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Chinese Overlordship and Western Penetration in Maritime Asia: A Late Ch'ing Reappraisal of Chinese Maritime Relations

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 November 2008

Jane Kate Leonard
Jane Kate Leonard
Affiliation:
Newark State College, Union, New Jersey
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Abstract

Historians have attached a great deal of importance to Wei Yüan's geopolitical work, the Hai-kuo t'u-chih (The illustrated treatise on the maritime kingdoms), because of its use of Western source materials and its treatment of the West. While its importance as the first major Chinese study of the West should not be minimized, this should not obscure the fact that the Treatise was primarily a reassessment of the history of China's relations with the Asian maritime world, particularly South-east Asia and India.It was as much a rediscovery of China'spast involvement in this tributary sphere as it was a discovery of the West. This paper will attempt to describe the way in which Wei Yuan became involved in the problem of the West and to analyze and describe his view of the traditional Asian maritime world and the implications of Western expansion into this sphere.

Type
Articles
Information
Modern Asian Studies , Volume 6 , Issue 2 , March 1972 , pp. 151 - 174
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1972

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References

This paper, together with those by Suzanne W. Barnett, Peter M. Mitchell and Fred W. Drake, was originally presented at a symposium ‘Western Intrusion and Conceptual Change in Mid-Nineteenth Century China’ held under the auspices of the Association for Asian Studies in Washington, D.C. in March 1971. The author wishes to acknowledge the help and advice of Professor K. C. Liu, University of California, Davis, who was the commentator on the papers on that occasion.

Part of this research was completed while the author held the position of Research Fellow in the History Department, La Trobe University, Melbourne, Australia.

1 Yüan, Wei, 60 chüan, 2nd ed. (Yangchou: Ku-wei t'ang , 1847 [1849 printing]. To be abbreviated as HKTC.Google Scholar

2 For a detailed description of the Western source materials used in the Treatise, see Barnett, Suzanne Wilson, ‘Wei Yüan and Westerners: notes on the sources of the Hai-kuo t'u-chih’, Ch'ing-shih wen-t'i (Bulletin of the Society for Ch'ing Studies), II, No. 4 (November, 1970), pp. 1–20.Google Scholar

3 A thorough analysis of the geographical aspects of Wei Yüan's treatment of the West is presented in Ch'en, Kenneth K. S., ‘The growth of geographical knowledge concerning the West in China during the Ch'ing dynasty’ (unpublished M.A. thesis, Peiping, Yenching University, 1934), pp. 67–86;Google Scholara more broad examination of the political and military aspects of the Treatise is found in Chia-chien, WangWei Yüan tui hsi-fang te jen-shih chi ch'i hai-fang ssu-hsiang (Wei Yüan's knowledge about the West and thought about maritime defense), History and Chinese Literature Series, No. 9 (Taipei: Taiwan University, 1964).Google Scholar

4 Wei Yüan focused on South-east Asia and India because he thought that these regions were the main centers of European commercial activity. Except for Japan, East Asia was not discussed in the Treatise. For a discussion of the geographical emphasis which Wei placed on these areas, see Leonard, Jane Kate, ‘Wei Yüan and the Hai-kuo t'u-chih: a geopolitical analysis of Western expansion in maritime Asia’ (unpublished Ph.D. dissertation, Cornell University, 1971), pp. 111–20.Google Scholar

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7 Chia-chien, Wang, Nien-p'u, p. 22.Google Scholar

8 Except for 1829 and 1830, Wei did not reside at the capital for any length of time. His travels and statecraft work took him to Kiangsu province primarily. He had permanent residences at Nanking from 1832 to 1837 and Yangchou from 1837 to 1844. Chia-chien, Wang, Nien-p'u, pp. 20 ff.Google Scholar

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11 This collection was modeled on a similar work written during the Ch'ien-lung reign period (1736–96) by Yüeh, Lu eentitled the Ch'ieh-wen-chai wen-ch'ao (Essays on many issues). The name, however, was taken from an earlier Ming compilation dealing with governmental affairs, entitled Huang-Ming ching-shih wenpien (Essays on statecraft during the Ming dynasty), by Ch'en Tzu-lung. Hummel, p. 282;Google ScholarWakeman, Frederick, ‘The Huang-ch'ao ching-shih wen-pien,’ Ch'ing-shih wen-t'i (Studies in Ch'ing history), I, No. 80 (02, 1969), pp. 8–9;Google ScholarChia-chien, Wang, Nien-p'u, p. 25. The compilation includes materials from the early Ch'ing to the Tao-kuang reign period (1821–51) and is divided into eight main sections. The first two introduce Confucian government with essays on the theory and purpose of government. The remaining six sections deal with the problems and responsibilities of the six boards: Civil Office, Revenue, Rites, War, Justice, and Public Works.Google Scholar

