THE
CHINESE REPOSITORY.
VOL. XI.-AUGUST, 1842.-No. 8.
ART. I.
Retrospection, or a Review of Public Occurrences in China during the last ten years, from January 1st, 1832, to December 31st, 1841. (Continued from page 374.)
Is our last number, the review of the events of 1839, in Canton, was brought down to the end of March, when the negotiations regarding the mode of delivering the opium were still pending. These were soon settled; and on
April 3d.
The second superintendent proceeded outside, to direct and oversee the fulfillment of the obligations. We continue this part of the narrative, as far as practicable, in the words of capt. Elliot's official dispatches to lord Palmerston.
In my position, and with my thoughts intensely fixed upon the difficulties that have befallen this great trade, I may spare your lordship the language of excuse for the following matter. It is my first duty to express a plain conviction, that no efforts of her majesty's government, either of negotiation purely, or of negotiation supported by arms, could recover, for trade to be carried on at Canton, such a degree of confidence as would restore its late important extent. All sense of security has been broken to pieces. In fact, my lord, the first truth deducible from the actual proceedings of this government, is strikingly momen. tous; namely, that a separation from the ships of our country, on the main land of China, is wholly unsafe. The movement of a few hours has placed the lives, liberty, and property of the foreign coinmunity in China, with all the vast inte. rests, commercial and financial, contingent upon our security, at the mercy of this government. And if this fearful intelligence reaches England and India before the news of our liberation, and before that of the reassuring measures which I felt myself called upon to take, I am greatly afraid that the shock will be incal. culably heavy, and most widely felt. Indeed, before I leave this part of the sub- ject, I would presume to express the anxious hope, that her majesty's government
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