INTERVIEW WITH A CHINESE AMBASSADOR.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXXVII, Issue 11533, 19 November 1900, Page 3

INTERVIEW WITH A CHINESE AMBASSADOR.

In Crampton's Magazine there appears an interesting interview with the Chinese Minister in London, who expresses his views on the present crisis in China with a freedom which is more characteristic of the country he resides in than of that which he represents. He does not hesitate to ascribe the recent troubles to the predominance of Manchu influences. | "It is very important," ho says, "to understand the distinction between the pure Chinese and the Manchus. The enlightened part of the Chinese population, including all the Chinese viceroys and governors, condemn the Boxers' movement. They have 110 sympathy with it. With the Manchu governors and viceroys the case is different. They have the advantage over the Chinese officials | of getting their posts without the same rigorj ous examination tests. But this privilege means that as a class they are less educated. All Chinese disciples of the great ethical teacher Confucius know that many of the tilings said by the Boxer leaders were all humbug, but the Manchu Mandarins were less enlightened. No educated Chinaman would believe, for instance, that the guns used by the foreigners would prove harmless in battle. J. should never have supposed that a Manchu Mandarin could believe such a statement. It has been a revelation to me, I, confess. We Chinese, and especially in the ports and along the coast, see the great advantages of free intercourse with foreigners, the valuo of a free exchange both of ideas and commodities. Mental and material improvement should progress together. We would never think of shutting ourselves up again in our olden ' splendid isolation.' The Manchus, 011 the other hand, believe that it is very dangerous to have free communication with the foreigner. For 0110 thing, the foreigner has th© doctrine of freedom. If that bo introduced into China, the powers and privileges of the Manchu officials would soon be gone. If there is to be free competition of talents, there can no longer be a class monopoly of offices. Tho Manchu Mandarins think they should have a monopoly c - f tho high offices of the Empire without any exertion. So they are all conservative, while the Chines© are more liberal." After describing Kang Yu-wei's schemes cf reform as crude and foredoomed to failure, he continues: '"The old, especially tho Manchu, Mandarins threatened by tho reform schemes of Ivang Yu-wei made the Empress tho head of the reactionary party, and then demanded the arrest of the reformer. Kang became a political refugee, but tho power of Great Britain protected him. I well understand that that was not from any partiality, but simply because it was the British tradition. All Chinese political offenders come to London—it is their exile-world. But our high officials in Pekin thought it was a case of foreign partiality toward this so-called reformer. I was ordered to ask Lord Salisbury to give up Kang, who was then a refugee in Hongkong. Lord Salisbury replied, ' I cannot do it,' and he told me show Lord Palinerston, though he had even a larger majority than the present British Government, was defeated in the House of Commons and turned out of office for having proposed, in order to please Napoleon 111., a measure which was regarded as destroying the right of asylum for political offenders in England. Lord Salisbury asked me if I wished him to suffer that fate. It is the tradition of England; but our high mandarins did not know that. So there was more irritation against the foreigner." Nevertheless Sir Chih Chen Lo Feng-Luh is of opinion that the old order of things cannot bo maintained: — "

' Ultimately China must adopt constitutional government. The old despotic and absolute Monarchy won't do. The precept of Confucius which supports it bears, I think, a different interpretation. It was, lie said, both the merit and demerit of bis system that he advocated implicit obedience to the ordars of the Sovereign. My interpretation ot that is that in national as well as in individual life, when we are in a minority, during childhood, parents should exercise unlimited authority; but that when we are fully grown, though a certain amount of respect is due, we reach a freer status. National life reaches this adult stage when the governed are as enlightened as, or more enlightened -than, the governing class. The old degree of obedience to the Sovereign, could not then be required. That is what I think Confucius meant. I cannot see, for instance, that there would be any justice in a demand for implicit obedience if the man at tli3 helm of State should go madly in support of a Boxer movement so as to endanger the destiny of 400 millions of people who were quite innocent. I hope that financial, educational, and judicial reforms will be introduced after this crisis is over, and I would even say—as a representative of my country as well as of my Government— I hope the Powers will insist on reforms."