12 HCCSWP, 5.5b–6, 18b–19; 48.23–24, 26b–29b; 58.10b–11; 60.12; 68.15–16b; 76.15b–16; 77.1–8; 80.1–2b; 86.1a–b; 88.1a–b, 8–13.

13 There is no separate section on the maritime customs in the parts dealing with imperial finance. A discussion of maritime trade is found, HCCSWP, 26.13b–16; and the collection of customs and related corruption is dealt with 28.10b–12.Google Scholar

14 HCCSWP, chüan 83–85. Out of the total of 20 chūan dealing with the military, only three consider maritime defense.Google Scholar

15 A detailed elaboration of Wei's statecraft work is found in Mitchell, Peter M., ‘Wei Yüan (1794–1857) and the early modernization movement in China and Japan’ (unpublished Ph.D. dissertation, Indiana University, 1970), Chapter 2.Google Scholar

16 Mitchell, , op. cit.; Ch'i, pp. 197–200; Hummel, pp. 127, 281–2, 511, 710–11, 932; Wang Chia-chien, Nien-p'u, pp. 25–26, 30, 32, 35–6, 38, 50, 60–1, 53–65, 72, 97.Google Scholar For a general treatment of the grain tribute system see Hinton, Harold C., The grain tribute system of China 1845–1911 (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1956);CrossRefGoogle Scholarfor problems of water control, see Ch'ang-tu, Hu, ‘The Yellow River Administration in the Ch'ing dynasty’, Far Eastern quarterly, 14 (1954–1955), 505–13.Google Scholar

17 For details about the traditional system used prior to the reforms instituted in the early 1830s, see Ping-ti, Ho, ‘The salt merchants of Yangchou: a study of commercial capitalism in eighteenth century China’, Harvard journal of Asiatic studies, XVII (1954), pp. 130–68. For the reforms which Wei worked on, see Ch'i, pp. 195–6;Google ScholarMetzger, Thomas A., ‘T'ao Chu's reform of the Huaipei salt monopoly’, Papers on China (Cambridge: Harvard University, East Asian Research Center, 1962), 16.4–11;Google ScholarMitchell, , Chapter 2 passim; Wang, Chia-chien, Nien-p'u, pp. 53–8, 68, 72–4.Google Scholar

18 For a valuable study of the growing concern in the early nineteenth century with internal security following the White Lotus Rebellion in 1796, see Kuhn, Philip A., Rebellion and its enemies in late imperial China; militarization and social structure, 1796–1864 (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1970).Google Scholar

19 Chia-chien, Wang, Nien-p'u, pp. 21, 49–50, 61.Google Scholar

20 Ibid., pp. 6, 23. Wei Yüan's ideas on local defense are found in his essays on local defense and the Miao rebellions in HCCSWP, 77.1–8; 86.1a–b; 88.1a–b, 8–13; See also Yüan's, WeiSheng-wu chi (Record of Ch'ing military exploits), preface dated 1842, 14 chüan (Yang-chou: Ku-wei t'ang, 1846;Google Scholar reprinted Taipei: World Book Company, 1962), chüan 7. For a translation of Wei's account of the 1832 Yao rebellions, see Cushman, Richard, ‘Rebel haunts and lotus huts: problems in the ethnohistory of the Yao’ (unpublished Ph.D. dissertation, Cornell University, 1970), Appendix 12, pp. 235–49.Google Scholar

