Page:Eminent Chinese Of The Ch’ing Period - Hummel - 1943 - Vol. 1.pdf/471

Rh ters, literary works, and miscellaneous notes concerning his life as an official. These notes, which bear the separate title, 甲癸夢痕記 Chia kuei mêng-hên chi, contain some honest and revealing descriptions of the life of officials in his day.

Li Huan is now remembered chiefly for having edited a massive and very valuable collection of classified biographies of famous men of the Ch‘ing period, entitled 國朝耆獻類徵 Kuo-ch'ao ch'i-hsien lei-chêng. It consists of 484 chüan of major biographies, and 204 chüan giving the lives of princes of the Imperial Clan and of Mongols. In addition there is a table-of-contents in 20 chüan, an index in 10 chüan, a list of persons who have identical names, in 1 chüan, and an introduction in 1 chüan—making a total of 720 chüan in 294 volumes. Li drew his materials from many sources—official and private biographies, epitaphs, inscriptions on tombstones, miscellaneous notes, literary collections, etc. He began the compilation in 1867 when he was in Hunan; continued to work on it during the eighteen-seventies when he resided at Hangchow; and started the printing in 1884 after he returned to Hunan and had lost his eyesight. Despite these handicaps, he made alterations and additions while the printing was going on, and finally brought the work to completion in 1890. He then added a collection of biographies of women of the Ch'ing period, entitled Kuo-ch'ao hsien-yüan (賢媛) lei-chêng, 12 chüan, printed in 1891, the year of his death.

[1/399/1a; 2/42/12b; 5/24/23b; 7/25/17b; 5/38/10a; Li Wên-kung kung hsing-shu (行述); Pao-wei chai lei-kao; Hunan t'ung-chih (1885) 36/17a; Wang Hsien-ch'ien 王先謙, 虛受堂詩集 Hsü-shou t'ang shih-chi 14/18b;, Yang-chih shu-nu wên-chi, 16/19b.]

2em

 LI Hsiu-ch'êng 李秀成 (original ming 以文), d. Aug. 7, 1864, age 40, commander-in-chief in the Taiping Rebellion, was a native of T'êng-hsien, Kwangsi. He was born in a poor family which eked out a precarious livelihood on mountain land. Between the ages of eight and ten (sui) he was taught by his maternal uncle to read, but thereafter assisted his parents in making a living. In 1850 began his rebellion in Li Hsiu-ch'êng's native province. When at the age of twenty-six or twenty-seven (sui) Li heard that Hung was preaching a new doctrine, the extreme poverty of his family was his sole incentive for leaving home and joining the rebel chief, Wei Ch'ang-hui (see under ) when Wei was stationed in a neighboring village. As the insurgent movement advanced from Kwangsi to Hunan and on to Kiangsu, Li Hsiu-ch'êng was only a common soldier in the army, but he did not abate his study of the Classics and histories even though such works were prohibited by the Taiping leaders. After the taking of Nanking (March 19, 1853), he became head of a battalion. In November 1853 he served as an officer under the Assistant King,, in Anhwei, and in 1854 under the minister of state, Hu I-kuang (see under ), in the attack on Lu-chou, Anhwei. As a reward he was made twentieth commander (1854).

Li Hsiu-ch'êng rose to power because of the abilities he displayed in a crisis. When murderous internal dissention overtook the Taipings (1856, see under ), the Eastern King, and the Northern King, Wei Ch'ang-hui and thousands of their adherents were killed. Equally disturbing was the fact that the Assistant King, Shih Ta-k'ai, led an enormous number of soldiers from Nanking to wage a private campaign in southwest China (see under ). A search was then made for capable leaders, with the result that the eighteenth commander,, the twentieth commander, Li Hsiu-ch'êng, and the minister of state, Mêng Tê-ên 蒙得恩 (d. 1861 or 1862), were recommended to the Celestial King, Hung Hsiu-ch'üan, to take charge of military affairs. Mêng Tê-ên, a native of Kuei-p'ing, Kwangsi, was later made Tsan-wang 贊王, or Prince Tsan, and finally became generalissimo—Ch'ên Yü-ch'êng and Li Hsiu-ch'êng being his assistants. The Celestial King's brothers, Hung Jên-fa and Hung Jên-ta (see under ) were entrusted with state affairs. Soon after his appointment, Li Hsiu-ch'êng was ordered to guard the city of T'ung-ch'êng, Anhwei, and to strengthen the defenses of that province. He invited a large number of Nien banditti under Chang Lo-hsing (see under ) to join the Taipings, thus stabilizing for a time the insurgents' position in Anhwei.

In 1857 Li Hsiu-ch'êng was recalled to Nanking to be made marquis with the designation, Ho-ch'êng 合成. He remained at the capital in order to attempt reform in the government. At this time the Celestial King's brothers con- 459