British sailors in the garden of a temple at Liu Chiu

In the early nineteenth century, Imperial China's fanatical determination to remain blissfully ignorant and totally misinformed about every other country in the world was regarded with wonder and bewilderment by contemporary Europe. This extreme chauvinistic isolation seemed inexplicable in the age of reason and discovery. The empire's arrogant philosophy was simple: everything that Imperial China did not want to be true must be untrue.

All other countries were treated as vassal states. When Lord Macartney went to Peking (Beijing) in 1792 as the envoy of the British king George III, this was made absolutely clear. A banner was paraded before him with the words “Tribute embassy from red barbarians” painted on it. The idea that China should treat any other nation as an equal was heresy.

In 1816, Great Britain sent a second embassy to China under Lord Amherst. The British rather naively assumed that because they had emerged from the Napoleonic Wars as the world's most powerful nation, China would treat the Amherst embassy with a certain amount of respect. This turned out to be wishful thinking.

Whilst Lord Amherst was performing his diplomatic business in Peking, the tiny British squadron that had conveyed him to Canton (Guangzhou) took the opportunity to survey the almost uncharted China Seas. Captain Sir Murray Maxwell was the commodore of the squadron of four ships: the frigate HMS Alceste, the 10-gun brig HMS Lyra commanded by Captain Basil Hall, and two survey vessels, the Discovery and the Investigator. These survey ships, on loan from Bombay Marine, were under the command of Captain Daniel Ross, the Honourable East India Company's Marine Surveyor General.

The small fleet assembled in Hong Kong where Chief Medical Officer Clarke Abel drew a delightful sketch of Waterfall Bay. The spot is now overlooked by the massive Wah Fu Estate in the southern part of Hong Kong Island. Basil Hall described the squadron as being surrounded by a wall of islands and mountains: “It seemed as if the ships had been transported by some magical process to the centre of a solitary lake, lying in the bosom of a Highland glen.”

Hong Kong was a notorious pirate stronghold. At about midnight, all hell broke loose as several hundred small boats descended on the tiny fleet. On the bows of each sampan were three or four men waving flaming torches, yelling at the tops of their voices and banging gongs.

Fortunately, the nervous British sailors did not open fire. It was not a pirate attack. The Chinese were fishermen noisily plying their humble trade. It seems that their technique was to create a “tumultuous uproar” and drive the frightened fish into cunningly placed nets.

Discovery Bay on Lantau Island was probably named after Ross's ship Discovery when he made a survey of that island. The tiny fleet had been divided into two, and Sir Murray and Basil Hall set out to explore the waters of northern China. It was some time before they discovered that their so-called interpreter was a con man who could neither read nor write Chinese characters and spoke only the unintelligible Cantonese dialect. By then it was too late to turn back.

Basil Hall attempted to save the situation by inventing what he called “Cherry Brandy Diplomacy”. He explained: “Cherry brandy, a species of liquor adapted to the taste of all countries, is a universal bribe amongst rude as well as civilised nations.” He continues by stating that it is “useful on many occasions, when graver lessons fail.”

They actually reached Korea. Their next stop was the Kingdom of Liu Chiu where Cherry Brandy Diplomacy was heartily reciprocated by Sake Diplomacy. In recent times, there has been a dispute for some years over the sovereignty of the kingdom's site. I recommend that those involved read this column and realise that the best answer may simply be a gigantic splash of Cherry Brandy Diplomacy.