by a great
increase of her fleet, get over the fear of England. I say China,
but I mean the Mantchou dynasty, for the Mantchous are despised
by the Chinese. Any war with China would be for France expensive
and dangerous, not from the Chinese forces, which would be soon
mastered, but from the certainty of complications with England.
As for the European population in China, write them down as
identical with those in Egypt in all affairs. Their sole idea is,
without any distinction of nationality, an increased power over
China for their own trade and for opening up the country as they
call it, and any war would be popular with them; so they will egg
on any Power to make it. My idea is that no colonial or foreign
community in a foreign land can properly, and for the general
benefit of the world, consider the questions of that foreign
State. The leading idea is how they will benefit themselves. The
Isle of Bourbon or Reunion is the cause of the Madagascar war. It
is egged on by the planters there, and to my idea they (the
planters) want slaves for Madagascar. I have a very mean opinion
of the views of any colonial or foreign community: though I own
that they are powerful for evil. Who would dare to oppose the
European colony in Egypt or China, and remain in those
countries?"

In a letter to myself, written about this time, very much the same
views are expressed:--

"I do not think I could enlighten _you_ about China. Her game is
and will be to wait events, and she will try and work so as to
embroil us with France if she does go to war. For this there
would be plenty of elements in the Treaty Ports. One may say,
humanly speaking, China going to war with France must entail our
following suit. It would be a bad thing in some ways for
civilization, for the Chinese are naturally so bumptious that any
success would make them more so, and if allied to us, and they
had success, it would be a bad look-out afterwards. This in
private. Li Hung Chang as Emperor, if such a thing came to pass,
would be worse than the present Emperor, for he is sharp and
clever, would unite China under a Chinese dynasty, and be much
more troublesome to deal with. Altogether, I cannot think that
the world would gain if China went to war with France. Also I
think it would be ev