Anyway, I thought his impressions of the Chinese made sense because they are from his point of view. If the books weren't from his extremely British and somewhat (understandably, since they want to separate him from Temeraire) resentful perspective, I think the portrayal might have bothered me.

I very much agree with this. Really, I mentioned the borderline sort of situation to emphasize the emerging trend, not because I felt it was really out of line at the time. It's really the African Tribespeople that get the unacceptable portrayal in book 4.