19
The Treedty Po~t Prm dnd the Hundred THOMAS R. Cox’ N July 11, 1898, while the imperial Chinese government was in the midst of that frantic, eleventh-hour attempt at reordering the nation that we have come to know as the Hundred Days Reforms, the Peking correspondent of the North China Heruld reported that all was quiet in the Chinese capital. Indeed, he noted, things were so tranquil that the corre- spondent for the Times of London had taken the opportunity to slip away to Japan for a vacati0n.l Ten days later the HeruZd’s correspondent again reported that little of interest was transpir- ing.2 If these dispatches were illustrative only of the reportorial myopia of the correspondents for the North China Herald and the Times they would hardly be worthy of notice. However, they reveal an obliviousness to developments in the internal affairs of China that was almost universal in the foreign communities in China at the time and a communications gap between the Chinese and Western worlds that has complicated relations between the two from that time to t h k 3 This paper seeks to demonstrate that in 1898 this communications gap was even wider than has generally been recognized and resulted not just from the nature 0 The author is Professor of History at San Diego State University. An earlier version of this article was presented before the Pacific Coast Branch, AHA, in Portland in the fall of 1970. 1 Shanghai North China Hriuld and Supreme Court and Consular Gazette [hereafter NCH], July 18, 1898. NCH, August 1, 1898. “s Alexander Michie put it in 1900: “International comity is seen to have made no progress in sixty years; on the contrary the gulf that divides China from the woild yawns wider than ever, of which a striking example is afforded by the telegrams lately exchanged between the Chinese and German Emperors. They speak in tongues unknown to one another and are mutually unintelligible, so that they have no common ground but that of hrute force.” See: Alexander Michie, The Englishnzan in China during the Victorian E m (Edinburgh, 1900), 11. 435 82

The Treaty Port Press and the Hundred Days Reforms: A Cross-Cultural Credibility Gap

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The Treedty Po~ t Prm dnd the Hundred

THOMAS R. Cox’

N July 11, 1898, while the imperial Chinese government was in the midst of that frantic, eleventh-hour attempt at reordering the nation that we have come to know as the Hundred Days Reforms, the Peking correspondent of the

North China Heruld reported that all was quiet in the Chinese capital. Indeed, he noted, things were so tranquil that the corre- spondent for the Times of London had taken the opportunity to slip away to Japan for a vacati0n.l Ten days later the HeruZd’s correspondent again reported that little of interest was transpir- ing.2 If these dispatches were illustrative only of the reportorial myopia of the correspondents for the North China Herald and the Times they would hardly be worthy of notice. However, they reveal an obliviousness to developments in the internal affairs of China that was almost universal in the foreign communities in China at the time and a communications gap between the Chinese and Western worlds that has complicated relations between the two from that time to t h k 3 This paper seeks to demonstrate that in 1898 this communications gap was even wider than has generally been recognized and resulted not just from the nature

0

The author is Professor of History at San Diego State University. An earlier version of this article was presented before the Pacific Coast Branch, AHA, in Portland in the fall of 1970.

1 Shanghai North China Hriuld and Supreme Court and Consular Gazette [hereafter N C H ] , July 18, 1898.

NCH, August 1, 1898. “s Alexander Michie put i t in 1900: “International comity is seen to have

made no progress in sixty years; on the contrary the gulf that divides China from the woild yawns wider than ever, of which a striking example is afforded by the telegrams lately exchanged between the Chinese and German Emperors. They speak in tongues unknown to one another and are mutually unintelligible, so that they have no common ground but that of hrute force.” See: Alexander Michie, T h e Englishnzan in China during the Victorian E m (Edinburgh, 1900), 11. 435

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r - Ireaty Port Press of the Chinese and Western communities of the day, but from the nature of the treaty port press as well.*

Study of the English-language newspapers published on the China Coast during the late nineteenth century reveals that they differed markedly one from another. The four papers analyzed in this study- the North China Herald, Peking and Tientsin Times, China Mail, and Hongkong Weekly Press - each reflected the views of its editor. The treaty port press, like the treaty port communities themselves, presented no unified front, either in China or in their relations with the British government. Now that these once-fugitive papers are available on microfilm, histor- ians will surely use them with greater frequency. To do so effectively, researchers will need to appreciate the differences among them.

But if there was variation among the newspapers, there was also much they had in common. Indeed, on initial examination, the similarities seem to dominate. Most clearly in evidence was their lack of knowledge or understanding of Chinese political affairs once more.6 Whatever else may be charged to the Empress of developments in Peking during the Hundred Days, wrote that changes in personnel and the imperial edicts being promulgated indicated that Tz’u-hsi, the Empress Dowager, was directing affairs once more.6 Whatever else may be charged to the Empress Dowager, formulating the reforms of the Hundred Days is clearly

*For simplicity’s sake the term treaty port is used in this paper to include Hong Kong in spite of its technical status as a colony.

SThe North China Herald and Hongkong Weekly Press published daily editions and the China Mail a weekly edition under other titles. These had the same editors and positions as the editions used in this study. Other English-language newspapers were also published in the treaty ports during the Hundred Days. Apparently no copies of two put out in Shanghai during 1898 have survived, though copies do exist for other years. They were the Shanghai Mercury (weekly edition entitled the Celestial Empire) and the China Gazette. I t is especially unfortunate that no copies for 1898 are extant, for the management of the Mercury and Celestial Empire was among the first to hire a Chinese reporter and translator and may have been pro-American, while the China Gazette had distinguished itself from its competitors by its objective coverage of the Sino-Japanese War. It seems these papers might have reacted differently to the Hundred Days than the papers used in this study. One separately edited paper still extant has not been drawn upon. Files of the Hongkong Telegraph covering the period of this paper are available in Hong Kong and London. The paper has not yet been microfilmed. See: Frank H. H. King (ed.) and Prescott Clarke, A Research Guide to China-Coast Newspapers, 1822-1911 (Cambridge, Mass., 1965), 71-72, 84-89, 174, 179; W. H. Donald, “The Press,” in Arnold Wright, ed,, Twentieth Century Impressions of Hongkong, Shanghai, and other Treuty Ports of China (London, 1908), 354, 360.