21 Chia-chien, Wang, Nien-p'u, pp. 39–40.Google Scholar

22 Ibid., p. 81. Tse, Wu, Wei Yüan te pien-i ssu-hsiang ho li-shih chin-hua kuan-tien’ (Wei Yüan's thought on change and viewpoint on historical progress), Li-shih yen-chiu (Historical research), No. 5 (October, 1962), pp. 33–59;Google ScholarTse, Wu and Li-yung, Huang ‘Wei Yüan Hai-kuo t'u-chih yen-chiu: Wei Yüan shih-hsüeh yen-chiu chih-erh’ (A study of Wei Yüan's Hai-kuo t'u-chih: second study on Wei Yüan's historical research), Li-shih yen-chiu (Historical research), 10, No. 4 (1963), pp. 117–40.Google Scholar

23 Cited above in note 20.

24 Chia-chien, Wang, Nien-p'u, pp. 39–40; Sheng-wu chi, Preface, 1.Google Scholar

25 Wei's inclusion of information about maritime affairs was undoubtedly prompted by the Opium War because, as will be apparent below, up until the late 1830s, his interests were centered on military questions related to the land borders, particularly Inner Asia, and tribal areas within China. Sheng-wu chi, chüan, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 9, and part of 10.Google Scholar

26 Sheng-wu chi, 14.384–7, 389 ff.

27 Hsin-pao, Chang, Commissioner Lin and the Opium War, Harvard East Asian Series, No. 18 (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1964), pp. 39–42;Google ScholarFairbank, John K., Trade and diplomacy on the China coast: the opening of the treaty ports, 1842–1854, 2 vols. in I (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1953), pp. 74–6;Google ScholarPin-chia, Kuo, A critical study of the First Anglo-Chinese War with documents (Shanghai: Commercial Press, Ltd., 1935), pp. 50–85;Google ScholarT'ing-i, Kuo, Chin-tai Chung-kuo shih (Recent Chinese history), 2 vols. in 1 (Taipei: Taiwan Cormnercial Press, 1963), pp. 35–124passim.Google Scholar

28 Chia-chien, Wang, Nien-p'u, pp. 6–5.Google Scholar

29 For details, see Ssu-yü, Teng, Chang Hsi and the Treaty of Nanking 1842 (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1944), p. 3.Google Scholar

30 (A brief account of England), I chüan ([Yang-chou], 1840)Google Scholar in Hsi-ch'i, Wang, comp., Hsiao-fang-hu-chai yü-ti ts'ung-ch'ao (Collected texts on geography from the Hsiao-fang-hu study), 8 cases, 60 ts'e (Shanghai, 1877–1897), Case 8, Pt. 3, chih 11, ts'e 55, item 8.Google Scholar

31 Chia-chien, Wang, Nien-p'u, pp. 75–6.Google Scholar

32 During Lin Tse-hsü's term of office as special commissioner and governorgeneral of Liang-Kwang (1839–40) during the First Opium War, he organized a staff of translators to collect and translate European-language materials about Western affairs. Part of this information was compiled into a geography, called the Ssu-chou chih (Record of the four continents), 20 chüan, 1841? This work, which is no longer available in complete form, was the first attempt to coordinate information about Europe and European expansion in Asia. The only version known to exist today is found in the Hsiao-fang-hu-chai collection, case 8, chih 12, ts'e 59, item 1, pp. 1–8b. Parts of it on maritime Asia, which are not in the Hsiao-fang-hu-chai collection, are found in the Treatise.Google Scholar

33 20 vols. (Canton, and Macao, ; 05, 1832–12, 1851).Google Scholar

34 Chia-chien, Wang, Nien-p'u, p. 76. Lin's farewell meeting with Wei is described by Wei in a short poem in the Ku-wei t'ang shih-chi (Collected poems from the Ku-wei study), 10 chüan (1870), I case, 4 ts'e, 8.13a-b.Google Scholar

35 Hummel, , pp. 939–41;Google ScholarSsu-yü, Teng, Chang Hsi, p. 15.Google Scholar

36 Chia-chien, Wang, Nien-p'u, pp. 78–82.Google Scholar

37 For information about the main thrust of Ch'ing border affairs in Inner Asia, see Clubb, O. Edmund, China and Russia: the great game (New York: Columbia University Press, 1971), pp. 19–60, 104–17;Google ScholarFarquhar, David M., ‘The origins of the Manchus' Mongolian policy’, in The Chinese world order, edited by John, K. Fairbank (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1968), pp. 198–205;Google ScholarLattimore, Owen, Inner Asian frontiers of China (Boston: Beacon Press, 1951), pp. 103–49;Google ScholarLee, Robert H. G., The Manchurian frontier in Ch'ing history (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1970);CrossRefGoogle ScholarMancall, Mark, ‘The Ch'ing tribute system: an interpretive essay’, in The Chinese world order, pp. 63–89;Google ScholarPetech, Lucian, China and Tibet in the early 18th century: history of the establishment of the Chinese protectorate in Tibet, Monographies du T'oung Pao, No. 1 (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1950).Google Scholar

