Granville
17 May 1882

My Lord,

As I stated in my Despatch No. 16 of this date, I arrived here on the 4th instant. I had been given to understand at the Tsungli Yamen that although obliged to live in his inner apartments, His Excellency Li would receive me as a private friend and on the 6th instant I paid him a visit.
Upon conversation had reference principally to the action of France in Tonquin, which Mr. Stayfair, the acting Consul at Pakhoi, tells me that he has reported to Your Lordship, and to the treaty between Corea and the United States.
As to the first, he seemed disposed to solicit our good offices, but did not press the matter much. I told him, as I had already told him last December, when he suggested, as a check to French influence in Anam, a treaty between Anam and Great Britain, that with the position asserted by France in Anam above twenty years ago, and all this time undisputed, intervention on our part would be scarcely possible. The French, I reminded him, had extorted a treaty in 1874, of the non-fulfillment of which they had frequently complained, and their late expedition, which had evidently much alarmed the Chinese Government, would be justified, I felt sure, by them, as a measure necessary to secure them the exercise of the rights they claimed.
There is another reason given for their action, ominously resembling the plea for occupation of Ili or Kuldja by the Russians in 1864-5, and unhappily of equal validity, viz., that the frontier of Anam is vexed by affiliated brigands, whom the Chinese Government makes no efficient effort to restrain.
The French expedition, however, explained, has troubled the Chinese on two grounds. First, the autonomy of a dependency, Anam, is compromised; next, the suzerain himself, the Emperor of China, is more or less threatened by the establishment alongside him of a very restless neighbour, whose declared object it is to push a foreign trade across the southern frontier of China.
As to the latter consideration, the French, in my belief, will be disappointed. They have no import trade to speak of. They have shown a disposition (see Lord Lyon’s correspondence 1874) to fetter the import trade of others. Lastly, had they trade and were they more liberal, the line they have chosen is not, geographically, the best. To reach the country they hope to open, as I pointed out to His Excellency, trade ought properly to ascend the great western river which, after traversing Kuang Li, joins the confluence at Canton. Imports would then pay import and transit duties to China; whereas by the other route, everything carried must of course pay something to France; and this without equivalent conceivable advantage.
As for any other dangers, I did not see how they were to be arrested until China should address herself seriously to organization of a land force. I recalled the advice I had given His Excellency and the Ministers of the Yamen in the spring of 1880. This will be found in my reports of that date. He begged me to call the attention of the Yamen once more to this matter; but he spoke in a half hearted sort of way. With the exception of one or two of the Ministers of the Yamen, he had manifestly not more faith in them than I am bound to admit they are entitled to.
As regards the extinction of the autonomy of Anam, he seemed more excited, repeating what he had earlier said about Lewchew, and adding with a sad smile that Birma, he presumed, would one day be ours. I assured him that, to the best of my belief, Birma was in no danger from us if she abode by her engagements. War with Birma in past years, it might be fairly said, had been forced upon us. We had, at all events, no designs upon the territory of Birma.
We passed on to Cashgaria, of which I shall speak elsewhere, and to Corea. I told His Excellency that Mr. Holcombe had concealed nothing from me about Corea; that I had promised him, so far as in me lay, to guard against any action on our part that might embarrass American negotiations; that I would recommend adoption of the draught treaty approved by Mr. Holcombe; that Admiral Willes, who was now here, had received a telegram from the Government on the subject and was quite prepared to proceed to Corea with nothing but his tender, accompanied by an interpreter of our Consular service whom I had promised to place at his disposal. I urged His Excellency Li to give me the Chinese text of the American draught treaty, and a letter to the Corean Secretary of State. I had learned from Mr. Holcombe that the Corean Government had already established a Tsungli Yamen. There seems no doubt, either, that Sir Robert Hart, the Inspector General of Customs, has been commissioned to organize a foreign inspectorate in Corea; a measure most favorable, in my opinion, to commerce.
His Excellency promised me the Chinese text of the Treaty, but made some difficulty about a letter. He had been charged, he admitted, by the Emperor with the conduct of intercourse with Corea. This he had told me in December, adding that the arrangement had been made to save the face of the Tsungli Yamen at Peking. The Yamen, I imagine, would have had difficulty in treating with a tributary state, (which should properly be referred to the Board of Ceremonies,) on the same footing as the Powers which are by treaty recognized as the equals of China. That His Excellency Li, therefore, should write to Corea about our coming, did not seem to me much to ask; but he would not promise it. He could hardly promise, he said, a verbal message, for Ma Taotai, the officer sent last year to India, had already started for Chefoo to join Commodore Shufeldt. He would see, however, what could be done, and would be obliged to me to ascertain the views of my Government regarding the Article translated in my Despatch No. 20. I hinted, but without making very much of it, that, failing the support of China, we might have to ask the Japanese to help us.
Meanwhile, Admiral Willes received from Sir Harry Parkes a letter mentioning a report prevalent in Japan that he, the Admiral, was presently appear off the coast of Corea with a large fleet. On hearing this, I immediately wrote to His Excellency Li, pointing out that if the Coreans were not enlightened as to the real nature of our intentions, rumours of this kind would produce the very mischief in Corea that, in our interview, he had so deplored as possible. He had insisted much on their timidity and ignorance.
I inclose copy of my letter, on receipt of which His Excellency sent a subordinate to me to say that a Corean official now here should immediately communicate with his Government, and that he himself would forward me in a few days copy of the draught treaty to be placed in Admiral Willes’ hands. He wished to know at the same time if I expected a reply to my letter. I suggested that, as His Excellency had difficulties about writing to Corea direct, he could not do better than reply to one in the Chinese fashion. The Chinese, in a case of this sort, reproduce the whole or the greater part of the letter under acknowledgment in the answer, and then conclude with a statement of what can or cannot be done. Copy of such a reply in the hands of Admiral Willes, I urged, would be nearly as good a paper to lay before any Corean authority who might receive him as the letter I had asked His Excellency Li to write to Corea. He sent back word to say that he would prefer to wait for the arrival of the Vice President Wang, who, as I have reported, was to be sent to him a latere to enjoin acquiescence in the Imperial decision about his mourning.
Admiral Willes left this on the 15th for Chefoo, having already learned that Commodore Shufeldt had quitted that port, in the course of the previous week, with a single American war-steamer accompanied by two Chinese gun vessels. Wang tajen arrived here I fancy on the 15th but having made no sign, I sent a message privately this afternoon to His Excellency Li to know how matters stood. I added that if my visits embarrassed him, or if, under the special circumstances of the case, Wang tajen would prefer not to come down to the foreign settlement, I would waive ceremony and call upon him. Properly, as the later comer, Wang tajen should at least have sent me his card.
His Excellency Li has sent me a reply, which, so far as the text of the treaty is concerned, appears to me evasive; but his messenger at the same time informed me that Wang tajen would be happy to receive me; indeed wished very much to see me.
It is not impossible that this wish, if Wang tajen has indeed expressed it, may have reference merely to a farther discussion about opium. Mr. Samuel has at last laid a memorandum of his propositions before the Chinese.
I have, &c.

Thomas Francis Wade