Ir is only six weeks since we wrote last on the Audience question, wondering whether it was fear of the Chinese, an a desire to conciliate the supposed enormous power of the empire, that prevented the Foreign Ministers from insisting on being received by the Emperor in person. Now the representations and remonstrances of the Ministers have at last had their effect, and the right of audience is conceded. In the first mouth of the coming China New Year, and every succeeding New Year, the representatives of the greater and lesser Powers of Europe and America, and of Japan, will be allowed to stand in a row before the Boy Emperor as he squats on his throne, and hear him utter a few words in Manchu.
It was thirteen years from the time that Lord Elgin and Baron Gros dictated terms of peace to China in Peking that the former audience was granted. For thirteen years the foreign Ministers had been pressing for it, and there was much reason to believe that they would not then have obtained it, but for the firmness, perseverance, and tact of Mr. Soyeshima, the Japanese Ambassador. He caused it to be understood that if he were not received by the Emperor, a rupture between Japan and China might be expected, and the Chinese Court appreciated the inconvenience of this yet, with this example before them, our governments do not hesitate to let the Chinese understand that under no circumstances will they back up their claims by force. What Mr. Soyeshima did was explained at the time in our columns, and it will not be out of place to give an extract from what we then credentials on the table in front of the Wrote Emperor, receiving an imperial nod in "It was stated when the Japanese return. The Emperor then muttered a ambassador first arrived, that his ap-' few words in Manchu, which were repearance was inopportune, as the audi- peated in Chinese by Prince Kung, who ence question was already virtually was kneeling in front of the throne, and settled. That was true, however, only the audience was over. in the sense that the question had Eighteen years have passed since this been settled in remote antiquity; audi- occurred. The Emperor died more or ences were freely accorded, but always less mysteriously some eighteen mouths vouchsafed as a gracious condescension after the audience, and the question which those thus favoured had to lay at rest again during the infancy of acknowledge with marked humiliation. the present occupant of the throne, It When Soyeshima arrived, the abject will soon be two years since he assumed posture of kneeling was insisted on. the reins himself, and just before the The right to be accompanied by an actual expiry of the two years, he is to interpreter was denied to Foreign admit the dreaded foreigners into his
right of selecting interpreters for the ally means we cannot tell even from the Ministers, the Chinese claiming the presence. What this recognition actu-Foreign Envoys; the right to wear a terms of the edict, until we know exactly sword and appear in one's own uni- how the audience is to be carried out form was refused. Distinctions of rank but we may earnestly hope that nothing whereby special audiences might be obtained were not acknowledged, nor of its repetition for another eighteen or will occur to necessitate a postponement finally had the main point, whereby an twenty years. 'I'he edict appears to be a aggrieved power might claim for its re-gracious one, and if the notice that sub-presentative private audience, and direct Sequently appears in the Peking Gazette appeal to the Emperor, been allowed."
We have imontioued more than onca is couched in language that will show the people that the Foreign Ministers that the Manchus are far more liberal-are regarded at Peking with the same minded in these matters than the courtesy that Chinese Ministers meet Chinese; and it was to the interposition vith abroad, a very valuable point of a Manchu, Vu-kwei, President of the will have been gained; but this is a Board of War and Manchu Interpreter-large supposition. It may be that the General, that the concession of Soye-Manchus are really anxious to know a shima'sclaimsby the chinese government little more of the foreigners, and to was partly due.
General Lo Gendre forget that their presence in Peking was socompenied Mr. Soyeshima to Peking, and Vu-kwei had become his personal friend when the one was Viceroy of Fukien, and the other U.S. Consul at Amoy. The audience itself was commemorate by a sketch which though not actually made by an eye-witness, was declared by those who were present to be sufficiently accurate. The cereqnony itself was a very brief one. "The edicts which preceded it, and the choice of the Hall in which it was held, were calculated to persuade the people that it was a case of the Emperor's receiving the envoys of tributary States, but even with those drawbacks the Ministers were glad to accept it. It was on the morning of the 29th of June, 1873, that the Ministers assembled at the house of their doyen, General Viangaly, the Minister for Russia. Whey were conducted to the Audience Hall by Chung How, and, Mr. Soyeshima having first had his audience alone, were introduced to the imperial presence by Prince Kung and Wensiang. They stood before the Emperor in the order of seniority as Ministers, General Viangaly on the right, then, in order, Mr. F. F. Low, the U. 8. Minister, Sir Thomas Wade, the British Minister, M. de Geofroy, the French Minister, and Mr, H. Ferguson, the Minister for the Netherlands, to whose lot alone it will probably fall to attend a second audience by another Emperor. General Viangaly read an address in French, which was repeated in Chinese by Mr. Bismarck, the German Legation interpreter. The Ministers then each with a bow laid his one of the penalties of a disastrous war, Tt may be that provincial officials will learn from the report of the audience that China at last recognises Forei; Powers as her equals. It may only be that one or two Ministers are soon going home, and have persuaded the Tsung-li Yamen to grant them this favour, if no other, before they go. The concession is at any rate the recovery of a step taken eighteen years ago and then lost; whether it is a short step or along step we must wait until February to know.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.