ir Mandarins levy duties, and tax every article sold in its
markets; its porters, boatmen, _compradores_, &c. require Chinese
licenses, but not Portuguese: in short, the Chinese are lords of the
manor, and the Portuguese are mere tenants, with leave to build forts,
and to levy certain duties on the commerce of the place. Looking at the
matter in this light, every unprejudiced person must admit, that Sir
Henry Pottinger, in exercising the power vested in him by Her Majesty's
Government, and in framing regulations for the wholesome restraint of
Her Majesty's subjects visiting China, (some of whom, it may be
remarked, are troublesome and very unruly characters,) was perfectly
right in including the peninsula of Macao in the dominions of His
Celestial Majesty. The Portuguese were very indignant; at least, they
pretended to be so; but it never would have done, to allow British
subjects, fleeing from their creditors or from justice, to have an
asylum where they could safely evade the laws of their own country, at a
foreign station scarcely forty miles from the new British settlement of
Hong Kong.[22]

[Footnote 22: The present Governor of Hong Kong, Sir John
Davis, has gone even further than Sir Henry Pottinger, and has
given notice to the Authorities at Macao, that British subjects
are no longer amenable to their laws. This is as it should be,
and as it ought to have been a hundred years ago.]

The trade of Macao was of very little importance, and its revenues never
paid its expenses, till the late Chinese war broke out. Circumstances
then drove the British merchants from Canton, and nearly the whole of
them took up their abode in Macao, where they continued till the
Portuguese Government was called upon by the Chinese to refuse them
further protection. They were then compelled to seek shelter on board
the shipping of their country, where many of them remained for nearly
twelvemonths, till the course of events allowed of their returning to
Macao. Their presence soon attracted hundreds of wealthy and respectable
Chinese dealers, and quadrupled the trade of the place, as well as its
revenue; which enabled the Portuguese Governor to make a handsome
remittance to Lisbon, in place of drawing upon that city for some 40,000
dollars annually, as he had hitherto been in the constant practice of
doing, to rebuild many of the public edifices, and to improve the town
generally, while it added much to the wealth and