BNCH, June 27, 1898; Hongkong Weekly Press and China Overland Trade Report [hereafter HWP], Aug. 23, 1898; Hong Kong China Mail [hereafter CMJ July 1 , 1898.

The Historian not among them. Similarly, though the Chinese correspondent in Peking for the North Chiiiu Herald reported during the first month of the Hundred Days that a major program of reform was being instituted, the Peking and Tientsin Times, a paper whose editor took pride in being in close touch with developments in the imperial capital, expressed doubt.7 More than a month later, the Tientsin paper finally reported that inlportarlt changes seemed underway in the capital, but confessed uncertainty as to what or why. As the editor put it:

A strange and wearying monotony seems to have fallen on parliamentary debate and international relations, and here [in China], where news is at all times shy and elusive as the antelope, absolute vacuity has been the order of the day. . . . In spite of, and perhaps because of thesc unpromising exterior signs, we have no hestitation in stating that there has been within the past few months very considerable movement in Peking, and within the last few days it has culminated in something like a crisis.

Having sensed activity, the editor suggested that it undoubtedly sprang from the struggle between Britain and Russia for domin- ance in China.b Not until September 17, just four days before a cozip d‘Ctat by the Empress Dowager brought the movement to an end, did the paper identify the Emperor as the source of a comprehensive program of reform. Even then the reports were sketchy. “Every day,” the editor wrote, “seems to emphasize the fact that a restraining hand has been somewhere withdrawn from the precincts of the Throne, and the Emperor is obeying an instinct which makes distinctly for reform.”Q Only after their ouster from positions of influence did the paper identify Kang Yu-wei and his circle as central figures in the short-lived attempt at reform.l0 Not all the papers of the foreign communities of China were so slow in recognizing that reform was underway, but even in the most perceptive there were long delays before the reform program was recognized and between events and their reportage.

‘Tientsin Peking and Tients tn Times [hereafter PTT] , July 9, 1898 aPTT, Aug. 13, 1898. “ P T T , Sept. 18, 1898. Even after detecting thal reL‘oriu Has being attempted,

the editor of the Tientsin paper felt that reform edicts were “not worth the paper they are written on.” See: Chinese Recorder and Missionary Journal (Shanghai),

lo PTT, Sept. 24, 1898. According to one contemporary observer, this blindness was not shared by the Chinese people who “undeistood very clearly the grand objectives. . .*’ of the reformers. See: Lim Boon-keng. The Chtiiese Crisis from Wzthtn (London, 1901), 60.

Personnel changes were reported soon after the fact, other items took longer. Translations of important edicts took two, three, or even more ueeks to appear.

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XXIX (Oct. 1898), 502-503.

Treaty Port Press I t was not that the editors and reporters of the China-Coast

papers opposed reform in China. -4s Alexander Michie, retired editor of the Chinese T imes of Tientsin, observed, by 1898 reform

had been preached continuously to China from every foreign pulpit for forty years. “Reform or Perish” was the regular formula - words so easily written that no resident, tourist, publicist, foreign official, or any one with a pen or tongue, refrained from repeating them continually. l2

The treaty port press had joined in the cry and, with varying degrees of faith that such might in fact be the case, occasionally reported signs that seemed to indicate reform was at last on the way. For example, on June 11, 1898, the very day the Hundred Days Reforms began, the Peking and Tientsin Times hailed the reinstating of Wu Mao-ting, a pro-British compradore for the Hong Kong and Shanghai Bank, as managing director of imperial railroads in North China. Such actions, the paper commented, had a way of raising hopes that China’s government had embarked on the path to progressive, modern government. 13

The fact that the Peking and Tientsin T imes chose to cite Wu’s reappointment as a major victory for reform illustrates the editor’s limited understanding. Wu was a minor figure, at best: more importantly, when Wu was named to head the new Bureau of Agriculture two months later, no less an authority than K’ang Yu-wei looked on the appointment not as a victory for reform, but as a setback.l*

This time lag ‘became less toward the end of the Hundred Days as editors became aware that important events were taking place in Peking. ‘The Hongkong Weekly Press was the first paper to report t h a t the Emperor was atkmptiirg reform, but in the weeks that followed showed no awareness that the attempt was continuing. The initial report of June 25 stands as an isolated piece in its pages. Two days later, the North China Herald reported that politics in the capital were in turmoil, but failed to pinpoint what was taking place. On July 25 the Herald explicitly mentioned K’ang Yu-wei‘s influence on the reforms coming from the capital. It was the first paper to do so and throughout the Hundred Days proved the most perceptive regarding events in Peking. Even including the Herald, however, following a rash of reports triggered by personnel changes in June, very little appeared on developments in Peking until mid-August and September as the Hundred Days approached its climax.

’”Michie, Englishman in China, 11, 457. On Michie arid his highly regarded paper, see Kiiig axid Clarke, Resecrch Guide to China-Coast Newspapers, 98-99, 137; 0. D. Rasmussen, Tientsin, A n Zllustrated Outline History (Tientsin, 1925), 85; Thomas Ming-heng Chao, T h e Foreign Press of China (Shanghai, 1931), 55-56;.

I3PTT, June 11, 1898. See also: PTT, Aug. 27, Sept. 24, Oct. 8 and 15, 1898; Yokohama Japan Weekly Mail, July 2, 1898; Jung-pang Lo, r a n g f’u-wei: A Biography and a Symposium (Tucson, 1967), 510.

