Presenter by author CHINA, DURING THE WAR AND SINCE THE PEACE. BY SIR JOHN FRANCIS DAVIS, BART., F.R.S. LATE HER MAJESTY'S PLENIPOTENTIARY IN CHINA; GOVERNOR IN TWO VOLUMES. VOL. I. LONDON: LONGMAN, BROWN, GREEN, AND LONGMANS. ΤΟ VICE ADMIRAL SIR THOMAS J. COCHRANE, K.C.B., LATE COMMANDER-IN-CHIEF IN THE EASTERN SEAS. MY DEAR ADMIRAL, This Work is addressed to you in remembrance of days passed in China, and because there is nobody better able than yourself to judge of the various subjects of which it treats. Yours faithfully, J. F. DAVIS. Athenæum Club, PREFACE. THE two portions of this work, though consecutive in point of time, and so far connected, are materially different in other respects. The first is, in fact, a Chinese History, founded on native documents not intended for our information; the second, the results of diplomatic transactions and personal experience during a four years' administration. A mass of Chinese official papers, captured or otherwise collected during the war, seemed worthy of a better fate than to become the prey of worms, always peculiarly active in a hot climate. Dr. Gutzlaff, by my desire, furnished a regular series of translations and abstracts during the years 1844 and 1845, |