Western goods,people,and ideas.The result was to give the West a privileged position in China not unlike that of earlier barbarian conquerors. Should we view the present rejection of the West as an anti-foreign resurgence among the Chinese people?Is it,on the contrary,part of still another barbarian conquest?Or is it really an unstable mixture of the two? These are the imponderables of present day policy.They can be assessed only against the background'of history. The historical context of the period 1842-54.The modern invasion of China by the Western world really began in the middle of the nineteenth century,after the first Anglo-Chinese treaty was signed at Nanking in 1842. Until that time relations with the West had been based upon the ancient Chinese tribute system;after that time they were based upon the "unequal" foreign treaties.Under the tribute system foreign trade had been restricted to the picturesque "factories"of old Canton.But 1842 began a new era- the opening of China to Western commercial exploitation.This was charac- terized by the treaty ports and the opium traffic,extraterritoriality,the treaty tariff,and the most-favored-nation clause.By the end of the nine- teenth century China had been placed in a semi-colonial status,the after- effects of which have not yet passed away.In this context the years from 1842 to 1854 have significance as the transition between two unilateral, Chinese and Western,schemes of things. These middle years of the nineteenth century saw new developments in all the Far East.The first enunciation of American manifest destiny,the development of the clipper ship and the Shanghai trade in the 1840's,were followed by the opening of Japan and the establishment of Russia on the Pacific between 1853 and 1860.The center of all this international develop- ment,however,was the British activity in China,where the treaty port consuls labored to break down the Chinese system of foreign relations and set up the Western treaty system in its place.Their initial achievement

CHAPTER I THE PROBLEM OF CHINA'S RESPONSE TO THE WEST THE CENTURY OF THE TREATY PORTS IN CHINA, from 1842 to 1943, is now at an end, and historians may examine it for clues as to the future of Sino￾Western relations. We can be sure that these three generations of steadily increasing contact have been more than a strange interlude in the long drama of China's ethnocentric history. For better or worse, the treaty ports remade Chinese life. Through them flowed Western goods, people, and ideas. The result was to give the West a privileged position in China not unlike that of earlier barbarian conquerors. Should we view the present rejection of the West as an anti-foreign resurgence among the Chinese people? Is it, on the contrary, part of still another barbarian conquest? Or is it really an unstable mixture of the two? These are the imponderables of present day policy. They can be assessed only against the background' of history. The historical context of the period 1842-54. The modern invasion of China by the Western world really began in the middle of the nineteenth century, after the first Anglo-Chinese treaty was signed at Nanking in 1842. Until that time relations with the West had been based upon the ancient Chinese tribute system; after that time they were based upon the "unequal" foreign treaties. Under the tribute system foreign trade had been restricted to the picturesque "factories" of old Canton. But 1842 began a new era￾the opening of China to Western commercial exploitation. This was charac￾terized by the treaty ports and the opium traffic, extraterritoriality, the treaty tariff, and the most-favored-nation clause. By the end of the nine￾teenth century China had been placed in a semi-colonial status, the after￾effects of which have not yet passed away. In this context the years from 1842 to 1854 have significance as the transition between two unilateral, Chinese and Western, schemes of things. These middle years of the nineteenth century saw new developments in all the Far East. The first enunciation of American manifest destiny, the development of the clipper ship and the Shanghai trade in the 1840'S, were followed by the opening of Japan and the establishment of Russia on the Pacific between 1853 and 1860. The center of all this international develop￾ment, however, was the British activity in China, where the treaty port consuls labored to break down the Chinese system of foreign relations and set up the Western treaty system in its place. Their initial achievement

CHINA'S UNPREPAREDNESS CHINA'S RESPONSE TO THE WEST 5 was the first treaty settlement of 1842-44;further efforts led to the inven- world has been possible only through the break-up of the old order.China's tion of the Foreign Inspectorate of Customs in 1854;their final success, society has had to be thrown into the melting pot and her people have had after the second war of 1856-60,was marked by the treaties of 1858 and to accept revolution as the law of modern existence;for the process of 186o which opened the interior to trade and established the Western modernization has involved intense and rapid changes on all levels of social legations at Peking. life and practice. The treaty system which had thus been created to serve as a vehicle This process of modernization began only a bare three generations ago. for British and other Western trade,diplomacy,and evangelism in China, In the days of Calhoun and Webster,Bentham and Mill,China's old ruling was also set up in Japan,Siam,Korea,and other Far Eastern states.It class was still firmly in the saddle,thinking in the accepted patterns of the may justly