ABSTRACT
From the middle of 1884, however, such a conspiracy of silence was no longer maintained, and Britain, Germany and the United States could openly assess the consequences to their own interests of the changed situation. Their immediate reaction, of course, was anxiety at the threat to commerce which a war would bring in its train, and in consequence a certain inclination to look askance at French aggression. The memory of the particular aspect of foreign domination is naturally infuriating to Chinese of every shade of political opinion, who point out that the Customs Service so constituted was one of most effective instruments which kept China for so many decades as a semi-colony. That haunt of the Black Flags must be ceded to France without more ado. But the Black Flags were a sore point with Peking, and it seemed impossible that any Chinese government could stomach the indignity of having to betray the men who were being acclaimed as heroes.
