Manchu Emperor Jiaqing / Kiaking / Kia King - 1796-1820
The Tai Ch'ing [Manchu] dynasty forms no exception to the general rule, which finds such frequent exemplification in the dynastic history of China, that the strong men fought for and maintained the Empire while the weak ones brought it to the verge of ruin. The first century and a half of Manchu rule was a period of ever increasing glory and success; the last century was an era of disaster during which the thread suspending the sword of Damocles was wearing ever thinner. A prediction respecting the dynasty ran somewhat as follows: "Over the land of peace and rest trouble rises like the tide; and the year sixteen demands that we prepare on every side. Now await the coming years of Lungshay and stalking Ma, when five nations will convulse our flowery land." Whatever be the astronomical conjunction here designated, the time of trouble was now at hand and largely through the "five" nations, taking five in its Chinese sense of the perfect number.
Almost all our information as to the reign must necessarily be derived from outside sources, since the dynastic history of the Manchus has yet to be published. M. Remusat speaks of the Tung htea lu (" Chronicle of the Eastern Flower "), a work in manuscript in sixteen volumes, as the sole Chinese written authority for the history as late as the reign of Chia Ch'ing. Fortunately, the time is sufficiently near our own to obtain some idea of its general-character. Moreover, the record .is a somewhat dismal one, the record of a time whose troubles were fitly enough presaged by the appearance of a great comet, or " broom-tailed star," which hung, we are told menacingly in the heavens for twelve months from the time of Chia Ch'ing's accession. Beneath that menace Chia Ch'ing, "churlish, sordid and uncouth," begirt himself for the stupendous task of government bequeathed to him by his illustrious ancestors.
A serious loss sustained by the new sovereign soon after his assumption of power was that of the great Manchu minister Ho shen. He had risen from a very humble station and had attracted the notice of Ch'ien Lung because of his good looks whilst acting as a guard at the palace gates. Happily he had other qualities in addition to his good looks, and ere the end of Ch'ien Lung's reign had become almost what Cardinal Wolsey was to Henry VIII. Like Wolsey, too, he had his fall, though not till the accession of a new monarch. Too powerful to be at once assailed, Ho shen found his position gradually sapped and undermined by his detractors, and his appointment as superintendent of the obsequies of Ch'ien Lung gave opportunity enough for charges of corruption. Sixteen articles of impeachment were drawn up, most of them frivolous enough, but there was sufficient evidence of his self-enrichment to condemn him, and he was graciously permitted to be his own executioner. His private fortune which was estimated at the huge figure of $105,000,000, was confiscated.
The entire reign of Chia Ch'ing was disturbed by the agitations of the various secret societies. This was especially the case in the south. The whole valley of the Si Kiang was a center of intense political and religious unrest for many years. The government maintained the greatest severity against the White Lotus, the Triads, the Society of Heavenly Reason and such like orders, but without much result. In 1801 the throne decreed the summary execution of all members of the societies engaged in pillage. In 1810 the people of Fuhkien were warned that if they favored the Triad movement the severest penalties would be visited upon them. The Government measures in this direction cost, we are told, the sum of 100,000,000 taels, and in one province alone twenty or thirty thousand persons are said to have been executed. Ten thousand condemned criminals were in the prisons at one time and so great was the fear of the Government that meetings of more than five persons were proclaimed as seditious.
In two conspiracies organized by the secret societies the Emperor nearly lost his life. The first was in 1803, when many persons in high estate, including even relatives of the Emperor, were involved. Even more keen than the dagger of the assassin was to the sovereign the indifference with which the whole affair was regarded at court and in the country. It rankled deeply that hardly any one rallied to the sovereign's side. "It is this indifference," he said, "rather than the poignard of the assassin which hurts me most." The conspiracy of 1813 was more serious still. An insurrection organized by the Heavenly Reason and White Lotus Societies broke out in Honan and Chihli; many cities were taken by storm and in broad daylight a party of conspirators entered the royal palace and fought body to body with the guards. The Emperor coming out was seized by the throat and it would have gone hard with him had not the prince Mienning (the future Emperor Tao Kuang) shot two of the assailants with a matchlock. A third was slain by a nephew (or cousin) and by this time the soldiers arrived. For his valor on this occasion the prince Mienning was nominated heir to the throne.
As though the questions already at issue between the merchants trading at Canton and the Provincial and National Governments were not sufficiently bristling with difficulties, another question now arose in an acute form for the first time. This was the question as to the trade in opium. Edicts prohibiting the trade were issued from AD 1729 onwards but the efforts made to stamp it out though undoubtedly sincere, were without avail. In 1773 Clive's conquest of Bengal led to the association of the East India Company with the unhappy business. With a curious casuistry the Company manufactured the drug in India expressly for Chinese consumption but, on their attention being drawn to the pernicious effects of opium smoking, they gave orders that no ships belonging to the Company should take any to China. The responsibility for the demoralizing situation created must be shared by the East India Company with the smugglers who defied all law, foreign and Chinese alike, first from Macao and later from Lintin; with the hong merchants who evaded all regulations for restricting the sale of the drug, and with the Chinese officials who were themselves frequently the slaves of the habit and at least disposed to make illegitimate profit by its introduction. This connivance rendered all the edicts issued from Peking futile and even farcical.
Foreign relations were unsatisfactory throughout the reign of Chia Ch'ing. He was himself personally antipathetic to foreigners. Still, apart from the opium question, the relation of foreign nations to China was provocative and vexatious. His letter addressed to King George III begins with this sentence: "Your Majesty's kingdom is at a remote distance beyond the seas, but is observant of its duties and obedient to our laws, beholding from afar the glory of our Empire and respectfully admiring the perfection of our government." The letter ends with this other sentence, a very polite way of saying, "Ambassadors not wanted": "With regard to those of your Majesty's subjects who for a long course of years have been in the habit of trading with our Empire, we must observe to you that our Celestial Government regards all persons and nations with eyes of charity and benevolence, and always treats and considers your subjects with the utmost indulgence and affection; on their account, therefore, there can be no place or occasion for the exertions of Your Majesty's Government."
The necessity of supplying the teacups of England with the national beverage led to the suggestion of another Mission, modeled after that of Lord Macartney. This was headed by Lord Amherst, who had formerly been Governor General of India. The party included as interpreter the famous missionary, Robert Morrison, and the picturesque traveler, Thomas Manning. It started for Peking in 1816 and reached the capital on August 28. Impartial historians have summed up the result in one pregnant word, "mismanagement." Others have talked about the "ignorance, pride, isolation and audacity" of the Chinese.
The Emperor, whose excessive devotion to pleasure had for a long while made him a subject for animadversion, if not an object of contempt, to the best minds of China, died on September 2, 1820, at the age of sixty-one and after a troubled reign of twenty-five years. His will left the throne to his second son, Mienning, known as the Emperor Tao Kuang.
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