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rebellion that, in the middle of the 19th century, raged over the greater part of China and devastated many provinces. In 1900 the Boxer outbreak found ample material among the highly superstitions Szechuanese, but, although there was a general evacuation of foreigners, no lives were lost and the province accordingly did not experience any of the sanctions imposed by the 1901 protocol.
The actual history of steam navigation starts in 1876; section III, article 1, of the Chefoo Convention, concluded in that year, providing—
Residence of British Officers at Chungking to watch British Trade.
The British Government will, farther, be free to send officers to reside at Ch'ung K'ing to watch the conditions of British trade in Ssu-Ch'uen. British merchants will not be allowed to reside at Chungking, or to open establish- ments or warehouses there, so long as no steamers have access to the port. When steamers have succeeded in ascending the river so far, further arrangements can be taken into consideration.
This article furnishes, at the same time, evidence of hostility to steam naviga- tion and food for the development of this hostility, and it is small wonder for surprise that, when Mr. A. J. Little proposed to try to reach Chungking by steamer, in the hope of thereby securing the opening of the port, he met with constant obstruction from Chinese officials, some of whom gravely deprecated the venture on the ground that when the vessel was passing through the gorges, the monkeys there might throw stones at it, and then the Szechuanese be blamed for the incident. The opening of the port of Chungking was effected in 1890 by an additional article to the Chefoo Convention providing
1. Chungking shall forthwith be declared open to trade on the same footing as any other treaty port.
Traffic between Ichang and Chungking.
British subjects shall be at liberty either to charter Chinese vessels or to provide vessels of the Chinese type for the traffic between Ichang and Chungking.
Merchandise conveyed between Ichang and Chungking.
II. Merchandise conveyed between Ichang and Chungking by the above class of vessels shall be placed on the same footing as merchandise carried by steamers between Shanghai and Ichang, and shall be dealt with in accordance with Treaty, Tariff Rules, and the Yang-tsze Regulations.
But here again restrictions were imposed on steam navigation, for the article went on to provide
Access of British Steamers to Chungking.
V. When once Chinese steamers carrying cargo run to Chungking, British steamers shall in like manner have access to the said port.
This would probably have proved an effective bar to steamer navigation for all time, but the question was finally settled in 1895 by the Treaty of Shimonoseki. Article 6 provides that, inter alia, Chungking shall be opened to trade on the same footing as Treaty Ports already existing, and continues :-
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out that, though this trade was regarded as a British interest, it was in many cases purely Chinese. The chartered junk business was carried on by Chinese agencies of the shipping firms, and the cargo carried was, as a rule, purely Chinese, British interest being involved only in that this cargo had been brought up to Ichang by the steamers of the British shipping companies or was destined to be consigned down- river by them.
The interest that was badly hit by the coming of the chartered junks was the tax collectorate, as the traffic became now immune from all taxation except that levied by the Maritime Customs at Chungking or Ichang. Hence it is not surprising that, in the disorder consequent on the civil wars, it became the constant practice of generals on the Upper Yang-tsze to hold up chartered junks in order to enforce payment of taxes levied by themselves. The chartered junk, which, particularly on its upward journey, has to keep close to the bank, can proceed only very slowly, and has to tie up for the night some thirty times or more between Ichang and Chungking, was an easy prey, and, except for consular protests which were easily ignored, the generals found no difficulty in enforcing these illegal taxes, although, in the early days of the illegality, they declared that their taxes would be levied on Chinese goods only, and that foreign-owned goods would be exempt.
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It was in this connection that the first bombardment of Wanhsien took place on the 6th November, 1918. On arriving at Wanhsien from Shanghai, where His Majesty's ship Widgeon had been undergoing refit, her commanding officer learned that the Yunnanese general in command there was detaining a large number of junks, laden with cotton yarn for Chungking merchants, in order to compel the payment of a tax he was levying. The Widgeon's commanding officer had an interview with the general, and as the release of the junks was refused he delivered an ultimatum, and threatened to bombard the town. The bombardment took place the next day; a few rounds of blank were fired, and then a couple of live rounds were directed at some cliffs, well away from the town. In the meantime an armed party released the captured junks.
This incident produced no repercussions; no lives were lost nor property injured; the people of Szechuan were by no means displeased to see drastic action taken against one of their Yunnanese enemies; and the cotton merchants of Chungking were so delighted at securing the release of their cargoes without the payment of any tax that they donated 5,000 dollars to the British Red Cross. Taxation of chartered junks soon revived, however, under one name or other, "protection fees being the favourite euphemism,
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Mention has already been made of brigandage as being endemic on the Upper Yang-tsze, and during the periods of civil war the forces of the brigands were constantly reinforced by deserters or scattered remnants of defeated armies. At times, too, soldiers, in what were theoretically regular armies, would indulge in a spell of brigandage to eke out their overdue pay, and it became a truism that the terms "brigand and soldier were interchangeable. This situation was exploited to its full by some commanders. Superficially, it was not unreasonable for a general to contend that, as he would be rendering very great service to a shipper by affording protection to his cargo, it was only right that he should pay for this service. But if the general took effective measures against the bandits and dispersed them there would no longer be any need for protection, and he would no longer have any ground for requiring the payment of these fees or taxes. It therefore became to the interest of the general that the brigand gangs should persist in their activity. and, in particular, that any vessel that had not paid protection fees should receive a full measure of their attention, and in view of the close connection that usually existed between the troops and the brigands, there was little difficulty in securing this. In short," protection fees were, as a general rule, nothing but blackmail.
In the spring of 1920 steamers were frequently fired on at a place named Hsiao this was the work of brigands in collusion with soldiers or soldiers acting as brigands, in order to enforce the payment of protection fees to the general at Wanhsien.
It was, as shown above, in 1895 that the right of foreign steamers to navigate the river from Ichang to Chungking was at last conceded by treaty. The first attempt to take advantage of this provision was made in 1898 by Mr. A. J. Little with a small launch named the "Leechuan." Although the vessel eventually reached hungking, it did little to forward commercial navigation, as it had to be obed over the rapids in the same way as a junk and was too small to be a business success. Two years later two British gunboats, His Majesty's ships
Woodcock." proved conclusively that the rapids and reefs of the Upper Yang-tsze
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Steam navigation for vessels under the Japanese flag for the conveyance Chou Ch'i, a short distance below Wanhsien, and the evidence seemed clear that
shall be extended to the following places :-
-
of passengers and
cargo (1.) On the Upper Yang-tsze River, from Ichang to Chungking."
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The right for steamers to navigate the Upper Yang-tsze was now clearly established after nearly twenty years, but another fourteen years were to pass before merchant steamers became an accomplished fact on these waters.
In the meantime commercial navigation was carried on by means of chartered junks, as provided in the additional article. This development was welcomed by the junk owners, as it provided them with the means of securing a regular and assure inconue, and the trade rapidly assumed flourishing dimensions. It may be pointed
Woodlark and
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