The account offers rich insights into the beginnings of the British Imperialism in China and thus makes it an important primary source for the historiography of Sino-Western relations. There is an academic dispute whether the account marks a breaking point in British-Chinese dynamics or should be interpreted as a sign for a slow and complex divergence.

While the political and economical ambitions of the embassy failed, the account by Staunton brought back detailed descriptions and observations on the Chinese culture that were received with curiosity in the West and led to the commercial success of the book and the publication of several translations and subsequent writings on the Macartney Mission.--Wikipedia, 2018.