The Battle of Zhoushan resulted in a defeat for both sides, and although both sides failed to achieve the goal of the campaign, relatively speaking, although the Taiping navy suffered far more losses in personnel and ships than the British army, the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom was still able to accept this result, because the British and French navies were much stronger than the Taiping navy.

After the Battle of Zhoushan, the two fleets in the East China Sea and the South China Sea were damaged and could not fight again, so they could only continue to send a small number of ships to conduct maritime guerrilla warfare. These pirates were fed up with the encirclement and suppression of the British on weekdays, and many of the Chinese pirates were still able to unite with the outside world in such matters, so the Taiping army used various means to attract many pirates to fight together.

As a result, the two sides launched a long-term naval guerrilla war in the South China Sea and its adjacent waters, while the British and French navies did not carry out a large-scale expedition to the north, let alone launch another attack on the southern coastal ports heavily defended by the Taiping Army, but only sent ships to blockade the ports of Guangzhou and Xiamen. The British and French navies were waiting for reinforcements to arrive, and without a strong land force, even if they could attack and capture one or two ports, they would not be able to hold them, so the British and French navies only blocked a few ports closer to Hong Kong.

In addition, the British and French navies were saddened to find that the scene of fighting with the Qing army more than 20 years ago while being able to trade all kinds of materials from the Qing people is gone. The British and French navies went on an expedition to the sea, and once they wanted to replenish the coast with fresh vegetables and fruits, it was basically impossible. None of the people along the coast will take the initiative to trade with Britain and France, and even some Chinese who are still compradors in foreign banks go ashore to trade for the British and French navies, once they are discovered. It must be half dead. The British fleet, which blockaded the port of Xiamen, even had to fight in order to obtain fresh fresh water. Xiamen concentrated a large number of nearby villagers, and skirmishes often broke out on the coast near Xiamen.

Meantime. The Taiping army on the mainland also launched a blockade strategy, and since the start of the war, the British army in Hong Kong has never received supplies of grain, vegetables, melons and fruits from Guangzhou and other places. Hong Kong's locally produced agricultural products are not enough to supply Hong Kong's local use, because there are tens of thousands of Hong Kong residents, British and French merchants, naval officers and soldiers, and so on. In many cases, the British army in Hong Kong had to go to places such as the Beibu Gulf to import agricultural products from Vietnam and even the South Seas further south to ensure the supply of goods to Hong Kong.

Although the fighting at sea continued, the trade at sea was never completely cut off. As a result of the mediation by the Americans, Britain, France, the United States and other countries signed the "Far East Wartime Trade Agreement." The British and French fleets did not target the merchant ships of the United States, the Netherlands, Prussia, Sweden and other countries, and they could not completely blockade all the ports of China anyway, so the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom did not cut off trade with the outside world, on the contrary, it was concentrated in Shanghai, Ningbo and other places, which further promoted the formation of these two major trading ports.

In addition to the headaches of material replenishment, pirate raids, and fleet operations, Ergin and other British and French leaders also gave them headaches due to the increasingly rampant espionage activities of the Taiping Army on Hong Kong Island. Due to the actions of the enemy's spies, more and more British officers and soldiers were bribed, not to mention the Chinese compradors of those foreign firms, and Ergin even suspected that there were people around him who had been bribed by the Taiping army.

As a last resort. Erjin has implemented a permit supervision system in Hong Kong, and anyone who goes out must have a pass issued by the Hong Kong Governor's Office, otherwise they will be treated as spies. Unfortunately, Ergin soon discovered that there were many fraudulent passes. Moreover, this practice has also caused great dissatisfaction among the local residents of Hong Kong, and although the British army can still suppress this discontent by force, the growing public anger is brewing.

Since the Battle of Zhoushan. Ergin was always looking forward to good news from the country, but as a politician, he knew it. It's not that fast, the UK is a constitutional monarchy. The British Parliament is notoriously abrasive, and the reason is very simple: Prime Minister Palmerston, as the representative of the ruling party, wants to pass any resolution, and the opposition party will inevitably stand up to stir up the situation.

As a special envoy to the Far East to report back to China, Wittoma did not dare to delay along the way, and near the end of the year, Wittoma finally returned to the Thames after a long absence. At that time, the Suez Canal was not yet open, and after arriving in Egypt, Wittoma took a train by land through North Africa and waited for the ships of the British Mediterranean Fleet before returning to England.

Wittoma took the common route between the Far East and London at that time, first by sailing to Suez, then by land to Alexandria, and then by galleon to London. It will take a month or two at the earliest.

At the Prime Minister's residence, Wittoma met with British Prime Minister Palmerston first, despite the fatigue of the dust. Palmerston and the rest of the British cabinet first listened to Wittoma's detailed report, and although Palmerston had already received a telegram from Egypt, he still had to wait for Wittoma's detailed report.

Palmerston still remembered the shock he felt when he received the telegram, and he could not imagine that the Taiping Heavenly Diet had declared war on Britain and France at such a time, and that the expeditionary force organized by Britain and France had been completely wiped out, and the news was undoubtedly terrible and quite shocking.

Before Palmerston ordered the news to be blocked, the British newspaper media had already preemptively published the news of the outbreak of war between the Far East and the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom, and the publication of the newspaper was only a short night away from Palmerston knowing the news. In fact, in the nineteenth century in the context of the surging development of the European news industry, the use of telegraph technology by the news agencies of various countries led the formation of the entire news industry chain, in 1855 the two largest British telegraph companies, ElectricTelegraph Company Limited and EnglishandIrishMagneticTelegraph Company, had jointly managed about 6,700 miles of British telegraph lines. They were no slower than the government to obtain information by telegram, and the telegraph companies had insider trading in news agencies. As a result, a complete news industry chain has been formed.