LO, K‘ang Yu-wei, 111, 113. At this point the Peking and Tientsin Times repeated its earlier endorsement of Wu. As the editor put it, “The Emperor, who

85

The Historian Misunderstanding of the roles of individual Chinese in the

affairs of state was common in the China-Coast press. Papers con- sistently excoriated Weng T’ung-ho for being a foe of reform. When Wens was forced from office in June, the press applauded. T h e disgraced ofiicial, the North China Herald explained, was “a Conservative of the Conservatives.” T h e Herald expressed hope that “his retirement means a more liberal regime at Peking,” but doubted that such would be the case; more than the removal of one man was necessary to “effect any revolution in such an invertebrate organism as directs the destiny of China.”I5 T h e Peking and Tientsin Times was equally elated. Weng was

a passive but chronic antidote to progress and improvement, no matter what its guise. His conservatism, or rather mulish adher- ence to the prejudices of his forebears, does not appear to have been tempered by events which have taken place in China of late, and he appears to have passed unscathed through a wave of changing thought whirh has not been without its effect on less obstinate minds. . . . One thing we may rest assured of; bad as the Aegean [sic] stable may be, it contains few more obstinate and obstructive occupants than the one of whose presence it has just been relieved. Ie

Such was hardly the case. Although Weng may not have been as dedicated to reform and as responsible for the rise to power of K’ang Yu-wei as some scholars have thought, i t seems clear that the Sino-Japanese war had opened his eyes to the necessity of reform. l7

T h e China-Coast papers were also mistaken in their estimates of Li Hung-chang. By 1895 Li had lost most of the power he had once possessed, but the edtiors of the China-Coast newspapers

seems to possess a surprising knowledge of affairs, has, we think, addressed the proper man in naming Wu director of railroads, as there is no other official who has so thoroughly an insight into Chinese and foreign financial and mercantile business. . . .” PTT, July 23, 1898. See also: Hosea Ballou Morse, The International Relations of the Chinese Empire (Shanghai, 1918), 111, 148; J. 0. P. Bland and E. Backhouse, China Under the Empress Dowager (London, 1911), 194; Wright, Twentieth Century Impressions, 754; Rasmussen, Tientsin, 268-69: Yen-p’ing Hao. “A ‘New Clasy‘ in China’s Treaty Ports: The Rise of the Comprador-Merchants,” Business History Review, X L I V (1970), 454-56.

N C H , June 20, 1898. Cf. NCH, Nov. 22, 1895, June IS and 27, 1898; HWP, June 25, 1898.

IePTT, June 25, 1898. See also: PTT, June 18, 1898; CM, July 19, 1898. Fang Chao-ying, “Weng T’ung-ho,” in Arthur W. Hummel, ed., Eminenl

Chinese of the Ch’ing Period (Washington, 1913-44), 860-61; Ping-ti Ho, “Weng T’ung-ho and the One-Hundred Days of Reform,” Far Eastern Quarterly, X (1951), 125-35. See also: Kung-chuan Hsiao, “Weng T’ung-ho and the Reform Movement of 1898,” Tsing HiLa Journal of Chinese Studies, New Series, I (1957), 111-245; Lim, Chinese Crisis from Within, 107-120.

SG

Treaty Port Press continued to attribute great influence to him. When Li lost his position on the Board of Foreign Affairs in September, they felt certain it marked a turning point in Chinese politics. As the Nongkong Weekly Press put it, “Li’s fall from power is the one topic of conversation in political circles”; his removal made hope of reform in China “much brighter.” The North China Herald agreed: Li had “even fewer scruples than the ordinary Chinese statesman”; so long as such a man dominated affairs in China there was little hope for reform. Is Such accounts attributed more influence to Li than he had in fact; he was little more than a spectator to the events of the Hundred Days.19

Not just individuals were falsely categorized. When Kang and his fellow reformers established the Society to Preserve the Nation (Pao-kua Hui), a correspondent for the North China Herald reported from Peking in alarm. He wrote that the organization had sprung up in reaction to the looting of a Confucian temple by German soldiers; its aim was to sweep the country of foreign influence. 2o Though the paper’s Chinese correspondent in Peking sent an accurate assessment of the organization and the two reports were published in the same issue of the paper, it was the inaccurate account that seemed to the paper’s editor to have the ring of truth. When he announced the organization’s demise in June, the editor repeated the charge that it was anti-foreign, added that an imperial investigation had established that there was no truth to the charge of desecration by German soldiers, and commented that the “story was invented by someone who knows how to fire the Chinese heart.” Now that the falsity of the charges was clear, the editor went on to say, those who had signed the memorial which the leaders of the organization had sent to the emperor were ashamed of having done so. 21 The assessment was manifestly inaccurate. Far from being ashamed of having memorialized for reforms,

IsHWP, Sept. 17 and 24, 1898; N C H , Sept. 13, 1898. See also: PTT, July 2, Aug. 6, Sept. 10 and 24, Oct. 1, 1898; NCH, May 23, Sept. 5 and 26, Oct. 3, 1898; HWP, Sept. 10, 1898; CM, July 9, Aug. 23, Sept. 9, 12, and 24, 1898; Japan Weekly Mail, Sept. 17, 18‘38. Only two days before his dismissal from the Tsungli Yamen, the North China Herald had referred to Li as a leader among “those who really wield the power of the Empire in Peking.” See: N C H , Sept. 5, 1898.

lnStanley Spector s u g p t s that the reformers viewed Li as a hindrance to the fulfillment of their plans and were responsible for his removal from the Tsungli Yamen. Perhaps so, but regardless of how the reformers viewed him, Li had little power by 1898. See: Stanley Spector, Li Hungchang and the Huai Army (Seattle, 1964), 264-66; Kenneth E. Folsom, Friends, Guests, and Colleagues (Berkeley, 1968), 288-89 and passim. Cf. Lim, Chinese Crisis from Within, 223-36.

2o N C H , May 16, 1898. See also: John Schrecker, “The Pao-kuo Hui: A Reform Society of 1898,” Papers on China, no. 14 (1960).

Z’NCH, June 6, 1898.

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T h e Historian K’ang I’u-wei and his supporters, who were on the eve of being given freedom to institute the programs for which they had pleaded, were to welcome the opportunity to do so when it came a few days later.

