so much withal that was true and capable of demonstration, that he aroused the enthusiasm of our people. . . . The last effects of Mr. Burlingame's glowing statements were then effaced [by the Tientsin riot of 1870], and an impression left that the Chinese entertained an unyielding, bitter hatred of foreigners."
However this may be, the fruitless effects of the mission cannot be made to reflect upon Mr. Burlingame's ability or foresight. Indeed his success in the United States and at London and the sudden collapse of the mission upon his death bear testimony to his capacity and magnetic personality. James G. Blaine, who was a participant in the honors paid to him at Washington, says of him: "As an example of the influence of a single man attained over an alien race, whose civilization is widely different, whose religious belief is totally opposite, whose language he could not read nor write nor speak, Mr. Burlingame's career in China will always be regarded as an extraordinary event, not to be accounted for except by conceding to him a peculiar power of influencing those with whom he came in contact; a power growing out of a mysterious gift, partly intellectual, partly spiritual, and largely physical." The imagination may well speculate upon what might have been the later history of China, if his life had been spared to conclude his mission and to return to Peking to exercise his unusual personal influence upon the imperial court.[1]
- ↑ On Burlingame's appointment and mission, U. S. Dip. Cor. 1868, pt. i. pp. 493, 502, 601; 1870, pp. 317, 332; 1871, p. 166; Williams's Letters, 370, 376, 382; Martin's Cathay, 374; Speers's China, 429;
