Page:Tseng Kuo Fan and the Taiping Rebellion.djvu/219

Rh by the reports that the rebels in the four prefectures south of Nanchang were building boats in the inland rivers and creeks expecting to take advantage of the summer freshets to sail down to the attack of Nanchang. They did come eventually, only to be defeated by the flotilla.

But these reinforcing armies called for more financial adjustments which drove Tsêng and the governor to the verge of despair. They therefore asked that the Hunan and Hupeh armies before Shuichow be paid by securing a monthly appropriation of thirty thousand taels from Shansi and Shensi, two northern provinces far removed from the scene of hostilities.

Now came another blow. Tsêng had gone off to inspect the army at Shuichow, when news came of a great disaster to the army laying siege to Fuchow in eastern Kiangsi. This army had sustained many attacks, having taken part in some fifty-two engagements without defeat. This city was a strategic center on which the power to hold Jaochow along the lake and Kwanghsin toward Chekiang depended; it was on the road over which supplies must pass. On the fifteenth of October the rebels from within made a sortie and, aided by relieving forces, defeated the imperialists and took their camp, throwing them into a panic. They scattered and made their way back to Nanchang, where they once more threw the provincial capital into a panic and caused great alarm in Kwanghsin and Kiench'ang in eastern Kiangsi. It therefore became necessary for Tsêng to hurry back in order to calm the populace and to take the requisite steps for defending Kwanghsin.

On the twenty-second of November Kiench'ang saw the attack upon the imperialist camp by rebels and the