one can fight with Heavenly Father helps us, and no one "With respect to the proposed meeting, he pointed to one of his officers standing near, and said the latter would come on the following day to guide any who might choose to come to an interview. I replied that such an arrangement might do very well for myself and others, but that Sir George Bonham was an officer of high rank in Her Britannic Majesty's service, and could certainly not proceed to any meeting unless it were previously settled where, by whom, and how he was to be received. However high his rank may be,' was the reply, he cannot be so high as the persons in whose presence you are now sitting.' And I could obtain nothing more definite than that the reception would take place in a yamun in the city, and that we should have no cause to take objections to the station of the personages met. I said I should make my report to his Excellency accordingly, but could not answer for his landing. In reply to my inquiries respecting the Tae ping Wang, the Prince of Peace, the Northern Prince explained in writing that he was the True Lord' or Sovereign; that the Lord of China is the Lord of the whole world; he is the second Son of God, and all people in the whole world must obey and follow him.' As I read this without remark, he said, looking at me interrogatively, 'The True Lord is not merely the Lord of China; he is not only our Lord, he is your Lord also.' As I still made no remark, but merely kept looking at him, he did not think fit to insist on an answer, and, after a while, turned his head, and began talking of other matters. His conversation gave great reason to conclude that though his religious beliefs were derived from the writings, or it might even be the teachings, of foreigners, still he was quite ignorant of the relative positions of foreign countries; and had probably got most of his notions of international dealings from the Chinese records of periods when the territory of the present Empire was divided into several States." These "Princes" were southern men speaking as their native tongue a southern dialect, and I observed that it cost the Northern Prince some effort to pronounce according to the mandarin pronunciation. When I therefore began inquiring about Teen tih, I wrote these words with a pencil on a sheet of memorandum paper to prevent misunderstanding. After finishing with Teen tih, I wrote Tee ping, and again handed the paper to the Northern Prince; upon which he asked for the pencil also and wrote the words translated in the text. Fortunately I have chanced to preserve an autograph so curious. Mr. Hamberg and Mr. Roberts had already heard at Hong Kong of the Rebels being a Christian sect; but this was the first announcement to any foreigner of the astounding claims put forward in behalf of the Heavenly Prince. The fact of the latter having, at the head of eighty thousand men, taken Nanking and inexorably put to death twenty to thirty thousand of those whom he regarded as the born enemies of his people, made his supernatural claim no truer indeed in my eyes, but it gave immense political significance to what I should otherwise have merely laughed at as the delusion of a fanatic. We returned to our boat surrounded, as in coming, by numbers of the armed crowd, but meeting with neither molestation nor insult. There would appear to have been some discussion and division of opinion among the chief counsellors of the new dynasty as to the precise course to be pursued toward us; and it was probably the will of the Eastern Prince that decided that the official who was to have acted as guide did not appear, but, late in the afternoon, two others in his place, with the following open and unsealed "mandate:" A MANDATE." "Commands are hereby issued to the brethren from afar that they may all understand the rules of ceremony. "Whereas God the Heavenly Father has sent our Sovereign down on earth, as the true Sovereign of all nations in the world, all people in the world who wish to appear at his Court must yield obedience to the rules of ceremony. They must prepare representations, stating who and what they are, and from whence they come, after previous presentation of which only can audience be accorded them. Obey these commands. "24th day of the 3rd month of the 3rd year of the Heavenly State of Tae ping (28th April, 1853). "NOTE.-No seal is affixed because your petition of yesterday had none." It was manifest from this reassertion on paper of the notion of universal supremacy enunciated the day before by the Northern Prince, that we could not too soon begin to disabuse them of it. I accordingly returned the paper with a message to the senders, conveying in the plainest possible terms our own views of full national equality with any and every State. I may here mention that I was not, in any of the conversations I had with the Tae pings, cramped by mere interpreting. Sir George Bonham did not of course intend seeing any officials of secondary or lesser rank, and did not, it so happened, see any of the higher men. Hence though I was the expounder of his views as to neutrality, &c., I was free to select my own arguments and phraseology, unfettered by purely English ideas and idioms. On the present occasion, in order to make those two officers clearly aware of our independent position hitherto at Hong Kong and the Five Ports, I got out my copy in Chinese and English of our treaties with the Manchoo Government; and, at the request of the Plenipotentiary, it was eventually sent by their hands to their superiors in his name. During the whole of this and the following days, that the Hermes lay off Nanking, her decks were crowded by a succession of curious visitors, officers as well as men; while there was always a party sitting in my Chinese boat talking with my clerks, Chang and Fang, my cook and servant. In this On the afternoon of the day after we returned the "mandate," an intimation came on board to the effect that Lae, the second of the Tae pings beneath those bearing the title of Prince, had come down to the landing-place and wanted to communicate. I at once despatched my man Chang to get him to come on board if possible. Chang succeeded so well in his mission that we soon saw Lae coming off in a fine upcountry travelling vessel bearing a large flag, and with a band of music playing on the foredeck. Lae, whom I may here introduce to the reader as that man among the Tae ping leaders who showed most desire to establish friendly relations with the "foreign brethren," at once "apologized for the tone of the mandate of the preceding day, saying it had been drawn up by persons ignorant of the fact that Wae heung te, foreign brethren,' could not be addressed in the same style as native brethren. I distinctly explained to him that while the English had, for 900 years, adored the Great Being whom he called the Heavenly Father, they on earth acknowledged allegiance to but one Lord, the Sovereign of the British Empire; and that, under no circum stances whatsoever, would they for an instant admit fealty to any other; though they were quite prepared to recognise as the Sovereign of the Chinese whomsoever the Chinese them selves might choose or submit to as such. After this had been fully assented to by Lae, I stated to him, at considerable length, the circumstances of our desire to preserve neutrality, of our having no connection with the vessels in the employ of the Manchoo Government, &c. &c., as had been done to the Northern and Assistant Princes two days before. After this it was settled that Lae, or a lesser officer, Leang, who accompanied him, should be in attendance at the landingplace on the following day, at 11 A. M., with a sufficient number of chairs and horses to convey Her Majesty's Plenipotentiary, his suite, and some naval officers to the residences of the Northern and Eastern Princes. "On the 30th of April, the two officers, Lae and Leang, came to the landing-place with chairs and horses as had been arranged, but his Excellency sent to state, that the tempestuous weather (which rendered it difficult to land dry) and indisposition prevented his carrying out the intention of yesterday, and that I should in an hour or two land as the bearer of a letter, communicating all that was to have been stated verbally. I landed accordingly at 1 P.M., Captain Fishbourne and Messrs. Woodgate and Burton accompanying me. Horses were furnished at the landing-place, and we were guided into the city, to a house occupied as a Yamun, by the four officers next in rank below those called Princes, Lae being of the number. We found that the latter had, after leaving the landing-place, gone to the Northern and Eastern Princes, and had not yet returned to his residence. As one of the other occupants was just then engaged in investigating a case of rape, we found the place crowded with spectators, whose curiosity subjected us to some annoyance until the house-steward procured us seats in an inner apartment. We waited here about an hour, during which tea and other refreshments were offered us, and an officer came from Lae to apologize for his delay in appearing, and to beg us to attribute it to nothing but to pressing business. Eventually we were received by the Ching seang, his immediate superordinate, and three |