Once they recognized that changes were underway in the imperial capital, the China-Coast press more often than not misinterpreted what lay behind them. On July 2 the North China Daily News printed a dispatch from its Chinese correspondent in Peking telling of the reform activity. The Peking and Tientsirz 2.i7nes expressed doubt. As the editor put it: “we fear the wish is father to the thought. The change the writer depicts is too good and too sudden . . . to be true.” However, if reform really was underway, it must result from Chinese officials at last recog- nizing Russia’s intentions of taking over Chinese territory, on the one hand, and Britain’s disinterested friendship for China, on the other. Under those circumstances, the paper forecast, China would soon dismiss all but British military advisers.22 In the same issue, the Peking and Tientsin T imes reported that a Chinese official had proposed a bureau to organize and control railroads and mines within the empire. To the editor such a proposal seemed designed to frustrate foreign control, a xenophobic reaction rather than genuine reform, and was “hardly practicable.” T w o weeks later, commenting on reports that the Chinese govern- nient was so pleased with the Chinese Progress, pubIished in Shanghai by Chinese reformers, that “it is contemplated to change the name and make it a government organ,” the editor of the Tientsin paper suggested that the action might well be planned, not because the journal had gained imperial favor, but to muzzle it. 23

The China Gazette (Shanghai) was no more adept at divining the forces behind the reforms. During June the paper noted edicts and appointments that seemed to indicate “feverish activity” on the part of the emperor. This unwonted activity must result, the editor wrote, from the influence Prince Henry of Prussia had on the Emperor during his recent visit to Pekingz4

Nor was inaccuracy a monopoly of the newspapers of the treaty ports. In its issue of August 1898, the Chinese Recorder, a missionary journal published monthly in Shanghai, discussed “the colossal changes which are coming over China.” Though the assessment ~7as markedly different from that in the newspapers,

= P T T , July 9, 1898. 2a PTT, July 23, 1898. On the Chinese Progress, see: Roswell S. Britton, Chinese

Periodical Press (Shanghai, 1933), 92-94. %Reprinted in HWP, June 2.5, 1898. On the China Gazette, see above, note 5.

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Treaty Port Press it showed no greater grasp of the situation. T h e journal correctly assessed the impact the proposed reforms in the examination system would have if implemented and recognized that K’ang Yu-wei was behind them, but went on to say that, now that the “bubble of orthodoxy has been pricked” by the imperial edict changing the examination system, “scholars will all readily fall in with any abuse which can be heaped upon the defunct derelict.” There was “no possibility” of the old system being reinstated. 26

The September issue of the Chinese Recorder (which went to press before the end of the reform movement) stated that follow- ing the death of Prince Kung the Empress Dowager had taken control of the government and reform was the result. The journal repeated its prediction of August: “The avalanche has begun to move, and its onward course is irresistible.”26 Both the Ckinese Recorder and the China Mail tended to view Western secular knowledge and Christianity as inseparable. When the Hundred Days Reforms came to an abrupt end, the Mail reported that the Emperor had proposed making Christianity the state religion and had, thereby, triggered the reaction. That a program of secular reforms should lead to the adoption of Christianity seemed reasonable to the Alnil. 27

Not until after the coup d’e‘tat by the Empress Dowager brought the Hundred Days Reforms to an end, did fairly complete and accurate reports come to dominate in the pages of the China-Coast press. When Kang Yu-wei reached Shanghai on his flight to safety and gave an insider’s account of what had been transpiring, the editors at last recognized the true nature of the movement.28 They did so without ever acknowledging their earlier misinforma- tion and failures of interpretation.

But, if throughout the Hundred Days the English-language publications in China displayed a lack of knowledge of what was taking place in the imperial capital and a general inability to

25 Chinese Recorder, XXIX (Aug. 1898), 396-97. See also: Chinese Recorder, XXIX (Sept. 1898), 449-50. The North China Herald gave credit for the reform of the exaniination system to Chang Chih-tung and Chen Pao-chen. Though both men did contribute to reform of the examinations, Chang favored a more deliberate overall program than that of K’ang and the Emperor. The Herald did not yet recognize that K’ang Yu-wei, as well as Chang and Chen, had a role in pushing this reform or that he was the key figure in the overall reform program. See: NCH, Aug. 1, Sept. 5, 1898; Meribeth Cameron, “Chang Chih-tung,” in Hummel, Eminent Chinese of the Ch’ing Period, 30; Lim, Chinese Crisis from Within, 210-222.

pB Chinese Recorder, XXIX (Sept. 1898), 415-417. C M , Sept. 26, 1898. Cf. Lim, Chinese Crisis from Within , 60-61. Though the general outline and importance of what had been transpiring

were quickly recognized by the editors after the coup, much misinformation and wild speculation continued to circulate in the treaty port communities and to make their way into the press.

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The Historian assess properly that information which was obtained, what were the reasons for this state of affairs? The answer is multipartite.

The nature of politics in the Chinese capital was one obvious and important barrier to understanding. Except for a few insiders, no one, whether Chinese or Western, could ever be sure of what was going on in the inner circles of the government. The China Mail characterized Peking as a “Kangaroo-pouch . . . [from] which only occasional squeaks . . . [reach] the outer world.” I t was an apt description. 29

A second barrier to understanding was the fact that the reformers made little effort to elicit foreign support. As Meribeth Cameron has observed, such a course

was perhaps the last expedient which would have occurred to them. The “battle of the concessions” was the background for the “Hundred Days”; the powers seemed to leer at China, waiting like ogres to devour her. 30

Under the circumstances, there was as much reason to avoid as to seek foreign support. In addition, the reFormers appear to have intentionally avoided soliciting foreign support so as not to give the powerful Summer Palace faction an excuse for denouncing them. Since they were not seeking aid from foreigners, the leaders of the reform movement made no effort to keep foreigners informed of what was taking place in Peking. Moreover, Timothy Richard, the person best qualified to serve as an effective and trusted intermediary between reformers and Westerners and a man who would probably have kept the foreign communities informed of the course of events regardless of whether K’ang Yu-wei and his circle had felt the need of foreign support, was in no position to serve in that capacity at the time of the Hundred Days. He had left for England on a two-year furlough from his missionary activities in the fall of 1896 and did not return to China until mid-June 1598. By the time he reached Peking, the fate of the Hundred Days was sealed.31

m C M , Aug. 31, 1898. 80 Meribeth E. Cameron, T h e Reform Movement in China, 1898-1912 (Stanford,

SIWiSliam E. Soothill, Timothy Richard of China (London, 1924), 235 and passim; Timothy Richard, M y Forty-five Years in China (New York, 1916), 266 and passim; Lo, K‘ang Yu-we i , 127; Bert Hideo Kikuchi, “Timothy Richard‘s Influence on the Missionary Movement and Chinese Reform in Late Ch’ing China” (unpub- lished thesis, University of Oregon, 1969), 86-91. In addition to serving as intermediary, Richard might have served as a moderating influence who could have helped the reformers avoid some of the excesses that hurried their downfall. It has also been suggested that, had Prince Kung lived or Weng T’ung-ho remained in office, they might have performed a similar service. See: Cameron, The Reform Movement in China, 35; Fang, “Weng T’ung-ho,” 861.

