In the matter of trade and intercourse with China, of which 
Lord Palmerston and Louis Napoleon have undertaken the 
extension by force, no little jealousy is evidently felt of the position 
occupied by Russia. Indeed, it is quite possible that without any 
expenditure of money or exertion of military force Russia may 
gain more in the end, as a consequence of the pending quarrel 
with the Chinese, than either of the belligerent nations. 

The relations of Russia to the Chinese Empire are altogether 
peculiar. While the English and ourselves—for in the matter of 
the pending hostilities the French are but littke more than 
amateurs, as they really have no trade with China—are not 
allowed the privilege of a direct communication even with the 
Viceroy of Canton, the Russians enjoy the advantage of maintain- 
ing an Embassy at Pekin. It is said, indeed, that this advantage is 
purchased only by submitting to allow Russia to be reckoned at the 
Celestial Court as one of the tributary dependencies of the 
Chinese Empire. Nevertheless it enables Russian diplomacy, as in 
Europe, to establish an influence for itself in China which is by no 
means limited to purely diplomatic operations. 

Being excluded from the maritime trade with China, the 
Russians are free from any interest or involvement in past or 
pending disputes on that subject; and they also escape that 
antipathy with which from time immemorial the Chinese have 
regarded all foreigners approaching their country by sea, con- 
founding them, and not entirely without reason, with the piratical 
adventurers by whom the Chinese coasts seem ever to have been 
infested. But as an indemnity for this exclusion from the maritime 
trade, the Russians enjoy an inland and overland trade peculiar to 

themselves, and in which it seems impossible for them to have any 
rival. This traffic, regulated by a treaty made in 1768,°* during 
the reign of Catherine II, has for its principal, if not indeed its 
sole seat of operations, Kiakhta, situated on the frontiers of 
southern Siberia and of Chinese Tartary," on a tributary of the 
Lake Baikal, and about a hundred miles south of the City of 
Irkootsk. This trade, conducted at a sort of annual fair, is 
managed by. twelve factors, of whom six are Russians and six 
Chinese, who meet at Kiakhta, and fix the rates—since the trade 
is entirely by barter—at which the merchandise supplied by either 
party shall be exchanged. The principal articles of trade are, on 
the part of the Chinese, tea, and on the part of the Russians, 
cotton and woolen cloths. This trade, of late years, seems to have 
attained a considerable increase. The quantity of tea sold to the 
Russians at Kiakhta did not, ten or twelve years ago, exceed an 
average of forty thousand chests; but in 1852 it amounted to a 
hundred and seventy-five thousand chests, of which the larger 
part was of that superior quality well known to continental 
consumers as Caravan tea, in contradistinction from the inferior 
article imported by sea. The other articles sold by the Chinese 
were some small quantities of sugar, cotton, raw silk and silk 
goods, but all to very limited amounts. The Russians paid about 
equally in cotton and woolen goods, with the addition of small 
quantities of Russian leather, wrought metals, furs and even 
opium. The whole amount of goods bought and sold—which 
seem in the published accounts to be stated at very moderate 
prices—reached the large sum of upward of fifteen millions of 
dollars. In 1853, owing to the internal troubles of China*”’ and 
the occupation of the road from the tea provinces by bands of 
marauding rebels, the quantity of tea sent to Kiakhta fell off to 
fifty thousand chests, and the whole value of the trade of that year 
was but about six millions of dollars. In the two following years, 
however, this commerce revived, and the tea sent to Kiakhta for 
the fair of 1855 did not fall short of a hundred and twelve 
thousand chests. 

In consequence of the increase of this trade, Kiakhta, which is 
situated within the Russian frontier, from a mere fort and 
fair-ground, has grown up into a considerable city. It has been 
selected as the capital of that part of the frontier region, and is to 
be dignified by having a military commandant and a civil 
governor. At the same time a direct and regular postal communi- 

4 Mongolia.— Ed. 

Russian Trade with China 225 

cation for the transmission of official dispatches has lately been 
established between Kiakhta and Pekin, which is distant from it 
about nine hundred miles. 

It is evident that, should the pending hostilities result in a 
suppression of the maritime trade, Europe might receive its entire 
supply of tea by this route. Indeed, it is suggested that even with 
the maritime trade open, Russia may, upon the completion of her 
system of railroads, become a powerful competitor with the 
maritime nations for supplying the European markets with tea. 
These railroads will supply a direct communication between the 
ports of Cronstadt and Libau and the ancient city of Nijni 
Novgorod in the interior of Russia, the residence of the merchants 
by whom the trade at Kiakhta is carried on. The supply of Europe 
with tea by this overland route is certainly more probable than the 
employment of our projected Pacific Railroad for that purpose. 
Silk, too, the other chief export of China, is an article of such 
small bulk in comparison to its cost, as to make its transportation 
by land by no means impossible; while this Chinese traffic opens 
an outlet for Russian manufactures, such as they cannot elsewhere 
attain. 

We may observe, however, that the efforts of Russia are by no 
means limited to the development of this inland trade. It is several 
years since she took possession of the banks of the River Amour,””’ 
the native country of the present ruling race* in China. Her 
efforts in_ this direction received some check and interruption 
during the late war,” but will doubtless be revived and pushed with 
energy. She has possession of the Kurile Islands and_ the 
neighboring coasts of Kamtchatka. Already she maintains a fleet in 
those seas, and will doubtless improve any opportunity that may 
offer to obtain a participation in the maritime trade with China. 
This, however, is of little consequence to her compared with the 
extension of that overland trade of which she possesses the 
monopoly.