Affected by the newspaper news, the London stock market suffered a heavy fall on the same day. The families of British officers and soldiers involved in the expeditionary force even broke through the door of the Prime Minister's residence in Downing Street, demanding a detailed explanation from the government. They are anxious to find out what happened to their husbands and sons. For this reason, Prime Minister Palmerston had to personally intervene several times to reassure him, and then everyone was waiting for the arrival of the special envoy to return to the country, Wittoma, who could bring more information. At the same time, after receiving the news, the opposition and opposition parties also began to initiate impeachment bills against the current cabinet and the prime minister, and Palmerston faced a parliamentary question. The news from the telegram was not exhaustive, and Palmerston had to wait for Wittoma to arrive before the whole thing could be clarified, as did the parliament and the opposition. The same was true of the families of the soldiers, and the whole of Britain endured the most difficult and painful twenty days in anxious waiting.

In the Downing Street Prime Minister's Residence, surrounded by a group of cabinet ministers, he first gave a detailed account of the causes, processes and results of the outbreak of the war, and finally displayed letters from British and French businessmen, soldiers and civilians from all walks of life in the Far East, all of which were the views of the British people from all walks of life in the Far East on the war and some suggestions.

For a whole day, Palmerston and the cabinet members watched and listened to the report from Wittoma. Then he carefully read every letter from the Far East, and at last Palmerston put down the letters from Midile and Elgin, which he had read three times, and said in his thick voice: "Gentlemen, it seems that we have made a fatal mistake. From the very beginning, the Taiping Rebellion could not be the key that we could use to further open the door to China, on the contrary. The rise of this emerging country in the Far East has become the biggest obstacle to the expansion of our interests in the Far East! ”

Wittoma glanced at Palmerston, and knew in his heart that they were the first to pursue a high-pressure policy. At the time of the Second Opium War, it was Prime Minister Palmerston who was able to secure the actions of the expeditionary force despite public opinion, even at the cost of dissolving Parliament. But now that the expeditionary force has failed, provoking another strong rising country to declare war with Britain, it is in this situation that Palmerston's first consideration is not whether he and his cabinet will fall, but the first thing that comes to mind is Britain's expansionist and high-pressure policy, because Palmerston has always believed that Britain must dominate the affairs of a person of color, and there is no difference between China and India.

It is a pity that Britain's political characteristics are also very distinct, no matter what the ruling party does, the opposition party will always stumble on your legs, and as for the people in the same party, they may not always maintain a high degree of consistency with the party Central Committee.

In February 1857, during a debate on the launching of an expedition to the Far East, the Tories leader, the Earl of Derby, introduced a motion in the House of Lords condemning the use of force by government officials in China to bully the bewildered and helpless barbarian culture. He may have been a very learned man; But it seems to me that when it comes to negotiating with the Manchus and the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom, he really suffers from unrequited love (laughter). I believe he's dreaming of the benefits of both; I believe he is lovesick, lovesick, and waking up in the middle of the night (laughter). I am sure he must have thought that as long as Sir Baring was formally received in both Peking and Nanking, no sacrifice would be great, no interruption of commerce, and almost no bloodshed would be a pity compared to the great benefits of the fact. ”

However, in the final parliamentary vote, due to the strong support of Palmerston and others, the vote was 110 to 146, and the Palmerston government won with a majority of 36 votes. At the same time as the upper house quarreled, the lower house also quarreled. Whig veteran John? Russell said in the House of Commons: Sending troops to the Far East is a big deal, which will seriously affect the pattern of our neutrality, once the troops of the British Empire appear in the Far East, no matter what they do, they will break the situation of neutrality, and we must consider it carefully. We should not be drawn into a civil war in China, but on the contrary we should hope that the civil war will end as soon as possible, and that a stable situation in the Far East will be beneficial to Britain's trade interests.

Palmerston's argument (according to British rules, the prime minister must be a member of the House of Commons): the Manchus were a barbaric and backward government, responsible for all crimes that trampled on human dignity; And the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom is no better than him, and the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom has embarrassed us even more than the Manchu Qing in the negotiation of tariffs! We can control and influence the civil war in the Far East, where the arms trade is surpassing the opium trade, and we do not want the civil war to end sooner, and it is in the interests of Britain to maintain a certain balance of power in the Far East. Vote carefully, and it is up to you to decide whether or not the arms and opium trade in the Far East will be carried out at the same time.

And the final vote in the House of Commons was 263:247, and Palmerston lost. Queen Victoria said of the Tory victory: "It is very sad that the vicious partisan conspiracy which has no patriotic feelings at all has succeeded. "According to the British Constitution, the Cabinet loses the support of the House of Commons and either resigns, or the Prime Minister asks the King to dissolve Parliament and hold a new general election to finally decide whether the Cabinet will stay or not. However, in 1784, British Prime Minister Pitt Jr. created a constitutional convention, that is, the cabinet could ask the king to dissolve Parliament without resignation, and conduct a new general election, directly seeking the approval and support of the electorate. In the new general election, Palmerston's Whigs won, and perhaps the Far East at that time could finally be overcome by Palmerston's high-handed policies, in which the influence of the empress is self-evident.

But now that the expedition to the Far East has failed, how will the Empress react? Wittoma fell into deep thought amid the bickering of cabinet ministers...... (To be continued......)