Note 185 — XV. (continued 2)

We extract from the London and China Telegraph of 31st March, 1862, the following severe but just criticism on this gentleman, whose letter, which we also quote, shows him to be a person of but limited education:—"Even the Rev. J. Roberts, who, as our readers are aware, has lived with the rebels at Nankin, and has to his discredit defended their conduct in the strongest possible manner, has at length discovered that they are nothing better than robbers and murderers. This change of opinion in a man who on all occasions so confidently urged the claims of the Tai-pings, arose from a very simple cause:—he at length suffered, personally, from their barbarity. A servant to whom he was attached was killed before his eyes; and considering his life in danger, he fled to Shanghai, and wrote the following letter, dated 22nd January, 1862, reprobating the conduct of his former friends:—'From having been the religious teacher of Hung Sow-chuen in 1847, and hoping that good—religious, commercial, and political—would result to the nation from his elevation, I have hitherto been a friend to his revolutionary movement, sustaining it by word and deed, as far as a missionary consistently could, without vitiating his higher character as an ambassador of Christ. But after living among them fifteen months, and closely observing their proceedings—political, commercial, and religious—I have turned over entirely a new leaf, and am now as much opposed to them, for good reasons, I think, as I was ever in favour of them. Not that I have aught personally against Hung Sow-chuen, he has been exceedingly kind to me. But I believe him to be a crazy man, entirely unfit to rule, without any organized government, nor is he, with his coolie-kings, capable of organizing a government of equal benefit to the people of even the old Imperial Government. He is violent in his temper, and lets his wrath fall heavily upon his people, making a man or woman 'an offender for a word,' and ordering such instantly to be murdered without 'judge or jury.' He is opposed to commerce, having had more than a dozen of his own people murdered since I have been here, for no other crime than trading in the city, and has promptly repelled every foreign effort to establish lawful commerce here among them, whether inside of the city or out. His religious toleration and multiplicity of chapels turn out to be a farce, of no avail in the spread of Christianity, worse than useless. It only amounts to a machinery for the promotion and spread of his own political religion, making himself equal with Jesus Christ, who, with God the Father, himself, and his own son constitute one Lord over all! Nor is any missionary, who will not believe in his divine appointment to this high equality, and promulgate his political religion accordingly, safe among these rebels, in life, servants, or property. He told me soon after I arrived that if I did not believe in him, I would perish, like the Jews did for not believing in the Saviour. But little did I then think that I should ever come so near it, by the sword of one of his own miscreants, in his own capital, as I did the other day. Kan-Wang, moved by his elder brother (literally a coolie at Hong-kong) and the devil, without the fear of God before his eyes, did, on Monday the 13th inst., come into the house in which I was living, then and there most wilfully, maliciously, and with malice aforethought, murder one of my servants with a large sword in his own hand in my presence, without a moment's warning or any just cause. And after having slain my poor harmless, helpless boy, he jumped on his head most fiend-like and stamped it with his foot; notwithstanding I besought him most entreatingly from the commencement of his murderous attack to spare my poor boy's life. And not only so, but he insulted me myself in every possible way he could think of, to provoke me to do or say something which would give him an apology, as I then thought and I think yet, to kill me, as well as my dear boy, whom I loved like a son. He stormed at me, seized the bench on which I sat with the violence of a madman, threw the dregs of a cup of tea in my face, seized hold of me personally, and shook me violently, struck me on my right cheek with his open hand; then, according to the instruction of my King for whom I am ambassador, I turned the other, and he struck me quite a sounder blow on my left cheek with his right hand, making my ear ring again; and then perceiving that he could not provoke me to offend him in word or deed, he seemed to get the more outrageous, and stormed at me like a dog, to be gone out of his presence. 'If they will do these things in a green tree, what will they do in the dry?'—to a favourite of Teen Wang's, who can trust himself among them, either as a missionary or a merchant? I then despaired of missionary success among them, or any good coming out of the movement—religious, commercial, or political—and determined to leave them, which I did on Monday, Jan. 20th, 1862.' Mr. Roberts adds that Kan-Wang had refused to give up his clothes, books, and journals, and that he had been left in a state of destitution. Most persons will agree that he fully deserves any amount of suffering that may be inflicted on him. Mr. Roberts has done his utmost to delude Europeans as to the true character of the Tai-pings; he has kept back some facts, has falsified others, and has acted throughout in a manner utterly inconsistent with his assumed character of a Christian missionary. On such conduct no comment can be too severe."