38 HKTC, 9.14a—b; Preface to South-east Asia, 1b. A more detailed and intensive analysis of Ch'ing views of maritime Asian regionalism is presently being prepared by the author for publication and only a brief outline of Wei's views on this subject is presented below.Google Scholar

39 HKTC, Preface to South-east Asia, 2; 9.14a–b; 11.7b, 11. The term ‘wang-hui’ is found in the Yi Chou shu where it refers to the royal assembly or congress of feudal vassals. Wei Yüan used it to mean the locus of the royal power centers in China's tributary sphere.Google Scholar

40 Leonard, , pp. 112–20.Google Scholar

41 Respectively, Yüeh-nan , Hsien-lo , Mien-tien , Hsiao-lü-sung , P'o-lo , Ko-liu-pa , Su-men-ta-la .Google Scholar

42 HKTC, Preface to South-east Asia, 2.11.10b.

43 HKTC, 11.7b–8. The actual location of the kingdom of P'o-li is subject to differing interpretations. For a succinct summary of these interpretationsGoogle Scholar, see Wolters, O. W., Early Indonesian commerce: a study of the origins of Śrivijaya (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1967), pp. 169–72. Wei Yüan thought that it was located on the island of Sumatra.Google Scholar

44 HKTC, 11.8.

45 HKTC, 9.14.

46 HKTC, 11.7b; 11.11. Wei's model of the Asian tributary hierarchy appears to differ markedly from that of the Ming dynasty where China maintained relations with all the maritime states on a universalistic basis. For an elaboration of the Ming concept, see Gung-wu, Wang, ‘Early Ming relations with Southeast Asia: a back ground essay’, in The Chinese world order, pp. 36–49.Google Scholar The recognition of regional configurations is also noted by Professor Wang, , however, in ‘China and South-east Asia 1402–1424’, in Social history of China and South-east Asia: essays in memory of Victor Purcell (26 January 1896–2 January 1965), edited by Jerome, Ch'en and Nicholas, Tarling (Cambridge, Eng.: At the University Press, 1970), pp. 388–90.Google Scholar

47 Leonard, pp. 135–7.

48 HKTC, 3.11b; 5.13a–b.

49 HKTC, 5.13b.

50 HKTC, 9.14b–15 11.11; Preface to India, 2. Studies of the Ming voyages are legion. Attention will, however, be drawn to the introduction of Huan, Ma, Ying-yai sheng-lan; ‘the overall survey of the ocean's shores’ [1433], translated and edited by Mills, J. V. G. and Feng, Ch'eng-chün, Hakluyt Society Extra Series No. XLII (Cambridge, Eng.: At the University Press, 1970), pp. 1–34. For a penetrating analysis of the Ming voyages within the context of internal and external affairs during the Yung-lo reign period (1402–24), see Wang Gung-wu, ‘China and South-east Asia, 1402–1424’. For a discussion of the Yüan dynasty expeditions in maritime AsiaGoogle Scholarsee Ch'eng-chün, Feng, Chung-kuo nan-yang chiao-t'ung shih (The history of Chinese relations with the Southern Ocean; Shanghai, 1937; reprinted Hong Kong: Taiping Bookshop, 1963), pp. 78–90.Google Scholar

51 For details about the annexation of Formosa after the pacification of south and south-east China, see Hudson, G. F., Europe and China: a survey of their relations from the earliest times to 1800 (Boston: Beacon Press, 1931), pp. 257–9;Google ScholarHsieh, K. C., ‘Removal of coastal population in the early Tsing’, translated by Ch'en, T. H., Chinese social and political science review, XV, No. 4 (1930–1931), pp. 559–96;Google ScholarHsü, Immanuel C. Y., The rise of modern China (New York: Oxford University Press, 1970), pp. 34–41;Google ScholarJohn, E. Wills Jr, ‘Ch'ing relations with the Dutch, 1662–1690’, in The Chinese world order, pp. 228–44. For an interesting eyewitness account of the devastation wrought by the Ch'ing evacuation of the Chinese coast during the pacification of the southGoogle Scholarsee Ricci, Vittorio, ‘Events in Manila, 1662–63’, in Helen, Blair Emma and Alexander, Robertson James, eds., The Philippine Islands, 1493–1803, 55 vols. (Cleveland: The A. H. Clark Company, 1903–1909), XXXVI, pp. 247–60.Google Scholar