1931), 50-51.

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Treaty Port Press But more was involved than the nature of Chinese politics,

fear of foreign encroachment, and the absence of Timothy Richard. There were barriers to understanding in Hong Kong and the treaty ports as well as in Peking.

Of key importance was the ethnocentricity of nearly all of the Westerners resident in China at the time, an ethnocentricity manifested in countless ways on countless occasions both in the treaty port press and elsewhere. Though the editors of the treaty port papers were in general agreement that China needed thoroughgoing reform, they believed that such reforms could only be carried to successful conclusion under the aegis of Western nations - preferably Britain. The Chinese, it was agreed, were incapable of accomplishing the task themselves. The China Mail believed the Chinese people were ready for reforms, but that the literati saw reform as a threat. Opposition from these wielders of power assured the failure of reform. Indeed, the state of the Chinese government was so bad, the editor felt, that only the British-run Imperial Maritime Customs had prevented its collapse years before. 32 Similarly, the Hongkong Weekly Press argued that the Chinese would not carry out reform “unless prompt and vigorous remedies are supplied by the patient’s friends.” Unlike Turkey, China could not be strengthened without foreign leader- ship. Britain’s announced policy of encouraging the advancement of China under Chinese direction

means in plain language the development of China under British influence and control, and unless British statesmen are prepared to accept the natural responsibilities of that policy they had better frankly abandon it and let the Chinese Empire fall to pieces. 33

The North China Herald agreed. That the Chinese could provide the impetus necessary for reform was deemed “an impossibility” as late as August 29. One week later, having taken cognizance of the reforms being attempted in Peking, the editor changed his immediate position, if not his basic belief that reform without outside help was doomed to failure. He proposed that Great Britain call an international conference with the aim of extending aid to China for a period of ten years or, if the Chinese government abandoned reform, of partitioning the country. As the editor explained:

‘I’he Conference . . . would put fresh heart into the reformers in China, as it would give them an unanswerable argument why the reforms they propose should be carried out; it would

“ C M , June 13 and 14, 1898. “ W W P , May 28, July 23, 1898.

The Historian strengthen the hands oE the Emperor himself; i t would be the first step . . . in the real recovery of

The Pek ing and T i e n t s i n Times saw China’s only choice as between help from Britain and absorption by Russia. 35

A natural concomitant of underestirnating China’s ability to shape its own destiny was overestimating the influence of Western- ers. I t was assumed the Chinese government had long been acting primarily in response to pressures from the powers and that it would continue to do so. Li Hung-chang’s ouster from office in September was seen as evidence that Sir Claude MacDonald, the British minister to China, had brought such pressure to bear that the government had acquiesced in Li’s removal. It was believed that the removal clearly demonstrated that Britain’s influence was on the ascendancy in Pelting, and, since Li was thought to be a servant of Russia, that the czar’s influence was on the wane. 30

None of the papers gave serious consideration to the possibility that Li was removed as a result of domestic factors. Similarly, when the Hundred Days was brought to an abrupt end, reports that Russia was behind the coup circulated in the foreign com- munities. A columnist for the China M a i l wrote, “it would not surprise me if, before many months, we saw a few thousand Russian troops in Peking to ‘preserve order’. . . .”37 Meanwhile observers in Peking dismissed the LOUP as of little importance. I t was merely “one 01 those palace intrigues that. . . take place in every Oriental country from time to time.”3H What a revealing pair of interpre- tations! Either the coup was important because an Occidental power was behind it, or it was unimportant because i t was wholly Oriental. 39

Overestimating the importance of Occidental forces in China contributed to the tendency to watch the activities of rival Western powers with greater care than those of: the government of China.

aaNCH, Sept. 5 , 1898. =PPTT, July 2, 1898. m P T T , Sept. 10, 1898; HWP, Sept. 10 and 24, 1898; N C H , Sept. 12, 1898, CM,

Sept. 9 and 13, 1898. 87 C M , Sept. 24, 1898. See also: CM, Sept. 26, 1898; N C H , Sept. 26, Oct. 3, 1898;

H W P , Oct. 1, 1898. For a summary of similar reactions of Japaiiese papers, see: Japan W.trrekly Mail, Oct. 1, 1898.

S8PTT, Sept. 24, 1898. 5 J T h a n k ~ to the information from K’ang and other reformers, the editors of

the China-Coast nenspapers discounted such interpretations. They now recognized that impirtant events had taken place in the capital and applauded the purposes (if riot the political acumen) of the reform leaders. This was ex post fucto support, however; there is no evidence indicating they lent any significant support to the reformeis while they were in power. Michie appears to have erred when he implied otherwise. See: Michie, Englishman in China, 11, 459.

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Treaty Port Press Concern over the ambitions of Russia - one might even say Russo- phobia - had been cOmmon among the British for years. Russian activities in the north of China during the months immediately preceding the Hundred Days strengthened this fear. The result was that the treaty port press often treated reports from Peking as little more than evidence of the course of the Anglo-Russian struggle for dominance. The Peking and Tientsin Times was especially guilty of this intellectual tunnel vision, perhaps because the community for which the paper spoke, being on the northern frontier of British influence, seemed especially vulnerable. The issue of September 3 contained a typical statement: since the future of the country would be determined by the struggle for dominance between Britain and Russia, decisions reached in the capitals of those two powers, not those reached by the government in Peking, were of paramount importance. 4O The Hongkong Daily Press shared this concern over Russia, but warned that, while all eyes had been focused on the north, France had been making advances in the south. The paper warned that Britain might awake to find Hong Kong isolated from the interior by a French sphere of influence. 41 In the south, just as in the north, the conviction that what Westerners did was more important than what the imperial government of China did was dominant. When American newspaperman Carl Crow arrived in Hong Kong shortly after the turn of the century, he noted that

the four hundred million who made up the population of the empire comprised an unknown and forgotten group of indi- viduals whose lives were of no importance [to residents of the foreign communities] except as they impinged on the lives of some member or group of the white race.

