3rd of April 20,283 chests of
opium were handed over to the mandarins and were by them destroyed. The
surrender of the opium led to further demands by Lin Tze-su, the Chinese
imperial commissioner, demands which were considered by the British
government to amount to a _casus belli_, and in 1840 war was declared.
In the same year the fleet captured Chusan, and in the following year
the Bogue Forts fell, in consequence of which operations the Chinese
agreed to cede Hong-Kong to the victors and to pay them an indemnity of
6,000,000 dollars. As soon as this news reached Peking, Ki Shen, who had
succeeded Commissioner Lin, was dismissed from his post and degraded,
and Yi Shen, another Tatar, was appointed in his room. Before the new
commissioner reached his post Canton had fallen into the hands of Sir
Hugh Gough, and shortly afterwards Amoy, Ning-po, Tinghai in Chusan,
Chapu, Shanghai and Chin-kiang Fu shared the same fate. Nanking would
also have been captured had not the imperial government, dreading the
loss of the "Southern Capital," proposed terms of peace. Sir Henry
Pottinger, who had succeeded Captain Elliot, concluded, in 1842, a
treaty with the imperial commissioners, by which the four additional
ports of Amoy, Fu-chow, Ningpo and Shanghai were declared open to
foreign trade, and an indemnity of 21,000,000 dollars was to be paid to
the British.

Hien-feng emperor.

T'ai-p'ing rebellion.

On the accession of Hien-feng in 1850, a demand was raised for the
reforms which had been hoped for under Tao-kwang, but Hien-feng
possessed in an exaggerated form the selfish and tyrannical nature of
his father, together with a voluptuary's craving for every kind of
sensual pleasure. For some time Kwang-si had been in a very disturbed
state, and when the people found that there was no hope of relief from
the oppression they endured, they proclaimed a youth, who was said to
be the representative of the last emperor of the Ming dynasty, as
emperor, under the title of T'ien-te or "Heavenly Virtue." From
Kwang-si the revolt spread into Hu-peh and Hu-nan, and then languished
from want of a leader and a definite political cry. When, however,
there appeared to be a possibility that, by force of arms and the
persuasive influence of money, the imperialists would re-establish
their supremacy, a leader presented himself in Kwang-si, whose energy
of character, combined with great political and religi