be taken as the symbol of the recent century of Western superi- Confucian system-universal monarchy,dynastic rather than national ority in the East.It forms a striking contrast with the preceding millennia politics,tribute relations abroad and the Chinese way of life at home. of the tribute system,when the great empire of China dominated the Far This ancient Confucian order and the expanding commercial empire of Eastern scene.It contrasts perhaps less sharply with the new international Britain had their first contact,on their lowest levels,through the Anglo- order of communism of which China has become a part. Indian opium traffic and the petty corruption of a demoralized Chinese We should not forget that the treaty system represented chiefly a state bureaucracy,through piracy,brutality,and racketeering,without benefit of affairs in the treaty ports,a mode of Sino-foreign intercourse which was of common speech or writing,and with little but uncomprehending con- an aspect or function of the larger situation within the Chinese body poli- tempt for each other's ideals and values.As we look back it seems amazing tic.It must be viewed in the context of the great revolutionary process of that so great a catastrophe as the invasion by the West could have been disintegration and rebirth which has convulsed the Chinese people since visited upon the Chinese people without producing more violent friction I842. No doubt this was due in part to the tolerance and passivity of a populace The fall of the Chinese empire is an epic still to be written.Seen from long inured to hardship,as well as to their relative inaccessibility to direct the Chinese side,no political collapse in history has been more cataclysmic Western contact.It was due also to the effort of the British government to -a decline from an age-old recognized supremacy over the known world serve as the handmaiden of commerce,the civilizing benefit of which was to an abject partitioning into spheres of foreign domination,all in the space deemed obtainable only through the establishment of the rule of Anglo- of one lifetime between 1842 and 1898.The causes of this fall were many Saxon law.The energies of the British consuls were bent for a generation and various.The decay of the Manchu dynasty after two centuries of power toward the creation of a framework of legal regulation within which foreign within China and the rise of the great Taiping Rebellion in 185r (an epic trade might prosper and Sino-foreign relations remain tranquil.Yet in the that would require another volume to tell)coincided with the invasion of last analysis China's response to the West was determined most of all by Western arms.Western-inspired efforts at industrialization and the growth the peculiar nature of her state and society. of nationalism followed hard upon this dynastic civil war.All these proc- Thus far the political collapse of the Chinese empire has been studied esses,native and foreign,have combined to produce the chaos and ferment almost entirely from the alien view of the Western invaders,whose im- of social change in modern China. perialist rivalry is recorded in numerous volumes.Nothing is more plain, The resulting experience of the Chinese people in modern times has been however,than that the key to the story lies within.The startling contrasts overcast by a pall of frustration and uncertainty,owing to their inability between the responses of Japan and of China to the West since 1842 make it to meet the West on equal terms.The inherited institutions of their society clear that imperialism was no juggernaut running roughshod over native have played them false.More than any other mature non-Western state, peoples,but rather a stimulant capable of invigorating the strong or debili- China has seemed inadaptable to the conditions of modern life.Nationalism tating the weak,depending upon the internal condition of the recipient. and industrialism,which triumphed so easily in Japan,were retarded in the Japan,for example,had a patriotic and adaptable ruling class.China did Middle Kingdom.Neither the scientific method nor the rule of law,the not.Japan had the medieval tradition of the samurai as a basis for modern inventor or the entrepreneur,have yet had their heyday in this strangely chauvinism.The early bankers of Osaka and Tokyo were forerunners of different society.Perhaps the very maturity and stability of Chinese social the modern Zaibatsu.By the nineteenth century,Japan,indeed,was a structure and political institutions have proved a handicap.Their dissimi- nation somewhat like Western nations,while the Middle Kingdom was a larity to the West was so deep and ingrained that adjustment to the modern state of a different political species altogether.Any study of China's modern

4 CHINA'S UNPREPAREDNESS was the first treaty settlement of 1842-44; further efforts led to the inven￾tion of the Foreign Inspectorate of Customs in 1854; their final success, after the second war of 1856-60, was marked by the treaties of 1858 and 1860 which opened the interior to trade and established the Western legations at Peking. The treaty system which had thus been created to serve as a vehicle for British and other Western trade, diplomacy, and evangelism in China, was also set up in Japan, Siam, Korea, and other Far Eastern states. It may justly be taken as the symbol of the recent century of Western superi￾ority in the East. It forms a striking contrast with the preceding millennia of the tribute system, when the great empire of China dominated the Far Eastern scene. It contrasts perhaps less sharply with the new international order of communism of which