52 Wei Yüan's views about Asian maritime trade in the pre-European period are discussed in Leonard, pp. 138–42.Google Scholar

53 HKTC, Preface to maps, 1.

54 HKTC, Preface to Europe, 1b.

55 HKTC, 6.17.

56 HKTC, Preface to India, 1.

57 HKTC, 10.32b–33. A great deal of Wei Yüan's information about Western trading operations was derived from nineteenth-century Western writings in Chinese. For a summary analysis of these sources, see Barnett, , pp. 1–20. A more detailed analysis will be forthcoming in Mrs Barnett's doctoral thesis in progress, Harvard University. Wei Yüan, however, also gained a great deal of information about Western trade from Chinese sources, such as Hsieh Ch'ing-kao'sHai-lu (Record of the seas; 2 chüan, recorded in 1820; published in 1842) and Wang Ta-hai'sHai-tao i-chih (A treatise on the sea islands; 6 chüan, 1791).Google Scholar The latter work, for example, describes the Dutch activities in Indonesia, centered at Batavia. A translation of this work was made by the Protestant missionary Medhurst, Walter, entitled A desultory account of the Malayan archipelago (Shanghai: Mission Press, 1849).Google Scholar

58 HKTC, Preface to Europe, 1b–2.

59 HKTC, 6.17.

60 HKTC, 6.16b.

61 Wei was particularly impressed with the British who had made extensive efforts to learn spoken and written Chinese and had explored, as well, the very essence of Chinese civilization—the Classics. He noted the Chinese-English schools at both Malacca and Singapore. HKTC, 6.16b.

62 HKTC, 5.13b; 6.17.

63 HKTC, 5.13b. For a discussion of Wei's views on Asian trade and the role of the Straits of Malacca, see Leonard, , pp. 138–43. Further information about Śrivijaya and Malacca can be found in Wolters, Early Indonesian commerce;Google ScholarWolters, O. W., The fall of Śrivijaya in Malay history (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1970);Google ScholarMeilink-Roelofsz, M. A. P., Asian trade and European influence in the Indonesian archipelago between 1500 and about 1630 (The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff, 1962); for an interesting eyewitness Chinese account, see Ma Huan, pp. 108–14.Google Scholar

64 HKTC, 6.16b–17.

65 HKTC, 5.14b; 10.32b–33; 18.17b.

66 For a discussion of early Singapore and its trade, see Cowan, C. D., ed., ‘Early Penang and the rise of Singapore, 1805–32’, Journal of the Malayan Branch Royal Asiatic Society, XXIII, Pt. 2 (03, 1950), pp. 3–210.Google Scholar

67 HKTC, Preface to Africa, 1; for a detailed discussion of the accuracy of Wei's account of Africa, see Ch'en, Kenneth K. S., ‘The growth of geographical knowledge’, pp. 73–77.Google Scholar

68 HKTC, Preface to Africa, 1.

69 Ibid., 1b.

70 Ibid., 1b–2.

71 Ibid., 1.

72 Ibid., 1a–b.

73 HKTC, Preface to Africa, 1b.

74 HKTC, Preface to Indian political history, 1a–b.

75 HKTC, Preface to India, 2; Preface to Indian political history, 1–2.

76 Ibid., 2.

77 Preface to India, 1.

78 Ibid. Wei does not appear to have been aware of the strategic importance of Bombay as a naval repair station for British ships.

79 Ibid., 1. Wei mistakenly thought that the United States, Holland, and Spain possessed ports on the Indian coast.

80 Wei did not use the term, Nan-yang, as a technical geographical designation. Instead, he divided his treatment of maritime Asia into two parts: (1) the South, eastern Ocean, Tung-nan-yang which dealt with South-east Asia and Japan, and (2) the South-western Ocean, Hsi-nan-yang which included South, Central- and Western Asia.

