Page:Tseng Kuo Fan and the Taiping Rebellion.djvu/24

6 'drunken swab. That this picture must be somewhat modified to admit some excellent Tartar generals and brave soldiers, Parker himself confesses, but contends that his indictment is true in the main.

We can, indeed, scarcely exaggerate their uselessness, not only as a fighting force, but even as a defensive arm. The most striking proof of their degeneracy is found in the behavior of the Manchus when the Taipings took Nanking in 1853. The garrison of paid Manchu forces at that place amounted to 5,106, indicating a total adult population of twenty or thirty thousand. The Taipings stormed the outer walls and met with some resistance from Chinese soldiers, after which they proceeded to attack the Manchus in the Tartar city within. Of this attack Meadows records:

These Manchus had to fight for all that is dear to man, for the Imperial family which had always treated them well, for the honour of their nation, for their own lives and for the lives of their wives and children. This they well knew, the Heavenly Prince having openly declared the first duty of his mission to be their extermination. It might have been expected, therefore, that they would have made a desperate fight in self-defense, yet they did not strike a blow. It would seem as if the irresistible progress and inveterate enmity of the insurgents had bereft them of all