Page:Tseng Kuo Fan and the Taiping Rebellion.djvu/225

Rh still remained in the hands of the insurgents. The road to the province of Fukien was also open.

Outside of Kiangsi the Taiping cause did not make much headway during 1857, partly because of Shi Ta-k'ai's absence in Kiangsi and elsewhere, and partly because the leadership in Nanking was largely in the incompetent hands of the T'ienwang's family. In Anhui the rebels were extremely active, being there joined by the Nien-fei from Honan, which made it necessary to keep a large army under Imperial Commissioner Sheng Pao and General Yuan Chia-san, to hold the boundaries between Honan and Anhui. Near Nanking, also, there was some fighting which resulted in victory to the imperialists; Ho Chun capturing Yangchow on December 27, while Tehsinga captured Kwachow about the same time. The capture of Chinkiang by Chang Kuo-liang was also an achievement that brought encouragement to the loyalists.

All these successes were encouraging, to be sure. But to Tsêng Kuo-fan, about to emerge from retirement, something better now seemed necessary than the former haphazard methods of supplying the forces he led. He again assured the government how terribly each move of his had been hampered by the obstacles which confronted him at every turn, and suggested that a bureau be organised — for which he submitted a list of names — to raise the necessary supplies and money for his armies, that he might be free to give himself without other worries to purely military matters. Such a bureau should be under unified control, with branches in Hunan, Hupeh, and Kiangsi. What that organisation failed to supply