81 Leonard, , pp. 165–70.Google Scholar

82 Ibid., pp. 167–70. Wei Yüan did not include the states on the Malay Peninsula among this group, but instead discussed them in the section on mainland South-east Asia because he considered them to be tributary states of Thailand. See chüan 6.

83 Japan was the only East Asian country dealt with in the Treatise, and it was included in the section on the South-eastern Ocean, chüan 12. Nepal, on the other hand, was discussed in the section on the South-eastern Ocean, chüan 18, 19. Nepal and Japan were viewed by Wei, along with the states of mainland South-east Asia, as forming the critical buffer zone on China's southern frontier.Google Scholar

84 HKTC, Preface to South-east Asia, 2.

85 Leonard, , pp. 108–9, 143, 145.Google Scholar

86 HKTC, Preface to South-east Asia, 2.

87 HKTC, Preface to South-east Asia, 2.

88 Ibid.

89 HKTC, 5.13b; 6.16b–17.

90 HKTC, 10.32b.

91 HKTC, 9.15; 10.32b–33. Wei was aware that the Dutch had temporarily lost their possessions in Indonesia during the Napoleanic Wars. For details about this issue and the Anglo-Dutch Treaty of 1824 which restored the area to the Dutch see Hall, D. G. E., A history of South-east Asia, 3rd ed. (London: Macmillan and Co., Ltd., 1964), pp. 443–81;Google ScholarMarks, Harry J., The first contest for Singapore, 1819–1824 (The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff, 1959), pp. 1–14, 178–237;Google ScholarMills, Lennox A., ‘British Malaya, 1824–67’, Journal of the Malayan Branch Royal Asiatic Society, XXXIII, Pt. 3, No. 191 (1960), pp. 86–98.Google Scholar

92 HKTC, 10.33b.

93 HKTC, Preface to South-east Asia, 2. Although Wei Yüan was aware of Anglo-Burmese clashes over the kingdom of Arakan, he does not appear to have known about the results of the First Anglo-Burmese War (1824–6) and the Treaty of Yandabo (1826) in which Arakan, Manipur, Assam, and Tenasserin were ceded to the British. He believed that Burma was intact and was a viable part of the tributary ring around China's southern border. Yet, although he proceeds on this assumption, it is interesting to note that while his maps of South-east Asia in the rare first, 50 chüan edition label Burma as one unit, it appears in the second edition divided into two: upper and lower Burma; thus, he may have been aware that changes of some sort had occurred. HKTC (1844), 2.14b; HKTC (1847), 2.14b.Google Scholar

94 HKTC, 5.14b.

95 HKTC, Preface to India, 1.

96 HKTC, Preface to South-east Asia, 2.

97 For details about the cession of Hong Kong, see Fairbank, , Trade and diplomacy, pp. 118–31 passim.Google Scholar

98 Chia-chien, Wang, Nien-p'u, pp. 114–17.Google Scholar

99 HKTC, Preface to Europe, 1–3. Wei did recognize that Macao was of reconnaissance value to the Chinese as a source of information about the West and vice versa.

100 For a discussion of Wei Yüan's views on Portuguese control of Macao, see Leonard, , note 59, p. 145.Google Scholar

101 HKTC, Preface to Europe, 2b.

102 The author's italics.

103 HKTC, Preface to Europe, 3.

104 Chia-chien, Wang, Wei, West, p. 85.Google Scholar

105 See Leonard, , pp. 46–50.Google Scholar

106 Wolters, , Fall of Śrivijaya, pp. 19–38, gives an insightful explanation of the origins of these stereotypes.Google Scholar

107 HKTC, Preface to Europe, 1b–2; Preface to Indian political history, 1b–2; Preface to South-east Asia, 1a–b.

108 HKTC, Preface to Europe, 1b–2.

109 HKTC, Preface to India, I; Preface to Europe, 1b–2; Preface to Africa, 1b–2; 10.32b–33.

110 HKTC, 5.14b; 10.32b–33; 18.17b. As was noted above, Wei did not seem to be a vare of the importance of Singapore in attracting east-west Asian trade to the Straits region.

