File:The Reception.JPG

Summary

by <a href="//commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/James_Gillray" title="James Gillray">James Gillray</a>, published 14 September 1792.
"A caricature on <a href="//commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/George_Macartney,_1st_Earl_Macartney" title="George Macartney, 1st Earl Macartney">Lord Macartney</a>'s Embassy to <a href="//commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/China" class="mw-redirect" title="China">China</a> and on the little which the Ambassador and his government are presumed to have known of the manners and tastes of the people they wanted to conciliate (the purpose of the visit was to propose the creation of a permanent English mission to the court of <a href="//commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Peking" class="mw-redirect" title="Peking">Peking</a>). Chinese etiquette is, that extreme prostrations should be made before the Emperor, which it was intimated Lord Macartney would not conform to. The whole contour of the Emperor is indicative of cunning and contempt and his indifference to the numerous gifts displaying the skill of British manufacturing, is evident. The German face bringing in the cage is Mr Huttner of the Foreign Office, who acted as an interpreter and published his own account of the visit. As soon as Lord Macartney had declined to make the required prostrations, only going down on one knee, he was dismissed from the presence of the Emperor. He was later ordered to quit Peking within two days and was given a letter addressed to George III wherein the Emperor states that,'As your Ambassador can see for himself, we possess all things. I set no value on objects strange or ingenious, and have no use for your country's manufactures'. An attache, Aeneas Anderson, later recalled that "we entered Pekin like Paupers, remained in it like Prisoners and departed from it like Vagrants".

Licensing

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