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By Root 1251 0

out of the chartered-company system. But there was a glaring difficulty with China, for whose products, such as silk and porcelain, Europe had developed a healthy appetite. Most especially, the British had discovered an apparently unquenchable thirst for tea – by the time of Macartney’s mission, they were importing more than 15 million pounds of Chinese tea every year. Joseph Banks had also given Macartney – himself a keen botanist – detailed instructions on which oriental specimens to collect for the Royal Botanic Gardens at Kew. But what British products could the Chinese be persuaded to buy in return? The trade delegation planned to show the Chinese emperor what his country was missing. To help, they had brought along all sorts of trinkets and gizmos they thought might amuse the old man – a small planetarium, scientific instruments, examples of Birmingham metalware and pieces of Wedgwood pottery.

After a year of travelling, the British were looking rather shabby. They were so exhausted and flea-bitten that when the Chinese crowds saw them, they fell about laughing. As Lord Macartney’s valet put it later, the delegation bore ‘greater resemblance to the sight provided by the removal of paupers to their parishes in England than the expected dignity of the representative of a great and powerful monarch’. The visitors had also underestimated the country they were visiting, for Imperial China considered itself the centre of the world and superior to all other civilizations. The dignity of the viscount’s party was not enhanced when Chinese officials took one look at their cargo and on the emperor’s orders demanded that retinue and baggage be transferred to thirty-seven Chinese junks before being allowed to proceed upriver towards the city of Jehol – the emperor’s summer retreat. For the avoidance of doubt a sign was nailed to one of the masts. It read ‘Tribute from the Red Barbarians’.

Protocol was a tricky question. Naturally, when the delegation finally reached the emperor’s palace, they tried to look their best. Lord Macartney overlaid a velvet suit of spotted purple with the bright-red mantle of a Knight of the Bath. His secretary, Sir George Staunton, dusted off the robes he had worn when given an honorary doctorate by Oxford University. Thus arrayed, they made their way towards the emperor, their dignity not much improved when they had to fight their way to their early-morning audience in the Garden of Ten Thousand Trees through wandering hordes of dogs, pigs and cows. At 7.00 a.m. the emperor arrived, borne on a chair by sixteen men dressed in gold, his ministers and advisers trotting behind. The leader of the visiting yahoos was admitted to The Presence, together with his secretary and page. How should they acknowledge the dignity of the ruler of the world? Visitors to the celestial throne were normally glad to fall to their knees and touch their foreheads to the ground in a kowtow. Macartney had explained to the Chinese officials beforehand that unfortunately he really wouldn’t be able to manage this, since he only went down on one knee even in front of his own king, George III. Someone suggested a compromise – perhaps the portrait of King George III the barbarians had brought with them could be hung on the wall behind the throne so that he could convince himself that he was kowtowing to his own king? Still Macartney refused to go for anything more than a one-knee bow, and the Chinese did not care for his offer to kiss the emperor’s hand. The next difficulty was that the only British person who spoke much Chinese was Lord Macartney’s twelve-year-old page, a feat which impressed the emperor, but did not make for easy conversations – all exchanges were therefore conducted through two priests brought from Italy. As they spoke little or no English, negotiations were translated first into Latin and then into Chinese. This cumbersome arrangement did not inhibit what modern diplomats would call a free and frank exchange of views when the viscount laid out the objects he had brought with him. He offered the emperor a pair