China has become a part. We should not forget that the treaty system represented chiefly a state of affairs in the treaty ports, a mode of Sino-foreign intercourse which was an aspect or function of the larger situation within the Chinese body poli￾tic. It must be viewed in the context of the great revolutionary process of disintegration and rebirth which has convulsed the Chinese people since 1842 • The fall of the Chinese empire is an epic still to be written. Seen from the Chinese side, no political collapse in history has been more cataclysmic - a decline from an age-old recognized supremacy over the known world to an abject partitioning into spheres of foreign domination, all in the space of one lifetime between 1842 and 1898. The causes of this fall were many and various. The decay of the Manchu dynasty after two centuries of power within China and the rise of the great Taiping Rebellion in 1851 (an epic that would require another volume to tell) coincided with the invasion of Western arms. Western-inspired efforts at industrialization and the growth of nationalism followed hard upon this dynastic civil war. All these proc￾esses, native and foreign, have combined to produce the chaos and ferment of social change in modern China. The resulting experience of the Chinese people in modern times has been overcast by a pall of frustration and uncertainty, owing to their inability to meet the West on equal terms. The inherited institutions of their society have played them false. More than any other mature non-Western state, China has seemed inadaptable to the conditions of modern life. Nationalism and industrialism, which triumphed so easily in Japan, were retarded in the Middle Kingdom. Neither the scientific method nor the rule of law, the inventor or the entrepreneur, have yet had their heyday in this strangely different society. Perhaps the very maturity and stability of Chinese social structure and political institutions have proved a handicap. Their dissimi￾larity to the West was so deep and ingrained that adjustment to the modern CHINA'S RESPONSE TO THE WEST 5 world has been possible only through the break-up of the old order. China's society has had to be thrown into the melting pot and her people have had to accept revolution as the law of modern existence; for the process of modernization has involved intense and rapid changes on all levels of social life and practice. This process of modernization began only a bare three generations ago. In the days of Calhoun and W~bster, Bentham and Mill, China's old ruling class was still firmly in the saddle, thinking in the accepted patterns of the Confucian system - universal monarchy, dynastic rather than national politics, tribute relations abroad and the Chinese way of life at home. This ancient Confucian order and the expanding commercial empire of Britain had their first contact, on their lowest levels, through the Anglo￾Indian opi\lm traffic and the petty corruption of a demoralized Chinese bureaucracy, through piracy, brutality, and racketeering, without benefit of common speech or writing, and with little but uncomprehending con￾tempt for each other's ideals and values. As we look back it seems amazing that so great a catastrophe as the invasion by the West could have been visited upon the Chinese people without producing more violent friction. No doubt this was due in part to the tolerance and passivity of a populace long inured to hardship, as well as to their relative inaccessibility to direct Western contact. It was due also to the effort of the British government to serve as the handmaiden of commerce, the civilizing benefit of which was deemed obtainable only through the establishment of the rule of Anglo￾Saxon law. The energies of the British consuls were bent for a generation toward the creation of a framework of legal regulation within which foreign trade might prosper and Sino-foreign relations remain tranquil. Yet in the last analysis China's response to the West was determined most of all by the peculiar nature of her state and society. Thus far the political collapse of the Chinese empire has been studied almost entirely from the alien view of the Western invaders, whose im￾perialist rivalry is recorded in numerous volumes. Nothing is more plain, however, than that the key to the story lies within. The startling contrasts between the responses of Japan and of China to the West since 1842 make it clear that imperialism was no juggernaut running roughshod over native peoples, but rather a stimulant capable of invigorating the strong or debili￾tating the weak, depending upon the internal condition of the recipient. Japan, for example, had a patriotic and adaptable ruling class. China did not. Japan had the medieval tradition of the samurai as a basis for modern chauvinism. The early bankers of Osaka and Tokyo were forerunners of the modern Zaibatsu. By the nineteenth century, Japan, indeed, was a nation somewhat like Western nations, while the Middle Kingdom was a state of a different political species altogether. Any study of China's modern