111 The first study of the Treatise was made in Ch'en's, GideonLin Tse-hsü: pioneer promoter of the adoption of Western means of maritime defense in China (Peiping: Yenching University, 1934; reprinted New York: Paragon Book Gallery, 1961).Google ScholarThis study highlights Lin Tse-hsü's efforts to innovate the use of Western military and naval equipment during the First Opium War in an attempt to demonstrate that military modernization along Western lines began prior to the T'ung-chih restoration of the 1860s. Ch'en incorrectly attributes the policy ideas and the geographical sections of the Treatise to Lin rather than Wei Yüan.Google ScholarHiromu's, Momose work, ‘Shinmatsu no senkakusha Shōyō no Gi Gen’ . (Wei Yüan of Shao-yang: pioneer thinker of the late Ch'ing period), Rekishi Kōrōn (Historical review), III, No. 6, 88–98, surveys Wei Yüan's ideas on coastal defense found in the Treatise and effectively discusses them in conjunction with the broad themes in Ch'ing military history found in Wei's Sheng-wu chi.Google ScholarThe most detailed study. of Wei's plans for coastal defense is Inobe, Kazuiy's work, entitled ‘Kaibō ronsha to shite no Gi Mokushin’ (Wei Mo-shen: advocate of coastal defense), Shien,(Journal of history), No. 8 (1937), pp. 115–34.Google Scholar The most recent and comprehensive study of Wei's ideas on defense is the excellent monograph by Chia-chien, Wang, Wei, West, cited above in note 3. This work synthesizes and expands previous work done on Wei's coastal defense plans and his geographic knowledge about the West. Its important contributions lie in the analysis of Wei's views of foreign coastal trade and the opium issue, and these two issues are developed in the context of his diplomatic policies for dealing with the West on the China coast.Google Scholar

112 HKTC, 3.11b. Wei's observation was made in reference to an episode in Vietnamese history.

113 HKTC, General preface, 2b.

114 Ibid., 1.

115 Ibid.

116 HKTC, Preface to India, 1–2; 5.14.

117 HKTC, 5.12b–13; 3.8b–9, 11b; 4.5b; Preface to India, I. Wei was aware of the rather stormy past in Sino-Burmese relations during the 1640s and 1760s. HKTC, 5.13. For further details about Chinese punitive campaigns in Burma, see Luce, G. H., ‘Chinese invasions of Burma in the eighteenth century’, Journal of the Burma Research Society, XV, Pt. 2 (08, 1925), pp. 115–28. However, he considered, and correctly so, that Burma had finally been drawn into proper tributary relations with China in the late eighteenth century. For details about Burmese tributary missions to China during the Ch'ing periodGoogle Scholarsee Fairbank, K. John and Ssu-yü, Teng, ‘On the Ch'ing tributary system’ in Ch'ing administration: three studies, Harvard-Yenching Institute Studies, No. 19 (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1961), pp. 146–8.Google Scholar

118 HKTC, Preface to India, 1b.

119 HKTC, Preface to India, 1b. See Chia-chien, Wang, Wei, West, pp. 29–30, 113.Google Scholar

120 Wei discussed early Ch'ing relations with Russia in Inner Asia. See HKTC, Preface to Russia, 1a–b; Sheng-wu chi, pp. 163–71.

121 HKTC, Preface to India, 1a–b.

122 For information about this episode, see Wolters, O. W., ‘Ayudhyā and the rearward part of the world’, Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society, Nos. 3–4 (1968), 166–78.Google Scholar

123 HKTC, 5.14.

124 Ibid.

125 HKTC, Preface to India, 1b.

126 Ibid., 1a–b. The feasibility of developing an alliance with the French and Americans is discussed in chüan, 49.14b–37b.

127 Ibid., 1b. Chüan 53 to 60 in the 60 chüan edition of the Treatise present information about the manufacture of ships and arms in detail. Chüan 53 deals specifically with the question of purchasing and manufacturing military equipment.

128 Wei Yüan's approach would seem to be more in line with the aggressive policy of the Yung-lo Emperor than that of the more security-minded Hung-wu Emperor (1368–99). See Wolters, , Fall of Śrivijaya, pp. 49–76, 154–70 passim.Google Scholar

129 HKTC, Preface to India, 2.

130 HKTC, 9.14b–15. Wei apparently believed that the Yüan were successful against the Japanese and Javanese. However, contrary to his belief, the Yüan expeditions were failures.

131 See note III for a review of secondary literature dealing with coastal defense.