A British reporter justified to Crow the absence of news of Chinese affairs in the treaty-port press by arguing that “the only important people in China are the Manchus and they don’t do anything but collect taxes, and most of them live in Peking and the telegraph tolls are high.”42 That the holders of such views should have failed to properly assess reports of reform activity in Peking is hardly surprising.

An additional barrier to understanding was the small number of individuals contributing information to the China-Coast papers. The North China Herald, which appears to have had the largest

“ P T T , Sept. 3, 1898. See also: PTT, July 2 and 30, Aug. 6 and 13, Sept. 10 and 24, 1898.

Hongkong Daily Press, Sept. 5, 1898. dCat-1 Crow, China Takes Her Place (New York, 1944), 3-8. Cf. H. G. W.

Woodhead, Adventures i n Far Eastern Journalism (Tokyo, 1935), 2-6; Chao, Foreign Press in China, 8-12.

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The Historian staff, apparently had only two regular correspondents in Peking. One was Chinese, the other Caucasian: neither appears to have devoted full time to ferreting out the news. As late as 1908 the editor of the Hongkong Weekly Press had only two reporters under him. The two appear to have spent almost all their time covering the foreign community of Hong Kong: court cases, social and sporting events, and actions by the municipal government and Occidental business interests. Except for items of this sort and dispatches from correspondents, almost all original material in this and other China-Coast papers, especially editorial comment, bears the mark of the editors.

T o help fill their columns (as well as to provide a wider range of interpretation, perhaps), the papers borrowed heavily from one another. The intellectual inbreeding that resulted buttressed the ethnocentricity with which the editors were affiicted, an ethno- centricity that the limited number of man-hours directed toward analyzing events in Peking was too small to overcome.43

In spite of their similarities, in spite of barriers to accurate assessment that faced them all, the treaty port press was made up of individual publications, each reflecting the view of its editor. The conceptions which the various editors had of China plaved a major role in determining how they interpreted the news: since conceptions differed, so, too, did interpretations.

AF has been indicated, the Peking and Tients in T imes was so concerned with the Anglo-Russian rivalry that all events tended to be seen in the light of that contest. The Hongkong Weekly Press was equally convinced that the Chinese were incapable of solving their own problems and that Britain should fight if necessary to protect its interests in China. Little is known of George C . Cox, who apparently edited both the Hongkong Weekly Press and its daily edition for publisher Daniel Warres Smith, but Cox’s position was consistent with the paper’s long-time policy. The paper had begun, a rival editor noted in 1908, as “a shipping paper . . . and as a shipping and commercial paper it still chiefly claims pre-eminence among its contemporaries.” Each page showed “its acknowledged status as a caterer to serious-minded men of business and affairs.” Cox’s argument that Britain must protect its interests in China found ready support among such readers.44

Unlike the Peking and Tients in Times, the Hongkong Weekly

“For a more detailed discussion of the nature of the foreign-language press of the China Coast, see: King and Clarke, Research Guide to China-Coast Newspapers, 5-14, 25 31 and pnsszm; Donald, “The Press,” 343-49, 354 55.

44 Donald, “The Press,” 350. See a h , King and Clarke, Researrh Guzde to China-Coust Newspapers, 64-67, 119; Nathan A Pelcovits, Old Chzna Hands and the Forezgn Offzce ( N e w York, 1948). 181 and passzm

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Treaty Port Press Press argued that the best course for Britain was to join in parti- tioning China. As Cox put it, since partitioning of the empire “is plainly approaching,” Britain should move quickly to secure what it requires and let the rest go, rather than run the risk of losing the whole “by attempting to resist the inevitable” by buttressing the regime in Peking. Cox sought to win over those who feared that partition would reduce economic opportunity. It was possible to have political spheres and the economic open door, he argued; indeed, if Manchuria were under the Russians, it would be a better market for English goods than under the Chinese. 46

As a result of such views, Cox gave scant coverage to the events of the Hundred Days; the only detailed reports were articles reprinted from the North China Daily News (the daily edition of the North China Herald) and the China Gazette. Those items originating with the Hongkong Weekly Press during the period were primarily concerned with the impact events in Peking might have on the international rivalry and anticipated partitioning of China.40 When the reforms were brought to an end, Cox ran true to form. “The outcome [of crushing the reform movement],” he suggested, “may be the institution of some form of foreign control.” 47

Thomas 13. Reid, the Scottish-born editor and part-owner of the China Mail, also believed partition was imminent. He repeatedly criticized “the craze as to maintaining the Imperial Chinese system of Government.” Rather than seek to insure China’s territorial integrity - a policy Reid characterized as “weak, flabby, and inconsistent” - the British government should actively further the interests “of the enterprising British merchants. . . .” N o country had done as much for China or profitted so little, he argued; “our great diplomats and rulers have been willfully blind” and have decided every conflict in favor of the Chinese.48

Such views, as much as proximity, led the China Mail to devote

& H W P , March 19, Sept. 2, 1898. See also: HWP, March 5 and 12, May 28, June 25, July 23, 1898; Hongkong Daily Press, Sept. 5, 1898. In the aftermath of the Hundred Days, the daily edition proposed a modification of the usual schemes for partition; the powers should take it upon themselves to remove the capital to Nanking and there set u p a new government and dynasty. I t would appear that Cox anticipated that this government would be dominated by the British, the northern area would fall under Russian control, and perhaps parts of southern China would come under French control. See: Hongkong Daily Press, Oct. 8. 1898. Cf. “Old China Hand” to editor, H W P , Aug. 20, 1898.

4aHWP, June 25, July 23, Aug. 13, Sept. 17, 1898. 47HWP, Sept. 24, 1898. The editor of the Japan Weekly Mail agreed. “We

may be on the eve of events so stupendous that one almost shrinks from contem- plating them,” he wrote. See: Japan Weekly Mail, Oct. 8. 1898.

’ C M , May 26, June 13, 14, 22, and 25, July 28. 1898.