CHINA'S UNPREPAREDNESS CHINA'S RESPONSE TO THE WEST 7 adjustment to the West must therefore begin with those peculiarities of the in the ports adjusted their lives to Chinese conditions.Your genuine Shang- Chinese state which made it uniquely inadaptable to the Western scheme hailander was really a half-breed,typical of neither East nor West. of things. In the course of decades the new stimuli operating through the treaty The nature of Chinese society and its reponse to the West.The recogni- ports led China into revolution.The response to the West upset traditional tion of China as a society different in structure and character from our own patterns of behavior which went far back into the past.Other great develop- suggests the need of defining and formulating this difference.All Western ments had indeed occurred throughout China's far from static history,but observers since Polo and the early Jesuits have tried to do this,either by down to the nineteenth century they had all remained within a distinctive description or by analysis.I have made my own brief attempt elsewhere.1 and persistent Chinese pattern.Thus repetitive phenomena like the political Here let us note merely that fruitful socio-historical analyses are now being cycle of dynastic disintegration,warlordism,and re-unification had all developed under the general headings of "Oriental Society,""the gentry taken place within the unshaken framework of the Confucian culture. state,"or the like-bodies of theory which are not simple magic formulae Similarly the pattern of China's foreign relations with the barbarians of but rather broad avenues of approach that afford new insights into Chinese Inner Asia had been manifested inside the structure of the universal Con- social behavior.With these has come a fresh appreciation of the role of the fucian monarchy. barbarians of Inner Asia in Chinese history.2 Although Western contact eventually destroyed this old political and All such theories assume,of course,that the record of events is still basic cultural framework,the first phase in China's response to the West was to our understanding.While conceptual schemes can inspire and guide neither inaction nor innovation,but merely repetition of the established research,they are not meant to substitute for it.The meagreness of our pattern of behavior.In short,the first overt Chinese activity in the begin- knowledge of modern China leaves us still in the stage of descriptive por- ning of Sino-Western relations was to apply to the West those traditional traiture.Exactly how the men and events,the personalities and circum- attitudes which were already inbred within the Chinese way of life.This stances,the data and interpretations should be combined to form our picture was to treat the West as though it were not the West at all,but merely a of modern China's contact with the West is a problem of artistic composi- new form of Inner Asian barbarian. tion more than of scientific measurement.Theories are not self-evident, This conditioned reflex made China's adjustment to the West much any more than facts can speak for themselves.Our understanding of China more difficult than it might otherwise have been.If the British barbarians must be accumulated painstakingly and in detail,through monographic re- had been an entirely unprecedented phenomenon in Chinese life,the search on one aspect of the record after another. Manchu rulers of the day might easily have formed a fresh and realistic Not having a final formula for Chinese society,we can hardly invent one view of them.Unfortunately,this was impossible because the British for China's response to the stimulus of Western contact,3 yet certain (Ying-i)were the unwitting inheritors of the status which had been reserved points may be noted.First,in the expansion of the Western state system for barbarians (/in Chinese society since time immemorial.Age-old during recent centuries,the incorporation of China into this nascent world stereotypes took the place of a creative response. order has proved unusually difficult.China's political behavior has not The first step in understanding the Western influence on China is,there- easily been assimilated to that of the West,presumably because of the fore,to understand the traditional role of the barbarian in Chinese society. difference in her institutions.Second,the so-called Western "impact"on The most cursory glance at this subject will indicate that the barbarians of China has been a stimulus rather than a shattering blow.Personal contact Inner Asia had played a constant and,indeed,an integral part,in the long in treaty ports and mission stations,material changes in economic life and history of the Chinese people.Their experience had included not only re- social custom,have led to the eventual metamorphosis of Chinese institu- current phenomena like the dynastic cycle but also the recurrent phenomena tions.But this modernization has been effected by the Chinese people of barbarian conquest.Doubtless these rhythms were not so regular and through the adjustment of their own ways;it has not been simple westerni- uniform as Chinese scribes have liked to assume.Yet the rise and fall of zation.Third,the response has worked both ways.In the hybrid society of dynasties were expected,like the waxing and waning of the seasons,and the treaty ports,Western forms of law,finance,industry,and individualism have formed the main theme of the Chinese dynastic chronicles.Modern his- have been subtly modified:the treaty ports have represented not the torians may be interested less in the obvious existence of these broad Western way of life transplanted to the China coast so much as China's rhythms than in their multiplicity and interaction;China's history gives us accommodation to the Westerner and his ways.The handful of foreigners today an oversupply rather than a lack of patterns.Nevertheless,since

