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They haggled for nigh a month as they traveled toward Peking. The Chinese grew testier. So did the British—they disparaged shark's-fin soup, complained of smelly peasants (like "putrefying garlic on a much-used blanket"), ridiculed the native opera ("the instrumental music, from its resemblance to the bagpipes, might be tolerated by Scotchmen; to others it was detestable"). Then, as they neared the walls of Peking, the troubled mandarins agreed that the troublesome ambassador might kneel before the Emperor on one knee and bow three times, repeating this homage thrice. The Canton trade, the British told themselves, was not worth any more appeasement.
Disrespectful. Perhaps it was a false agreement, as the Britons later suspected.
On the night his mission reached the capital, tired and travel-stained, the ambassador received an abrupt summons from Emperor Chia Ch'ing: appear immediately at the imperial residence. Amherst stood on his dignity and refused, pleading first fatigue, then illness. The Emperor promptly sent a court physician who reported back that the Briton was malingering.
Angrily, Chia Ch'ing ordered the mission to turn home without an audience.
So it was done. As Amherst withdrew from Peking, the snub was subtly underscored. In the streets he passed a beggar, who rose up deferentially. Amherst's mandarin escort instantly commanded the beggar to sit down again—"the British ambassador," dolefully observed his secretary, "not being now considered deserving respect even from the lowest class of society."