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The Historian more attention to negotiations for an addition to the British colony of Hong Kong than to Chinese politics. The paper consistently devoted attention to the international struggle for empire while largely ignoring the internal affairs of China. The activities of British forces in the Sudan received as much attention as the reform movement in Peking; the Spanish-American War, especially the contest in the Philippines, received far more. Most stories of developments among the Chinese told of riots, murders, and local uprisings - the sort of incidents that might be used to demonstrate the advisability, or even inevitability, of Western control over China.49 Though a few accurate reports of reform activity in Peking did appear in the China Mail, Reid’s attention was so fixed on the struggle for empire that he let them pass without comment. His focus remained elsewhere. Letters to the editor provide no evidence that his readers were any more perceptive than Reid.50 When talk of reform could no longer be ignored, Reid treated it contemptuously. “Reform indeed,” he wrote, “Much good this is likely to accomplish!” 61

Such views were undoubtedly supported by George Murray Bain, former editor and proprietor of the China Mail and now senior partner. Bain had vigorously fought Governor John Pope- Hennessy when the latter had tried during the period from 1577 to 1882 to extend rights to Hong Kong’s Chinese. Rights for Chinese, Bain had argued, would weaken British supremacy in the colony and encourage violence, corruption, and other evils. Individual Chinese were no more capable of handling the rights Pope-Hennessy wished to extend them than the government in Peking was of governing China fairly and effectively.

The position of Robert W. Little, editor of the North China Herald, was somewhat different from either that of Cox or Reid and Bain. Though not unconcerned over the ambitions of Bri- tain’s rival powers, Little gave primary emphasis to the need for internal reform - to be accomplished with the help of British advisers, of course. He gave favorable attention to Chang Chih-tung’s exhortations to reform. Chang asserted that the solution to China’s problems was self-reformation, Little wrote; the North China Herald, he added, agreed.53 Though he often

‘8For examples, see: CM, June 11 and 22, July 9, 13, and 28, Sept. 12, 1898.

61CM, Aug. 27, 1898. See also: Sept. 12, 1898. June 22 and 29, Aug. 10, 1898.

Donald, “The Press,” 347-49; James Pope-Hennessy, Verandah: Some Efiisodes in the Crown Colonies, 1867-1889 (London, 1964), 185-228; G. B. Endacott, A Htstory of Hong Kong (London, 1958). 178-79, 181.

g 5 N C H , Sept. 5, 1898. See also: NCH, May 23, Aug. 1, 1898; [China Mail], Who’s Who in the Fur East, 1906-7 (Hong Kong, 1906), 12, 553.

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Treaty Port Press expressed doubts that such reforms would occur, Little repeatedly spoke of reform, rather than partition or the defeat of Russia and outright British domination, as the route to China’s salvation. He pointed to three groups of Chinese as possible instruments for changing the country - the younger scholars (already active in the reform cause), the merchant class (unhappy with the exactions placed upon its members by the established leaders), and the treaty-port Chinese (whose eyes had been opened to the potential of Westernization). By contrast, the existing government was so reactionary and corrupt that its reformation was impossible. 54

Though the latter view caused Little to report victories of reformers in Peking with skepticism, the former assured that he followed events in the capital with more interest and reported them in more detail than did the papers in Hong Korig and Tientsin. 55 However, reports in the North China Herald, no less than those in the other papers, seem to have been intended more to demonstrate that what the editor had argued was true than to report arid accurately assess what was transpiring in the nation’s capital. Henry Woodhead, who joined the staff of Little’s North China Daily News not long after the Hundred Days, has left an account of the operation of Little’s Daily News and North China Herald that gives no hint of effort to penetrate the meaning of China’s domestic politics.56 As truly if not as openly as earlier, the China-Coast papers were organs for the expression of personal opinion more than impartial reporters and analyzers of the news. 57

Besides their differences over policies toward China, another difference existed among the publications of the treaty ports. The Peking and Tientsiiz Times reflected the views of the British community in northern China. Since the commercial community in the area was small, the paper’s concerns tended to be those of the diplomatic community in Peking and of British employed in the Imperial Maritime Customs and other agencies of the Chinese government. These quarters apparently provided the paper’s main sources of information. Clearly, it had ready access to them. Alice M. Vaughan-Smith, the editor, was the wife of W. I-I. Vaughan- Smith, manager of the Imperial Chinese Telegraph Administra- tion. In addition, William McLeish, later described as the one who actually controlled the paper’s editorial policy, was an

a N C H , Feb. 7, March 28, April 18, June 20, Oct. 10, 1898. For a recent work arguing that the treaty ports were forces for reform in China, see: Rhoads Murphey, Shanghai: Key to Modern China (Cambridge, Mass., 1953).

NCH, July 25, Aug. 15 and 29, Sept. 5, 12, and 19, 1898. In addition, small items reporting the “latest” edicts, etc., appeared in almost every issue.

68 Woodhead, Adventures in Far Eastern Journalism, 2-4, 6. 6 7 0 1 1 the earlier period, see: King and Clarke, Research Guide to China-Const

Newspapers, 7-10, 21-23, and passim.

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‘The Historian instructor at the Imperial Naval College. However, the diplomatic community in Peking had little other than formal diplomatic contact with educated Chincse, and there is no indication that Alice Vaughan-Smith or McLeish gained any particular insight into Chinese affairs through their semi-official contacts. 58 The Peki?hg ut id Tieli tsin T imes was as insulated from the political and intellectual curreim of China as the blissfully ignorant resi- dents of Legation Street. RU

By contrast the Chinu Mail, North China Herald, and Hong- fiong Weekly Press were organs for commercial, more than diplomatic interests. Their views seem to have been shaped more by what went on in Hong Iiong, Shanghai, and their hinterlands than by what transpired in Peking. As a result, they were in a position to be more informed than their northern counterpart on the activities of Chinese reformers, much of which had centered in the areas of Shanghai and Hong Kong-Canton. Having opportunity for more intimate knowledge of the Chinese reform movement and of the comparatively Westernized treaty-port Chinese, as well as more contacts with them, these papers gave areater attention to interiial affairs of the Middle Kingdom, even i f , as was the case with the C h h a Mail, the coverage was largely limited to stories of localized violence. The North Chinu Herald in particular did better than the Tientsin paper. I t had Chinese as we1 1 as Occidental correspondents, wrote with some knowledge of the activities and ideas of Sun Yat-sen, and regularly provided trailslations of what it judged to be interesting or important Chinese documents, especially imperial decrees. The Peking and I zentsin T imes , though closer to the imperial capital, often depended upon the Herald for translations of edicts from Peking; i t apparently had no Chinese correspondents.

