In the absence, however, of any positive denial of the points really complained of, this negative and evasive statement of Sir H. Pottinger failed to satisfy the mercantile community of Hongkong. They did not for a moment believe the absurd allegation that Sir H. Pottinger's interpreter had been bribed, but they were convinced that, when Sir H. Pottinger signed the Chinese text of the Supplementary Treaty, he was ignorant of some of the objectionable provisions it contained, and that by his known aversion to a literal English version to be submitted to him for publication, and by his being content (for unexplained reasons of his own) with an English abstract, the Chinese Mandarins were enabled to slip into that version which they submitted to him for signature, provisions which, while looking in a free English translation like harmless prolixity of diction, had the effect of limiting the Hongkong coast trade to dealings with Canton under arbitrary restrictions (differential duties) and excluding it (by a flourish of the pen) from the other open ports.
Sir H. Pottinger, it was said, fumed and fretted when he discovered how he had been duped by Kiying and the other Commissioners, whom he and all Hongkong had honoured as exceptionally meek and truthful men. The Cantonese Authorities had all along put an embargo on all trade with Hongkong, but now claimed Sir H. Pottinger's express authority for doing so. At all the Treaty ports the Chinese officials frowned at any reckless Chinaman who had the hardihood to apply for a permit to ship goods to Hongkong, telling him that he was a base traitor to the national cause and ought to be dealt with accordingly. On June 7, 1841, Captain Elliot had 'clearly declared that there will be an immediate embargo upon the port of Canton and all the large ports of the Empire if there be the least obstruction to the freedom of Hongkong.' Had Sir H. Pottinger now carried out this threat, the Chinese would have yielded at once. But he shrank from a renewal of the war and from the confession that he had been duped by Kiying as much as Elliot was duped by Kishen. So he confined himself to diplomatic remonstrances, a game in which Europeans have
