r their part, placed
every possible obstacle in the way of the British. In 1856 the Chinese
held up a ship sailing under the British flag, pulled down its flag, and
arrested the crew on suspicion of smuggling. In connection with this and
other events, Britain decided to go to war. Thus began the "Lorcha War"
of 1857, in which France joined for the sake of the booty to be
expected. Britain had just ended the Crimean War, and was engaged in
heavy fighting against the Moguls in India. Consequently only a small
force of a few thousand men could be landed in China; Canton, however,
was bombarded, and also the forts of Tientsin. There still seemed no
prospect of gaining the desired objectives by negotiation, and in 1860 a
new expedition was fitted out, this time some 20,000 strong. The troops
landed at Tientsin and marched on Peking; the emperor fled to Jehol and
did not return; he died in 1861. The new Treaty of Tientsin (1860)
provided for (a) the opening of further ports to European traders; (b)
the session of Kowloon, the strip of land lying opposite Hong Kong; (c)
the establishment of a British legation in Peking; (d) freedom of
navigation along the Yangtze; (e) permission for British subjects to
purchase land in China; (f) the British to be subject to their own
consular courts and not to the Chinese courts; (g) missionary activity
to be permitted throughout the country. In addition to this, the
commercial treaty was revised, the opium trade was permitted once more,
and a war indemnity was to be paid by China. In the eyes of Europe,
Britain had now succeeded in turning China not actually into a colony,
but at all events into a semi-colony; China must be expected soon to
share the fate of India. China, however, with her very different
conceptions of intercourse between states, did not realize the full
import of these terms; some of them were regarded as concessions on
unimportant points, which there was no harm in granting to the trading
"barbarians", as had been done in the past; some were regarded as simple
injustices, which at a given moment could be swept away by
administrative action.

But the result of this European penetration was that China's balance of
trade was adverse, and became more and more so, as under the commercial
treaties she could neither stop the importation of European goods nor
set a duty on them; and on the other hand she could not compel
foreigners to buy Chinese goods. The efflux of silver brough