The Immobile Empire by Alain Peyrefitte

Author:Alain Peyrefitte [Peyrefitte, Alain]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 978-0-345-80394-8
Publisher: Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group
Published: 2013-05-21T04:00:00+00:00

This was not so much a report as a mirror held up to the emperor’s face, and Qianlong clearly enjoyed looking at himself in it.

Two other memoranda were sent to the emperor at the same time. One came from Guo Shixun, military governor of Canton, and reached Peking at the end of October: “As soon as the delegation arrives in Guangdong, I will order the high civilian and military officials to come out to meet it, at the head of numerous suitably equipped and drilled soldiers, to make an impression on the delegation. The Barbarian is treacherous by nature, and it is difficult to trust him. If he renews his ill-considered requests in Guangdong, I will firmly reject them.”8

The second came from Shulin, viceroy of Jiangxi and Jiangsu, and reached Peking on October 18: “All the military units are ready. I have secretly ordered the authorities to strike an impassively severe demeanor, the better to dissuade the Barbarians from lingering. I will not receive the envoy.”9

Everything was in place for the expulsion of these irksome intruders. In Paris things moved even more expeditiously. Marie Antoinette’s trial began on October 10. On the sixteenth she mounted the scaffold of the guillotine.

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