bear on the Imperial power. [Sidenote: Subterfuges,] [Sidenote: defeated by firmness.] _Shanghae.--Sunday, October 10th._--We have not done much yet, which is the cause of my having written less than usual during the last few days. I have reason to suspect that the Commissioners came here with some hope that they might make difficulties about 'some of the concessions obtained in the Treaty, with a kind of notion perhaps that they might continue to bully us at Canton. If I had departed, I think it probable enough that everything would have been thrown into confusion, and the grand result of proving that my Treaty was waste paper might have been attained. I have thought it necessary to take steps to stop this sort of thing at once, so I have sent some very peremptory letters to the Commissioners about Canton, refusing to have anything to say to them till I am satisfied on this point, &c. I have also, through a secret channel, had the hint conveyed to them, that if they do not give me full satisfaction at once I am capable of going off to Tientsin again,--a move which would no doubt cost their heads to both Kweiliang and Hwashana. I have already extorted from them a proclamation announcing the Treaty, and I have now demanded that they shall remove the Governor-General of the Canton provinces from office, and suppress the War Committee of the gentry. _October 16th._--Yes, the report of the conclusion of a Treaty which was conveyed so rapidly overland to St. Petersburg was true, and yet I am not on my way home!... Do not think that I am indifferent to this delay. It is however, for the moment, inevitable. Everything would have been lost if I had left China. The violence and ill-will which exist in Hong-Kong are something ludicrous.... As it is, matters are going on very fairly with the Imperial Commissioners, and I expect an official visit from them this day at noon. The English mail arrived yesterday.... The visit of the Commissioners went off very well. I think that they have accepted the situation, and intend to make the best of it. _October 19th_.--Yesterday I returned the visit of the Commissioners, going in state, with a guard, &c., into the city. We had a Chinese repast--birds'-nest soup, sharks' fins, &c. I tried to put them at their ease, after our disagreeable encounters at Tientsin. They seemed disposed to be conversable and friendly. The Governor-General of this province, who is one of them, is considered a very clever man, and he appears to have rather a notion of taking a go-ahead policy with foreigners. [Sidenote: The tariff.] The chief matter that remained to be arranged was the settlement of certain trade-regulations, supplemental to the Treaty, involving a complete revision of the tariff. [Sidenote: The opium trade.]