The existence of an _imperium in imperio_ which comes between
them and their people is of course distasteful to the mandarins;
and they are bent on curtailing its privileges. If its franchises
were surrendered, "Ichabod" might be inscribed on the gates of
the model settlement.
The practice of marking out a special quarter for each nationality
is an old one in China, adopted for convenience. When, after the
first war, the British exacted the opening of ports, they required
the grant of a concession in each, within which their consuls should
have chief, if not exclusive authority. Other nations made the
same demands; and China made the grants, not as to the British
from necessity, but apparently from choice--the foreign consul
being bound to keep his people in order. Now, however, the influx
of natives into the foreign settlements, and the enormous growth
of those mixed communities in wealth and population, have led the
Chinese Government to look on the ready compliance of its predecessors
as a blunder. Accordingly, in opening new ports in the interior it
marks out a foreign quarter, but makes no "concession." It does not
as before waive the exercise of jurisdiction within those limits.
[Page 258]
The above question relates solely to the government of Chinese
residing in the foreign "concessions." But there is a larger question
now looming on the political sky, viz., how to recover the right
of control over foreigners, wherever they may be in the Empire.
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