It may be well here to recapitulate the chief articles of the Treaty thus concluded, which may be briefly summed up as follows:-- The Queen of Great Britain to be at liberty, if she see fit, to appoint an Ambassador, who may reside permanently at Pekin, or may visit it occasionally, at the option of the British Government; Protestants and Roman Catholics to be alike entitled to the protection of the Chinese authorities; British subjects to be at liberty to travel to all parts of the interior, under passports issued by their Consuls; British ships to be at liberty to trade upon the Great River (Yangtze); Five additional ports to be opened to trade; The Tariff fixed by the Treaty of Nankin to be revised; British subjects to have the option of clearing their goods of all transit duties by payment of a single charge, to be calculated as nearly as possible at the rate of 2-1/2 per cent. _ad valorem_; The character 'I' (Barbarian) to be no longer applied in official documents to British subjects; The Chinese to pay 2,000,000 taels (about 650,000_l._) for losses at Canton, and an equal sum for the expenses of the war. [Sidenote: Reasons for moderation.] [Sidenote: Right of sending an ambassador,] In bringing this Treaty to a conclusion Lord Elgin might have said of himself as truly as of the brother who had so ably helped him in arranging its terms, that he 'felt very sensibly the painfulness of the position of a negotiator, who has to treat with persons who yield nothing to reason and everything to fear, and who are at the same time profoundly ignorant both of the subjects under discussion and of their own real interests.' Moreover he had constantly to recollect that, under the 'most favoured nation' clause, every concession made to British subjects would be claimed by the subjects, or persons calling themselves the subjects, of other Powers, by whom they were only too likely to be employed for the promotion of rebellion and disorder within the empire, or for the establishment of privileged smuggling and piracy along its coasts and up its rivers. In all these circumstances he saw grounds for exercising forbearance and moderation; and his forbearance and moderation were rewarded by the readiness with which the Emperor sanctioned the Treaty, and the amicable manner in which its details were subsequently settled. One exception there was to this moderation on his part, and to this readiness on theirs; viz. his insisting, against the earnest remonstrances of the Imperial Commissioners, backed by the intercession of the Russian and American envoys, on the right of sending an ambassador to Pekin. But it was an exception of that kind which is said to prove the rule; for the stipulation was one which could not lead to abuses, and which would be conducive, as he believed, in the highest decree to the true interests of both the contracting parties. He was convinced that so long as the system of