296
April 1st
Review of Public Occurrences During the
his government.
MAY
Captain Elliot wrote the following communication 10
My lord,-Before I proceed to Canton, I think it right to place your lordship in possession of my own views upon the actual posture of circumstances con- nected with the public intercourse between his majesty's government and this empire. The imperial cdict which I have had the honor to transmit, is certainly a very formal and unequivocal recognition of my character as a British officer, appointed by the government of my country, to manage its public concerns in these dominious. No attempt is made to evade the material distinction between my own position and that of the chief servant of the Company, or of any other foreign functionary hitherto permitted to reside here. The understanding that I cannot engage in trade, and that my business is purely public, is plainly ex- pressed.
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Upon the side of his majesty's government then, my lord, it appears to me, that no condition is wanting to give to the representations of Its agent here, a complete formal character. They are the communications of a foreign officer recognized by the emperor, addressed to the head of the provincial government, and they reach his excellency's hands in a sealed shape. As respects the com- munications of the government intended for me, the state of the case is very different. They are not addressed to me at all: they speak of me, not to me. They are injunctions to persons with whom, in the admission of the emperor, I have no congeniality of pursuit, and who, therefore, in common sense, ought to have no public relations with me. To the extent that the employment of the hong-merchant, as a channel for the conveyance of direct sealed communications to the governor, commits me to receive by the same hand direct sealed cominu- nications from the governor, the analogy, indeed, is a sound one, and I could offer no objection to practice founded upon it. But the use of the hong-mer- chant, as a letter-bearer to the governor, certainly carries with it no acquiescence in the doctrine, that the governor's orders addressed to that individual are binding
upon me.
“As it is at present, I am entitled to consider that the governor's communica- tions in respect to me reach me in the form of no more than highly credible information. And when no public inconvenience, or grave personal responsibility is to be incurred by shaping my proceedings upon knowledge thus acquired, I hope your lordship will be of opinion that I shall only manifest a proper respect to these authorities by conforming to their understood wishes, notwithstanding the indirectness of their signification. But as a constant principle, it appears to be clear that¡ my obligations to conformity to the pleasure of this government, or of my notice of it, are justly limited by the rule, that it should be directly and formally signified to me. It is not for me to dictate a mode of intercourse to the Chinese government with an officer of a foreign nation—and, indced, I have a strong impression that events will soon open their own eyes to the unsuitableness and inefficacy of the present course, for their own purposes. When his excel- lency finds me incommunicable upon points ou which he desires to communicate with me, (for to receive papers addressed to the hong-merchants, in my judgment, by no means commits me to acknowledge them in other papers, addressed to the governor,) I imagine his excellency will set about to seek what these obstacles are, and how they may be conveniently and quietly set aside
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His excellency it may be suggested in some auch conjuncture, receives my
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