6 CHINA'S UNPREPAREDNESS adjustment to the West must therefore begin with those peculiarities of the Chinese state which made it uniquely inadaptable to the Western scheme of things. . The nature of Chinese society and its reponse to the West. The recogni￾tion of China as a society different in structure and character from our own suggests the need of defining and formulating this difference. All Western observers since Polo and the early Jesuits have tried to do this, either by description or by analysis. I have made my own brief attempt elsewhere.1 Here let us note merely that fruitful socio-historical analyses are now being developed under the general headings of "Oriental Society," "the gentry state," or the like - bodies of theory which are not simple magic formulae but rather broad avenues of approach that afford new insights into Chinese social behavior. With these has come a fresh appreciation of the role of the barbarians of Inner Asia in Chinese history.2 All such theories assume, of course, that the record of events is still basic to our understanding. While conceptual schemes can inspire and guide research, they are not meant to substitute for it. The meagreness of our knowledge of modern China leaves us still in the stage of descriptive por￾traiture. Exactly how the men and events, the personalities and circum￾stances, the data and interpretations should be combined to form our picture of modern China's contact with the West is a problem of artistic composi￾tion more than of scientific measurement. Theories are not self-evident, any more than facts can speak for themselves. Our understanding of China must be accumulated painstakingly and in detail, through monographic re￾search on one aspect of the record after another. Not having a final formula for Chinese society, we can hardly invent one for China's response to the stimulus of Western contact,3 yet certain points may be,noted. First, in the expansion of the Western state system during recent centuries, the incorporation of China into this nascent world order has proved unusually difficult. China's political behavior has not easily been assimilated to that of the West, presumably because of the difference in her institutions. Second, the so-called Western "impact" on China has been a stimulus rather than a shattering blow. Personal contact in treaty ports and mission stations, material changes in economic life and social custom, have led to the eventual metamorphosis of Chinese institu￾tions. But this modernization has been effected by the Chinese people through the adjustment of their own ways; it has not been simple westerni￾zation. Third, the response has worked both ways. In the hybrid society of the treaty ports, Western forms of law, finance, industry, and individualism have been subtly modified: the treaty ports have represented not the Western way of life transplanted to the China coast so much as China's accommodation to the Westerner and his ways. The handful of foreigners CHINA'S RESPONSE TO THE WEST 7 in the ports adjusted their lives to Chinese conditions. Your genuine Shang￾hailander was really a half-breed, typical of neither East nor West. In the course of decades the new stimuli operating through the treaty ports led China into revolution. The response to the West upset traditional patterns of behavior which went far back into the past. Other great develop￾ments had indeed occurred throughout China's far from static history, but down to the nineteenth century they had all remained within a distinctive and persistent Chinese pattern. Thus repetitive phenomena like the political cycle of dynastic disintegration, warlordism, and re-unification had all taken place within the unshaken framework of the Confucian culture. Similarly the pattern of China's foreign relations with the barbarians of Inner Asia had been manifested inside the structure of the universal Con￾fucian monarchy. Although Western contact eventually destroyed this old political and cultural framework, the first phase in China's response to the West was neither inaction nor innovation, but merely repetition of the established pattern of behavior. In short, the first overt Chinese activity in the begin￾ning of Sino-Western relations was to apply to the West those traditional attitudes which were already inbred within the Chinese way of life. This was to treat the West as though it were not the West at all, but merely a new form of Inner Asian barbarian. This conditioned reflex made China's adjustment to the West much more difficult than it might otherwise have been. If the British barbarians had been an entirely unprecedented phenomenon in Chinese life, the Manchu rulers of the day might easily have formed a fresh and realistic view of them. Unfortunately, this was impossible because the British (Ying-i) were the unwitting inheritors of the status which had been reserved for barbarians (I) in Chinese society since time immemorial. Age-old stereotypes took the place of a creative response. The first step in understanding the Western influence on China is, there￾fore, to understand the traditional role of the barbarian in Chinese society. The most cursory glance at this subject will indicate that the barbarians of , Inner Asia had played a constant and, indeed, an integral part, in the long history of the Chinese people. Their experience had included not only re￾current phenomena like the dynastic cycle but also the recurrent phenomena of barbarian conquest. Doubtless these rhythms were not so regular and uniform as Chinese scribes have liked to assume. Yet the rise and fall of dynasties were expected, like the waxing and waning of the seasons, and have formed the main theme of the Chinese dynastic chronicles. Modern his￾torians may be interested less in the obvious existence of these broad rhythms than in their multiplicity and interaction; China's history gives us today an oversupply rather than a lack of patterns. Nevertheless, since