The gulf between the diplomatic world of Peking and the

7 . .

‘* [b id . , 99, 158; Rasmusseri, Tientsin, 59-60, 109-111; Donald, “The Press,” 56.5-66; [China Mail], Who’s bVho in the Far Enst, 225, 325-26. T h e latter source scems to indicate that W. H. Vaughan-Smith did not become head of the Imperial ‘Telegraph Administration until 1902.

K!’ For descriptions of life in the diplomatic community of Peking, see: Michie, Englishman in China, 138-55 and Clive Bigham (2nd viscount Mersey), A Year in China, 1899-1700 (London, 1901), 39-50. I t has been argued that Sir Claude MacDonald, the British Minister in Peking, was niorc infolmed than most of the diplomatic community. This reputation may not have been deserved. He may simply have profitted from a favorable press because his views tended to parallel those of British merchants and the editors who spoke for them. Cf. Chl , Sept. 13, 18%; 2ara Steincr, T h e For-eign Ofice and Foreign Policy, 1898-1714 (Cambridge. Mass., 1969), 178-79; D. C. M. Platt, Finance, Trade and Politics in British Foreign Policy, 1815-1924 (Oxford, 1!)68), 288; George N. Curzon, Problems of the Fur Eart (London, 1894), 427-28; Pelcovits, Old China Hands and the Foreign Ofice, 201 and passim.

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Treaty Port Press world of the treaty ports is evident in the reports of the coup d’e‘tat that brought an end to the Hundred Days. The Hongkong Weekly Press, the North Chtna Herald, and the Chinese Recorder all reported that residents of Shanghai and Hong Kong considered events surrounding the coup more serious than did residents of the foreign community in Peking. The reaction of the Chinese Recorder was typical. The editor noted the wholesale rescinding of reform edicts, including those which had abolished tests in competency in the bow and arrow in military examinations, and commented acidly:

What a spectacle for the witnessing nations! Yet our represen- tatives in Peking would have us believe that nothing more than a family quarrel has happened, and that it would be impolite for us to say anything about the slight misunderstanding of a disturbed household1 60

The North China HeraZd expressed concern that the coup might have left no alternatives for China other than revolution or partition by the powers. If such were the case, the coup was obviously of the first importance. 61 Even the Peking and Tientsin Times joined in chiding the diplomatic community for its com- placency. The editor quoted an imaginary, but supposedly typical resident of Legation Street as asking, “Why do people so persis- tently anticipate that something is happening, and why do papers in the Treaty Ports so continuously circulate rumours of impend- ing catastrophy [sic]?” T o the editor this attitude illustrated

yet once again the home truth that those who know most about a man are not always those of his own household. . , . [A] crisis of an unprecedented character is being gingerly lived through from day to day [in Peking]. . . .62

Such a comment set the Peking and Tientsin Times partially apart from the diplomatic community whose views it generally shared. Yet, the editor’s basic conceptions of the situation in China do not appear to have changed. Concern over events in Peking was expressed primarily in terms of their impact on the interna- tional struggle for domination over China and what action the powers might take in response to the coup. 63 The English-language publications in Shanghai and Hong Kong, by contrast, often expressed concern over what the coup portended for reform in

Chinese Recorder, XXIX (Dec. 1898), 606. See also: ibid, XXIX (Nov. 1898)’ 562-63.

“ “ C H , Oct. 10, 1898. Ct. Japan Weekly Mail, Oct. 1, 1898. UaPTT, Oct. 29, 1898. -PTT, Sept. 24, Oct. 1 and 29, 1898.

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?'he Historian China.04 The disaster that befell K'ang Yu-wei and the Emperor clearly had not served to forge a consensus among the China-Coast press.

In the final analysis, what can be concluded from this study of the reaction of the English-language press of the treaty ports to the Hundred Days Reforms? Of course, it illustrates what informed observers have long realized: Westerners resident in China had little knowledge or understanding of the domestic affairs of the country and this failure was the result not just of the nature of Chinese politics, but also of barriers to understanding that existed within the foreign communities - barriers which rested, at base, on the ethnocentric attitudes that the foreigners held. But the study reveals something more. For all the biases they shared, the publications of the foreign communities on the China Coast differed markedly from one another. The publica- tions were instruments for the propagation of the personal views of their editors. As a result, the reports from which foreigners resident on the China Coast learned of the Hundred Days were warped by attempts to propagandize for particular viewpoints in addition to being clouded by ethnocentricity. Under the circum- stances, it is hardly surprising that these Westerners were amazed when K'ang Yu-wei, fleeing the wrath of the Empress Dowager, explained what had been taking place in Peking.

Frank King and Prescott Clarke have pointed out that, of all the China-Coast papers, historians have only used the North China Herald (and for earlier events the China Mail) extensively. Most of the papers have remained largely untapped.65 For the sake of their research, it is perhaps well that the North China Herald is the paper to which historians have turned most frequently, for if the difference among the various papers that showed up during the Hundred Days also existed at other times - and they probably did - far more could be learned of developments in China from a study of the Herald than of its rivals. On the other hand, this reliance on the Herald may have tended to obscure just how wide the chasm between China and the Westerners resident therein really was. Its viewpoints blinded it less completely to what was transpiring in the Celestial Kingdom than did the viewpoints of such papers as the China Mail, Peking and Tientsin Times, and Hongkong Weekly Press. In the foreign communities of the China Coast the narrow vision of the Mail, Times, and Press seems to have been more typical than the somewhat broader vision of the Herald.

e'NCH, Sept. 26, Oct. 10, 1898: HWP, Oct. 15, 1898; Hongkong Dairy Press,

King and Clarke, Research Guide to China-Coast Newspapers, 1-2, 29, 80-81. Oct. 8, 1898; Chinese Recorder, XXIX (Nov. 1898), 562-63, 606.

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